Study Abroad--Parent and Student Goals

[irprof]

I'm working on revitalizing my university's study abroad program. I haven't been on this board for many years but I thought this would be a useful place to ask parents what they and their children are looking for in a study abroad experience and how a school should present this information on their website.

In return I'd be happy to answer any parent questions about study abroad from a director perspective.

[Lilaclady]

I think some of the things I am interested in are: costs- approximate total cost so I can know if it is feasible, classes they will be taking and approximate level- we found most study abroad are geared  towards 2nd year courses so if you already took those, you don’t have much options. 
Age limits- we did not find out that my dd’s college had a age limit of 18 on study abroad until she went for the new student orientation. It would have been helpful

to know before. 

[kokotg]

I would have loved to see more transparency/detail about how financial aid works for study abroad. All we could find in advance were fairly vague assurances that "your FA travels with you." In fact, it turned out his financial aid was adjusted so that we paid pretty much exactly what we would have paid had he stayed at his home school (which in this case meant that his college saved money that semester, since the tuition for his study away program was so much less than theirs)....I wish they'd stated how that works in a more straightforward way somewhere. Maybe also a clearer breakdown of different kinds of programs (i.e. which ones are run by the college itself if any, which ones will be in a program with other US students vs. with students from the country where they're studying, etc) and what those differences mean to the student. 

[kokotg]

Oh, one thing that my son's college does that I think is interesting/helpful--his first semester junior year he lived in a specialty house that was just for study abroad students; so it was one group that would be studying away in the spring fall semester and then they switched out with a group that had studied away fall semester who moved in in spring. The idea was both that it got rid of some logistical issues (a lot of kids at his school live off campus junior year, but he opted not to largely because it would have meant dealing with finding subletters for the spring) and that you have a group with a common interest/experience living together. There were supposed to be monthly programs promoting internationalism and supporting each other and all that, but I don't know how much of that actually happened. But it was still a good experience for him.

[kirstenhill]

In looking at the information presented on the website at the university my daughter attends, we found the information very focused on study abroad programs that can meet program requirements in various majors.  It seems like most majors had some kind of affiliated program somewhere in the world, and they are proud that students can study abroad for a semester and stay on track in their program of study.  There are also a lot of very short cultural programs (2 weeks of cooking in Italy! A historical tour of Great Britain! etc).  But, my daughter wants to study abroad primarily for language learning purposes, probably for a summer.  She is minoring in a foreign language, and the first representatives from the study abroad office we talked to had no idea which program would be best for traveling to a country that speaks her target language and really developing better language skills.  I think she will get it figured out and there is probably something they can work out for her, but I was surprised that this information was not obvious and she will have to do more discussions with the study abroad office and maybe with the language department at her school to get this figured out.

[ScoutTN]

We are in the college app process now snd my daughter plans to major in a foreign language. Info about study abroad for language majors and for general broadening/variety of majors seem not to be coordinated anywhere. 
 

Seconding the need for VERY clear financial and course/credit transfer info. 

[irprof]

Thanks, this is all quite helpful.

I agree that finances can be confusing. I'm working with my financial aid office to develop a FAQ for the website that will at least address the most common questions.

To kokotg's point, I've seen some private schools profit to a significant degree on study abroad programing. A lot of good direct enroll programs are much cheaper than a semester at a normally priced private even when accounting for financial aid.

It is difficult to put up information about every possibility for every major and program--I'm trying to get students to fill out a questionnaire that helps me narrow down their interests so I can make suggestions that fit what they need, and we are small enough (3500 or so) that this is manageable. For example I had a student who wanted to study Indonesian which didn't fit with our usual menu of programs but wasn't hard to find options for.