<p>I would love to know more from parents or students about their study abroad programs. One D is planning on attending fall in the DIS program in Copenhagen. She is majoring in Environmental Studies and this seems like a particularly good fit. The other D is considering either the SU Florence program or the BU Padua program. She is a Cog Sci/Film major with some college Italian. She is interested in a cultural immersion. She is not interested in partying with other Americans.
If there were some other program in English that was particularly compelling, she would definitely consider it. Are there any places where the classes are particularly good? Any resources to find past attendees? Any ideas?</p>
1 Like
<p>Odessagirl went abroad January last year for spring semester. The program was called BCA, which I believe is Brethern College Abroad or something like that. It was run very, very smoothly. She was in Cheltenham, England. She attended University of Gloucestershire, is a History/Ed major. The tuition, etc., cost almost exactly what we paid for a regular semester at her college in PA. We did give her tons of money to travel, though. The grading was very different - perhaps 2 grades for the entire semester in a class or two.</p>
1 Like
<p>D studied at University of Edinburgh her fall semester junior year. She absolutely loved it. She went through Butler University’s study abroad program. She did not want to go on a school-sponsored study abroad program - she wanted to meet a lot of people from all over, which this program allowed her to do. The Scottish system of grading is very different, and it was a challenge - but there were so many great things about it. She majored in Medicine, Health, and Society … she was able to study European health care delivery systems. We paid her normal tuition at Vanderbilt, and we had to pay for airfare & living expenses … which added up to less than a semester of room & board at Vandy. Her good friend studied in Italy with Vandy’s study abroad program, and she liked that very much.</p>
1 Like
<p>My D just finished a semester in Zanzibar through SIT. She LOVED her experience. She is also an Environmental Studies major. I’ll ask her if she knows anything about the program your D is considering.</p>
1 Like
<p>My son has done two study abroad programs so far and will do another one in the spring. They are all located in Jordan. The first one was run by SIT and did not, in our opinion live up to expectation. The level of Arabic instruction was well below what he’d gotten at Tufts. He got mostly a (much needed for him) review of what he was already supposed to know, but very little new material. There were some fun field trips. The main issue was that the placement with local families was terrible. His first family had a British parent and they listened to English speaking TV all day. The second family put him in a separate apartment and did not let him socialize with the family at all and fed him nothing but hummus or jam and pita bread. Apparently the school year programs have better family placements, but still, he’d really hoped to get an immersion experience. One problem he said, was cultural, young men can’t interact with female family members in strict Muslim culture, so the girls in the program actually had a better experience except for the one older man who was housed with an Imam.</p>
<p>The second experience with CET Academic programs was somewhat better, but still far from perfect. This time he was supposed to share an apartment with a university student. Unfortunately due to much red tape at the University, the placements didn’t actually happen until very late in the semester at which point he was swamped with work. This program used to be in Syria, and the teachers are Syrian, which may account for some of the issues. The teachers in this program did not speak English and perhaps no foreign language at all, which meant that sometimes grammar was presented in ways that were unnecessarily obscure for English speakers. (Note that everyone is expected to have at least two years under the belt and have the basics down.) My son felt they didn’t really understand that you have to practice a concept a lot before you really can use it. This program required a language pledge. For some reason the girls in the program broke the pledge after a week, but the boys kept it up. When we picked up my son in December it was clear he was speaking comfortably. He learned the local dialect as well as Modern Standard Arabic and he took a history course in Arabic, which he found (especially at first) well beyond his capability. The program included language partners from the university, my son went and played backgammon with the locals at cafes, and generally made an effort not to just socialize with Americans. It was a very small program (9 at first, 2 left after Israel and Gaza started throwing shells at each other.) The program was located in a decided untouristic city which helped. Interestingly, despite the immersion experience, this program also puts him a chapter or two behind Tufts pace as far as grammar is concerned, but he probably learned much more vocabulary especially the local dialect. </p>
<p>His next program is CIEE Diplomacy and Policy Studies located in Amman. It doesn’t have a language pledge, but I believe that my son’s Arabic is now strong enough that he won’t be tempted to speak a lot of English. It includes an internship in a local NGA or Jordanian government agency. We’ll see how it turns out.</p>
<p>I think if you want an immersion experience you need to look for programs that place you families or local students. An international dorm will use English as the lingua franca, and living with Americans is the worst of all. My son had hoped to do volunteer work on weekends, but found that there were a lot of field trips that he didn’t want to miss out on. It was hard to find opportunities to do things with locals, but from experience, I can tell you that it can be done. Going to church, joining a singing group, taking an exercise class, taking evening adult ed art classes are all things I, or friends of mine have done, to get out of the bubble of being around foreign students.</p>
1 Like
<p>My son just got back from the DIS program in Copenhagen. He had a terrific time. He did Bio Medicine as his core program. Stayed with a host family who were wonderful to him. We visited and had a great time with them as well (and have invited them to stay with us next year). I thought they had a good combination of reasonable academics (although much easier than his home university), good social activities and travel breaks. My older son did the Stanford program in Florence, and had a good experience, but frankly I think it was more limited since it was all Stanford students. He wasn’t nearly as immersed in the culture. Lived with an Italian family who spoke no English. Should have helped his Italian, but the result was that he didn’t bond the way my younger son did with his Danish family. I liked that my son at DIS met students from a great variety of colleges. </p>
<p>As to other programs…your D’s college should have a list of approved programs with their study abroad office if she doesn’t want to do one of their own programs. My son found DIS through Brown’s approved list and found other students to talk to who had attended previously. Maybe your D’s study abroad office would have a list of prior students who have been on those programs?</p>
1 Like
<p>One of my son’s complaints about Tufts is that they don’t have any Arabic programs of their own and they haven’t preapproved some of the better programs. He did manage to get the fall program approved by the Arabic teachers, but has had no luck getting any IR profs to approve any of the Arabic culture and history courses he’s taken, so he’s going to end up having to count them as electives. It’s making his education less well rounded instead of more well rounded since he’s going to end up doubling up unnecessarily on IR type courses. Do read reviews of programs and talk to other students. Though it doesn’t always help. The first program my son did is much better during the school year than it is during the summer. He’s still astounded though how many students come over and really seem to have no interest in experiencing Arabic culture and actually learning Arabic.</p>
1 Like
<p>My son will be leaving in two weeks for the DIS program in Copenhagen. After a not very good experience with a home stay in Germany, he has requested to stay in a collegium but will not hear about his housing status until next week. He has a double major at Lafayette: film & media studies and history. I think that he is pretty realistic about how limited his learning of the Danish language will be in just 4 months after taking German for 13 years. One of his travel weeks is to Prague where he is hoping to reconnect with an exchange student who lived with his best friend here in Pittsburgh.</p>
1 Like
<p>My son is going to Copenhagen with DIS next fall. He wants to stay at a Folkehojskole. His core program is Sustainability in Europe. I’d appreciate any advice, especially in regards to optional study tours.</p>
1 Like
<p>@Washmother: My son didn’t do any optional study tours, but he heard nothing but good things about all of them. He especially regrets not doing the Southern France culinary tour. I would advise your son to book early. A lot of the tours were booked up (including Southern France) by the time my son decided to look more closely at them. Just remember to find out which travel week your core program is traveling. My son traveled the first travel week with his core (to Edinburgh), but some traveled the second break. The second travel week we came to visit and he came with us to Stockholm and Berlin (it was terrific) and the last travel week he visited Norway and then a friend studying in Amsterdam. I did find that a lot of my son’s friends from high school were in Europe on various study abroad programs so he had choices to visit. </p>
<p>If you want to visit him, PM me and I can give you some suggestions. Berlin and Stockholm were inexpensive and quick flights. We hadn’t originally planned to go (the expense) but found we were able to use points for our hotels and airfare was relatively inexpensive in October. </p>
<p>One thing I will warn about DIS is that some of the housing is quite far away. My son was with a host family in a suburb only 30 minutes by train, but some people had over an hour commute. You could indicate on your housing form if you have a preference. They also allowed some people to switch housing if there was a problem.</p>
1 Like