<p>Could some of those who have gone this route describe what kind of experiences their kids had?</p>
<p>My S1 graduated in November and had a 9 month Gap year.</p>
<p>First, he went to Africa with madventurers out of the UK, <a href="http://www.madventurers.com%5B/url%5D">www.madventurers.com</a>. S1 built a school in a village in tanzania for six weeks and then did a six week low budget safari through East Africa. LOVED the whole deal. Great outfit.</p>
<p>Then he went to London to study digital animation at ridley Scott's animation facility, escape studios. <a href="http://www.escapestudios.co.uk%5B/url%5D">www.escapestudios.co.uk</a>. He did a twelve week course of Maya programming. During the course, filled with brilliant global talent btw, S1 decided that he wouldn't pursue computer anything as a career. Loved London.</p>
<p>Finally, he went to Bejing to do an immersive mandarin course with CET academics, <a href="http://www.cetacademicprograms.com%5B/url%5D">www.cetacademicprograms.com</a>. That is an Aemrican program and S1 went again this past summer. His Chinese and calligraphy are great. I thought his exam calligraphy had been done by computer. He went to a party on the Great Wall for 6500 kids this past summer. Beijing was fascinating, fun and difficult at the same time.</p>
<p>As the Gap Year approached, I gave him a list of 100 things he could do. There were work options on there, LOL, but we did encourage him to travel (travelling opportunities get curtailed in the real world).</p>
<p>There was one thing on the list of things he couldn't do:</p>
<p>Live at home.</p>
<p>He picked visit Africa, digital animation and Chinese. From there, I sorted out programs and timing and airfares via the internet and then, oh yeah, got out my credit card. ;)</p>
<p>He made some great friends in the year, got college credit for the chinese and turned himself into a confident traveller. It was all good.</p>
<p>Search some of the threads started by Andi- her son is currently doing a gap year as a result of an admissions disaster. He has put together an interesting and varied set of activities, including a course at MIT.
Also- I know a number of kids who do a PG (postgrad) year at a boarding school to beef up their academics and/or athletics and gain some maturity. Good schools for PG years are not just at the Exeter/Andover level.</p>
<p>cheers: if you don 't mind my asking, can you give an idea of how much a year like that costs? It looks like it'd be more than a year or two of college!</p>
<p>my daughter who always has been young for her age- took a gap year.
She spent it volunteering with CityYear, in our city ( Seattle) her primary work was with a 5th grade class in a school that has a high percentage of homeless students. She also took Cisco training ( computers) and taught inner city high school students how to use the web for research and to write resumes. This was a 9 month process- at the end she went to the convention in Chicago and met President Clinton and John McCain. ( she also earned an education stipend which she can put towards school loans)
Friends have taken gapyears with leapnow, and gotten mountain search and rescue certification, divemasters off the Great barrier Reef and worked on a sheep station in Australia.
One even spent several years teaching english in Micronesia</p>
<p>Africa was surprisingly reasonable, say $4k for the program and safari plus airfare.</p>
<p>escape studios is expensive, say $15 for a 12 week course, plus airfare plus living costs of $6K. If you were an adept student, however, you could earn $50 per hour at the end of that course--as many grads did. (That's $100k per year if one worked full time). Maya programmers are in hot hot demand.</p>
<p>CET is $5k all inclusive for 12 week program but the student gets a full year of credit at university--a SAVINGS of $5k for the same course at private university ($40K/yr--$10k per full year course).</p>
<p>Total costs, including cheapo airfares, were something like $36K--less $5k savings would be $31K. </p>
<p>Still a heafty discount on the private university fees we currently pay! LOL.</p>
<p>My son is one month into his gap year. He is spending 4 months in the a first term at The Aegean Center for the Fine Arts (<a href="http://www.aegeancenter.org/frontpage.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.aegeancenter.org/frontpage.htm</a>) and having an amazing experience. First month is intensive art history study in Italy and then 3 months of studio work in Greece. Several subject choices and apparently amazing level of instruction (Cost is $8000 Euros and includes housing, program travel and some meals. Airfare and food/laundry in last 3 months are additional) There is a second term (March to June, $7000 Euros), college credit available. (also some financial aid available)</p>
<p>I do not know yet if he will opt for the second term--but even if he does it will be less than a year at a LAC--and I am already certain that he will now be going off to his first year far better prepared to make good use of the investment in tuition. </p>
<p>There are some good resources for helping plan a gap year and a seemingly unlimited range of choices. Many colleges seem to endorse taking a year.</p>
<p>My son didnt take a gap year, but many of his European friends do, I think because of the different application process and schedule.</p>
<p>The most effective gap years seem to be those that are split into different segments. Under the American system, the year is actually 15-16 months from high school graduation until the time that the student would start college, so its easier to break it into 2 or 3 different activities. For example a boy we know did a language program in Beijing, volunteered at the Olympics in a minimum wage type job and then interned in his hometown newspaper.</p>
<p>I think if you group activities by different motivations you can come up with a good list of options in each one:
Education and the Arts at home or overseas
Community Service/Volunteer Work/Internship
Adventure travel / outdoorsy activities
Menial job to pay for all of this</p>
<p>There are many organizations that cater to gap years and will work with the student to design one or more activities. Of course, they get paid for this. Although the gap year is an excellent maturity builder in itself, it also requires a fair amount of initiative to start with. If the student is at a loss at the idea of striking out on his/her own then hooking up with an organized program with a group of kids can be easier.</p>
<p>You also have to take in consideration the college application process. If the student goes through the usual process senior year and then defers then its quite simple. If, on the other hand, s/he wants to use the gap year experience to enhance his/her chance of admissions, then the activities have to be scheduled around the application timing. E.g., its hard to manage an admissions campaign if youre on a mountain in Tibet. If you want to use your Tibetan experience on your application it has to be at the start of your gap year.</p>
<p>As far as cost goes, it can be anything and everything as airfares and living expenses are quite variable. The more you rely on outsiders to help you with the organization, the more it costs. Believe it or not, in a lot of cases you have to PAY to volunteer.</p>
<p>In my Ss case, his African 'fees' went toward buying the building materials for the school building they built. He also paid 'rent' to the African farmer who provided room and board.</p>
<p>He did not get paid for his labor--although his African co-workers gave them the pleasure of a solid thrashing in the after-work soccer games.</p>
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My son didnt take a gap year, but many of his European friends do, I think because of the different application process and schedule.
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<p>This is so true. I am a student at Oxford, England and I am one of very very few who didn't take a gap year! It's the normal thing to do here. Lot's of people go to Australia or New Zealand for a year of work experience and backpacking. It is easy to get a work visa for a year there if you are under 30. There are lots of companies which arrange gap year trips. Also it's popular in the UK to do internships and work placements so there are companies which arrange this too. (I don't know about the US because I haven't lived there in a long time.) There is some scheme called "year in industry" which is a free UK government thing to get school leavers a work placement in science and engineering. I'm a biology PhD student and about half my fellow students seem to have done amazing placements at AstraZeneca and similar.</p>
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One even spent several years teaching english in Micronesia
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Emeraldkity, I think I've heard of this program, but I was under the impression that it required a bachelor's degree. Did the friend have one, or was he or she able to find a way around this?</p>
<p>I did a gap year before going to university - I spent a year in China teaching English. It was fantastic - I worked during the school semesters to earn money, and then travelled during the holidays. The only cost that the teaching pay did not cover was the flights, which came to about £400. This website is a good resource: <a href="http://www.gapyear.com%5B/url%5D">www.gapyear.com</a></p>
<p>A friend of mine went to Japan with YFU - he spent a year studying in a Japanese school (did all the lessons, exams, everything), and lived with a Japanese family. He'd never learned any Japanese before he went - he came basically fluent. <a href="http://www.yfu.org%5B/url%5D">http://www.yfu.org</a></p>
<p>Also, try checking at the embassies of the countries your S/D may be interested in going to - they often have scholarships and programmes available that he/she may be interested in.</p>
<p>got any more suggestion on what to do?</p>
<p>sorry.. got nay suggestions on what skill I can learn so that it helps me on campus to earn too?</p>