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Does Anyone Regret Studying Abroad?

tintinisahottie said:
Talking with some of my friends during their study abroad on Skype, and then a few months after, people definitely only remember the awesome moments of their study abroad and forget about the sucky parts, hence study abroad always sounding like the single most perfect experience of all time
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Annette syndrome
 
I spent almost all the money I had and it was the best time of my entire life. I didn't go through Wake. I did two nights of work the entire semester.
 
With the internet, there's really no excuse for not going abroad if you can afford it. I was afraid I would miss something back in my day and that was ridiculous looking back.
 
I studied abroad in Salamanca in Spring of '07 after going to every Wake Football game for the '06 season. It was a magical nine months
 
Yeah I went spring 06 so missed the first year post-CP. Then came back and got to see our OB season win-win. Was nervous when signing up I would miss awesomeness from CP's jr season, but we all know how that worked out. So I went amd enjoyed the hell out of my semester in Spain.
 
TR1982 said:
Can you blame them? Who wants to spend a semester on a boat taking classes?
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I had a friend who did Semester at Sea and talked about it non-fucking-stop. It was apparently the best thing ever.
 
What % of wake students go abroad. I never really considered doing it when I was there, don't think the thought crossed my mind, probably mainly because none of my friends did or anything. Did business majors not really do it?
 
Going through Wake is basically the same tuition-wise as a semester in Winston, not counting flights and day-to-day expenses or other travel.

I went through Wake and really enjoyed the experience. Most people I met studying abroad in Spain went through some other program and basically did nothing school-wise their entire semester. Wake trains professors at the universities to teach a WF style rigorous course -- Ours in Spain were pretty difficult, but it felt like the work was rewarding. I was still able to party as much as anyone else I ran into, so the workload didn't really take away from that aspect.

Tintin's right, we do have a tendency to forget some of the parts that sucked about it, but the good parts of the experience really are that good.
 
All of my friends in college (not Wake) went abroad. Argentina, Greece, Germany, France, Italy, etc. I really regret it in hindsight. If anything, then it was kind of a drag to be one of maybe five juniors in dorms first semester. :rulz:
 
Strickland33 said:
All of my friends in college (not Wake) went abroad. Argentina, Greece, Germany, France, Italy, etc. I really regret it in hindsight. If anything, then it was kind of a drag to be one of maybe five juniors in dorms first semester. :rulz:
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Shoot if that was 1st semester junior year I wouldn't have traded all the Mario Kart and Conkers Bad Fur day for anything in the world, probably my most fun semester.
 
There is a tendency to remember the good parts of studying abroad, but there's also a tendency to remember the good parts about any memory if, on balance, you thought it was good. When you're thinking back to the acc championship semester, no one will remember the days that it rained, you got muddy red clay all over your rug, and your shoes got drenched (for example).

But, more to the point of the thread, living in another country and culture for the first time is such a life changing experience that it's really hard to regret it. It changes the way you see yourself and the US in a way that going on vacation abroad can approximate, but never really duplicate. On the other hand, studying (or living) abroad for the second (or third or fourth) time likely will be a more mixed experience. At that point, you've already gotten all the outside-the-US benefits from the first time, so it's more or less about the benefits that the country you pick can provide weighed against the annoyances of everyday life there.
 
WFU03 said:
There is a tendency to remember the good parts of studying abroad, but there's also a tendency to remember the good parts about any memory if, on balance, you thought it was good. When you're thinking back to the acc championship semester, no one will remember the days that it rained, you got muddy red clay all over your rug, and your shoes got drenched (for example).

But, more to the point of the thread, living in another country and culture for the first time is such a life changing experience that it's really hard to regret it. It changes the way you see yourself and the US in a way that going on vacation abroad can approximate, but never really duplicate. On the other hand, studying (or living) abroad for the second (or third or fourth) time likely will be a more mixed experience. At that point, you've already gotten all the outside-the-US benefits from the first time, so it's more or less about the benefits that the country you pick can provide weighed against the annoyances of everyday life there.
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+1
 
Question: If everyone studied abroad in Canada or Mexico I imagine people wouldn't consider it to be the most amazing experience of their life. Why does europe tend to evoke a different reaction?
 
CaptainAwesome said:
not so much the tution. more so the flights and living expenses and what not. most of my degree was paid for with scholarships or loans (both my own and my parents took out one) so any money i would have saved in tution would have just been saved on loans. and we didn't have the money to actually send me anywhere
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If I remember correctly, almost every student at Wake is eligible for a $1000 scholarship to help with costs.
 
palmab03 said:
Question: If everyone studied abroad in Canada or Mexico I imagine people wouldn't consider it to be the most amazing experience of their life. Why does europe tend to evoke a different reaction?
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I'm not sure I agree with your premise. Canada might be too similar to the US to warrant such praise, but Mexico surely isn't. And it isn't just Europe that people say this about. I've talked to people who studied abroad in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Australia, Japan, China, etc. and almost everyone says it. The common factor is not Europe, but living outside the US bubble (which is why Canada might or might not work).
 
I agree with a lot of what was said on here. I was nervous about signing up for study abroad at first because I was afraid to miss a semester back at Wake, but I wouldn't trade it for anything. I was also really glad I branched out from the Wake programs (went to Florence through UNC, but our program shared classes with Syracuse, BC, and some others). There were a couple Wake kids in my program, but I also made some awesome friends, who I am still close with, from other schools, and had a less rigorous course load for a semester (IIRC my classes began Monday around noon and ended Wednesday afternoon, so I frequently hopped an overnight train Wednesday night and returned to Florence Monday morning for some pretty awesome long weekend trips).

The opportunity to live within another culture, but also to travel to many other cities and countries was something I will pretty much never have the opportunity to do again (unless I happen to win the lottery and can take a long leave of absence from work). Yes I missed some things that happened that semester (luckily not the best football season ever), but I still had 3.5 awesome semesters to enjoy Wake as well. Of course there were negatives from the experience, but even remembering those, they in no way outweigh the positives.

If you can afford it (my tuition was A LOT cheaper through UNC, but there are added costs of flights living, traveling, etc), I couldn't recommend anything more during college. If you really don't want to miss a semester, definitely look into a summer program or Eurotour (does Wake still do Eurotour?). I actually signed up for Eurotour before I knew I was going abroad, so I had a sweet 5 week trip to 11 cities the summer before my semester abroad and got to test out where I wanted to go back to.
 
They did euro tour as of 2007. I was working in Denmark that summer and met a bunch of wake friends a couple of nights as they passed through.
 
I hugely regret NOT studying abroad. I fucked around too much early on and had to make up ground academically which, combined with travel abroad restrictions for ROTC, meant that I missed my window to go.
 
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