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Does Anyone Regret Studying Abroad?

DoubleOrNothing said:
I regret not staying in one of the Wake Houses when I studied abroad. I did a wake program that had a homestay and then when I went with Wake abroad in grad school we stayed in the Flow House which was much better than being secluded in a house with host parents who I think were primarily housing me for the financial benefits of it.
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i go back and forth on the house thing. i wanted to do a spanish-speaking country so that kind of took care of the question for me at the time, but even if wake had a 'madrid house' i think i'd still have selected the salamanca homestay. i LOVED salamanca and felt like i was much more immersed in the culture than if i'd just surrounded myself with wake kids 24/7. my madre and abuela weren't the most personable, but they liked me (and liked me far more than the japanese boy there at the same time... poor guy). that said, i am jealous of the friendships the houses allow you to make. i definitely got none of that from my experience.
 
I am glad I didn't do a Wake house. I wanted way more immersion since my German was good enough and wanted all of my classes to be in German.
 
Each of our three kids studied abroad in college, two in England and one in France. They met wonderful friends, had very interesting academic studies, and traveled practically every weekend. They experienced a continuum of maturing stages. Most of the semester was fun and exciting, but even the challenging times (homesickness , illness, rigorous expectations from their foreign professors) were in retrospect great opportunities to overcome obstacles and to cherish friends and family back home. The semester that they "gave up" at UNC, NCSU and WFU was well-invested and I was glad we could provide this for them.
 
lbE08 said:
i go back and forth on the house thing. i wanted to do a spanish-speaking country so that kind of took care of the question for me at the time, but even if wake had a 'madrid house' i think i'd still have selected the salamanca homestay. i LOVED salamanca and felt like i was much more immersed in the culture than if i'd just surrounded myself with wake kids 24/7. my madre and abuela weren't the most personable, but they liked me (and liked me far more than the japanese boy there at the same time... poor guy). that said, i am jealous of the friendships the houses allow you to make. i definitely got none of that from my experience.
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see I loved my host madre and she was quite personable. the family was a bunch of FC Barcelona lovers and that's how I helped develop my obsession for them. we had the office just off the Plaza Mayor, and that was a great place to hang out in between classes and meet up with friends, so it was like being in the common room of a dorm with everyone sleeping at their own place. From what I understand they seriously upgraded the office a few semesters later and it was supposed to be awesome. Not sure what it's like now, though.

and Salamanca is a wonderful town to be abroad: nothing but students, great bars, decent restaurants/cafes, really cool architecture and history as well. The only thing that's maybe a drawback is it's a bit off the beaten path, but that didn't stop us from taking copious trips around Europe, just gotta budget in extra time getting in and out of Madrid. trains and buses aren't really options unless you're going elsewhere in Spain or Portugal.
 
BarcaDeac said:
see I loved my host madre and she was quite personable. the family was a bunch of FC Barcelona lovers and that's how I helped develop my obsession for them. we had the office just off the Plaza Mayor, and that was a great place to hang out in between classes and meet up with friends, so it was like being in the common room of a dorm with everyone sleeping at their own place. From what I understand they seriously upgraded the office a few semesters later and it was supposed to be awesome. Not sure what it's like now, though.

and Salamanca is a wonderful town to be abroad: nothing but students, great bars, decent restaurants/cafes, really cool architecture and history as well. The only thing that's maybe a drawback is it's a bit off the beaten path, but that didn't stop us from taking copious trips around Europe, just gotta budget in extra time getting in and out of Madrid. trains and buses aren't really options unless you're going elsewhere in Spain or Portugal.
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yeah, the office off the plaza was money, as was the candy shop RIGHT underneath and the H&M across the street.... what was NOT awesome is that i lived a freakin' hour's walk away from the plaza. i was the one unfortunate student who lived way out past the train station, so i had to really, really plan my whole day out because having to 'run home' turned into a 2hr round trip.
 
lbE08 said:
yeah, the office off the plaza was money, as was the candy shop RIGHT underneath and the H&M across the street.... what was NOT awesome is that i lived a freakin' hour's walk away from the plaza. i was the one unfortunate student who lived way out past the train station, so i had to really, really plan my whole day out because having to 'run home' turned into a 2hr round trip.
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Yeah that candy shop was sweet...get some sour gummies and refill your Amena cell phone (though mine was used by a girl the previous semester and apparently all she ever did was call her bf so there was like 200 euros on it when I got it). also bought quite a few things from the soccer shop on the corner.

my apartment was like two blocks from the train station. walk down the main street and when you get to the station turn left down the side street for a minute or two. we used to meet up at the cafe in the train station for wifi when the the office was closed. also, the Istanbul kebab shop in the train station was fucking delicious. at first people thought it was weird when I said we should meet up at the train station, but the place was basically a mall with trains pulling through out back. saw several movies there, too.
 
yeah, unfortunately for me the train station never caught on.
amusing anecdote- i associate the train station with 'sole survivor' (the song) because i listened to the same playlist almost every day walking to class, and i knew if i was moving on time because sole survivor would come on as i hit the cross street in front of the station.
 
PhilliesDeacs said:
I wish I had studied abroad - there's no question in my mind.

When it comes to college, the two things that I will brand on my kid(s) brains whenever the moment arrives:

1. Don't go into debt for college. Its not worth it.
2. Do whatever is necessary to study abroad for at least a semester.
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what if 2 requires you to do 1?

i know americans are becoming increasingly allergic to debt and its a good thing in many ways because most people have no sense when it comes to financial matters, but if it means going into a little bit of debt to go to a better school which will increase your long-term earnings potential then not taking on the debt is dumb. obviously going 100k+ in debt to go to some expensive yet unprestigious private school or grad/professional school is dumb.
 
Dented said:
what if 2 requires you to do 1?

i know americans are becoming increasingly allergic to debt and its a good thing in many ways because most people have no sense when it comes to financial matters, but if it means going into a little bit of debt to go to a better school which will increase your long-term earnings potential then not taking on the debt is dumb. obviously going 100k+ in debt to go to some expensive yet unprestigious private school or grad/professional school is dumb.
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My semester abroad actually saved money. The program + all travel and expenses was cheaper than a semester at Wake.
 
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Australia was the shit. It was a summer program, but still.
 
Dude, if you don't want them to go in debt, don't let them go to Wake.

Although I have to say, Wake gave me the most free money/scholarship dough out of 5 private lib arts schools I applied to (Davidson, Wofford, etc)
 
The debt thing is no longer worth it to go to a better undergrad. If you're in touch with recent grads they'll tell you degrees from top schools like Penn, Wake, UNC don't mean much more than a degree from anywhere else these days. Kids that will benefit from nepotism in their post college careers tend to go to top schools. That's why it looks like its financially worth while to go to a better school, but nepotism in the student population is the lurking value that invalidates the data. Of course there is a benefit for having good people to network with, but that's a crapshoot compared to sure fire debt.

3. Make your kid go to a school that has won a national championship in football or basketball.
 
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