I’ll admit that I’m not entirely sure how I want my study abroad experience to go. This summer, I’m hoping to go on the trip to Mexico and Brazil–I’m just putting the finishing touches on my application. I’m really hoping that I’m accepted for that opportunity. I think the length of the trip is perfect for my first real study abroad experience, and I hope that in Mexico, I might be able to practice Spanish a little. I’m also looking forward to the classes that Dean Grillot will be teaching throughout the trip.
After taking that trip, I think it might be easier to decide where I’d like to travel for my longer study abroad trip. If the language practice is too overwhelming on the shorter trip, I might decide against a more language-intense and immersive study abroad location. When I did my study abroad advising session, Ms. Vincent suggested that I consider places like Peru, Chile, Ecuador, or more rural parts of Spain if I wanted to really improve my Spanish language skills.
So, I’d consider myself about halfway decided. I do know what I want to do with my short study abroad experience, but not the long one. I know that in my study abroad experiences, I want to be surrounded by another language to some extent (not sure how immersive a program I’m looking for), I want to be fairly independent (so maybe that means living on my own or with a host family, but probably not with a large group of other American students), and I definitely want to be taking useful, relevant classes that will help me graduate on time. Because journalism classes I take abroad will almost certainly not transfer back, I think it would be beneficial for me to take either Spanish or computer science classes abroad to work towards completing my minors. Once I complete my summer study abroad trip, I think I’ll know a bit more about myself and what I want for round two of study abroad, and it’ll be a much easier decision then.
