2008 Woodie Awards
Study Abroad Revisited: More Than Just a Language and Life Lesson
A response to "Study Abroad, Study in Chaos: International Programs at Rollins".
Shellie Ponce
Issue date: 10/14/05 Section: Opinions
Upon reading this article in the Sandspur, I was surprised to read such a scathing review of the performance of International Programs at Rollins. I just returned from a six-month study abroad through Rollins International Programs and I was more or less pleased with their reactions to our struggles abroad.
One thing that Angela and Kelsey failed to realize is that when you go abroad, things don't always go as planned and it's not always someone else's fault. Sometimes things just happen. Examples would be keeping current with their flight plans and developing flexible eating patterns when a guest in someone else's home.
My experience in Germany started out a little rough; I take the blame for missing my train, taking too much baggage, and not making an appointment to get my key to my dorm. These are not things that I would expect International Programs to be responsible for, nor did I expect them to "take care of me."
I won't say everything went perfectly with the program. To be fair, I also felt that the Crossing Cultures class was aiming at the wrong aspects of traveling abroad. Rather than talking about our "comfort zones," and analyzing them to death, I would have rather discussed how to establish phone service in a foreign country, how the weather would be, not just in March (quite cold) but as the semester rolled on into the summer (quite hot).
Complaining about sleeping in the airport is just silly. On the contrary, it's an adventure; it's a losing of the traveler's virginity! I've slept in enough train stations/airports to write a guide on the most and least comfortable benches to sleep on, where to get the least amount of gum stuck in your hair, how to not get robbed while sleeping, and how to get to the London-Stansted airport at 2 am after the Tube has closed for the night.
I learned so much on my study abroad trip, and not just language skills. Living in Germany taught me how to live without a car (something I now prefer!), how to communicate with German dentists after falling flat on my face and losing my two front teeth, how to deal with the suicide of a fellow American study abroad student, and how easy it is to simply hop on a train and go somewhere for the weekend with no prior planning (see paragraph above about sleeping in train stations).
One thing that Angela and Kelsey failed to realize is that when you go abroad, things don't always go as planned and it's not always someone else's fault. Sometimes things just happen. Examples would be keeping current with their flight plans and developing flexible eating patterns when a guest in someone else's home.
My experience in Germany started out a little rough; I take the blame for missing my train, taking too much baggage, and not making an appointment to get my key to my dorm. These are not things that I would expect International Programs to be responsible for, nor did I expect them to "take care of me."
I won't say everything went perfectly with the program. To be fair, I also felt that the Crossing Cultures class was aiming at the wrong aspects of traveling abroad. Rather than talking about our "comfort zones," and analyzing them to death, I would have rather discussed how to establish phone service in a foreign country, how the weather would be, not just in March (quite cold) but as the semester rolled on into the summer (quite hot).
Complaining about sleeping in the airport is just silly. On the contrary, it's an adventure; it's a losing of the traveler's virginity! I've slept in enough train stations/airports to write a guide on the most and least comfortable benches to sleep on, where to get the least amount of gum stuck in your hair, how to not get robbed while sleeping, and how to get to the London-Stansted airport at 2 am after the Tube has closed for the night.
I learned so much on my study abroad trip, and not just language skills. Living in Germany taught me how to live without a car (something I now prefer!), how to communicate with German dentists after falling flat on my face and losing my two front teeth, how to deal with the suicide of a fellow American study abroad student, and how easy it is to simply hop on a train and go somewhere for the weekend with no prior planning (see paragraph above about sleeping in train stations).