Are College Study Abroad Programs Worth It?

I grew up in a small town in Michigan. It wasn’t tiny, like some one-stoplight Midwestern towns, but it was insulated enough that my father, a world traveler, encouraged me to study abroad in college. Unfortunately for him, I showed zero interest in experiencing other cultures, countries and languages. It wasn’t until my daughter turned 16 that I actually left North America and took her to Paris. The trip changed my view of traveling abroad. I fell in love with both the city and the country. So when our twins went to college, I strongly encouraged them to take advantage of their respective university’s study abroad programs. My daughter did just that this past summer. And the experience was life changing for her.

Benefits of Studying Abroad

While studying in another country may sound expensive, the tuition is often cheaper than a semester of classes taken in the States. Most importantly, it’s safer than if your child travels abroad alone since the college and the non-profit, the university’s partner that actually runs the program overseas, are responsible for your student’s safety. Meaning they teach students about the risks of the culture and the environment. This put my mind at ease since my daughter was studying on a remote island in the Caribbean.

Learning

First and foremost, your student will learn more in a few weeks or months in a foreign country, than in an entire year in the U.S. This is not meant to be a negative reflection on the university which he/she attends. It is simply an indication of how much your child will grow and mature by being on their own in a foreign environment.

Think about it. They leave the States without knowing any of their fellow students, are thrown into a learning setting they have never experienced and are often placed in less-than-comfortable living conditions. 

Our daughter lived in an open-air facility, in tropical heat and humidity, where she shared a room with eight other girls. They ate meals in an outdoor dining hall with mosquitoes and flies, washed their clothes in saltwater, and were only allowed one freshwater shower a week. Additionally, they attended four-hour lectures, twice a day, learning about the sea creatures who lived in the ocean, just steps away from their classrooms.

Seeing

Embracing a foreign culture is something that can only be experienced by living there. The center where our daughter studied literally doubled the island’s population when classes were in session. So the directors and students provided weekly outreach to the natives. One night they had all the women over to the center for dinner. Saturdays were spent teaching local kids how to snorkel or do arts and crafts.

As for the college students, well they snorkeled about five days a week. Seeking out all of the species in the ocean that they had learned about in the classroom. While it wasn’t all fun and games, there were tests on fish, oh so many fish, the participants in the program, who came from colleges all across the U.S., applied what they learned in the classroom to a real-life ocean environment.

Doing

Last, but not least, some study abroad programs offer either internship opportunities or the chance to participate in field research. Our daughter had the chance to go “turtle-ing.” This involved snorkeling in search of sea turtles for the graduate students to tag as part of a larger research study. She also participated in “sharking.” Not only was she able to pet sharks in the ocean, she also assisted grad students in tagging a total of 18 sharks in just four weeks. And she was afraid of sharks before this study abroad experience!

Disadvantages of Studying Abroad

Honestly the only downside that we found to studying abroad in college is that most universities don’t staff the overseas programs with their own professors and graduate assistants. Rather, it is common for colleges to partner with a non-profit, which specializes in setting up and executing the program. This organization handles everything from where your student will live to what classes they will take and what, if any, work experience they will gain while in a foreign country. Which means your college student is beholden to the non-profit for the experience. My best advice – research the non-profit partner extensively before committing to a study abroad program. If they aren’t forthcoming on the details, well in advance of the trip, find a different program.

Watching our daughter experience a college study abroad program was awe-inspiring. She rallied in living conditions that were less-than-ideal, which is pretty hard to experience in the States. More importantly, she lived and breathed an aspect of her major which she hadn’t yet explored. She learned that she absolutely loved field research, and as a result added a Conservation minor to her Zoology major. Best of all, she got to experience marine biology, her true passion, in a real-world setting. And our girl who used to be afraid of sharks? She left the experience wondering how she could get paid to research and tag some of the fiercest creatures in the ocean.

Photo by Rocky Scotty on Unsplash