A lot of people (grandmas, second cousins, ex-bosses) ask me how I ended up studying abroad in Berlin.
In a way, it was sort of an accident ““ before the end of my freshman year, Germany had never crossed my mind.
But after some serendipity and a lot of research, I realized this city was the right place for my semester abroad.
Now that the University of California Education Abroad Program and many other study abroad programs are accepting applications for next year, it’s time for potential student travelers to find theirs.
Like many Californians, I studied Spanish in middle and high school. After taking the Advanced Placement test, I spent the summer after my junior year on a language immersion program in Spain, eating tapas in Salamanca, learning to flamenco in Seville and walking through the gardens of the Alhambra. This program reaffirmed my desire to go abroad in college.
There’s a lot to take into consideration, but here are a few pointers to help you navigate the world (literally) of study abroad.
Pointer No. 1: Decide where you want to go.
You don’t have to have your mind set on a country ““ Germany had never crossed my mind then ““ but knowing ahead of time that you want to go somewhere allows you to schedule your classes accordingly.
It’s possible with almost any major, and you won’t be alone: Around 270,000 Americans study abroad each year, according to the 2011 Open Doors Report on International Education. UCLA alone sends about 2,300 ““ the fourth-most students in the country ““ with around 600 participating in EAP programs.
I started to think about Germany after meeting two Fulbright scholars in a fiat lux seminar spring quarter of my freshman year, who had been so enthusiastic about their home country. Besides, Germany had been the home of Albert Einstein and Max Planck, two of the most important contributors to modern physics.
Pointer No. 2: Settle on a country, or at least a continent, that feels right to you.
One of the easiest ways to do this is by deciding whether you want to learn a new language.
That’s one of the top reasons students go abroad, said Malcolm Quon, the UCLA Travel Study adviser.
For Macie Basom, a third-year UC Santa Barbara mathematics student, fluency is her primary goal.
In 2010, she visited a friend in Bavaria, the largest German state, but with no German language skills she found it difficult to get to know her hosts.
“It was so frustrating, not being able to communicate with (my friend’s) family,” she said. “I just wanted to be able to wake up, understand and speak German.”
So she took a year of language classes, then flew back to Germany for the same EAP program I’m attending, except she is taking her classes at the Technical University of Berlin and spending the full year.
Pointer No. 3: Decide how long you want to stay abroad.
Semester and year-long programs offer a better chance of learning the language, but they can affect how long you have to stay in school.
Stephanie Dunn, a third-year cognitive science student, will be able to graduate early after spending a semester at the University of Edinburgh. On the other hand, I’m going to have to spend at least an extra quarter in college to complete my physics major.
After choosing length, location and language, you can narrow down the programs by taking cost, ease of class and credit transfer and extent of immersion into consideration.
Many of the German programs offered a narrow range of classes taught only in English. The EAP program stood out because it promised to completely immerse me in German culture, and all my units would automatically transfer, although you still have to petition for your credit to count toward specific classes. Financial aid also automatically transfers over.
Here in Germany, I am enrolled in an established university with real Germans, I live in an apartment (that I had to find on my own) with a real German, and after having recently developed a taste for leberwurst (liver sausage, or spreadable meat) maybe, just maybe, I’m on my way to feeling a bit like a real German.
On the flip side, EAP only goes to 36 countries and provinces. So if, say, you want to join the 65 students who studied in Antarctica in 2010, you have to go through an outside company or organization.
Pointer No. 4: See if you can talk to anyone who has been on your program before, or at least lived in your intended country.
While Berlin worked out extremely well for me, Tsoleene Partamian, a fourth-year art student at UC Santa Cruz, said student input would probably have affected her decision to study in Bordeaux, France with EAP.
She chose the program because it was the only one through the University of California that allowed her to study art.
However, she said she has been consistently disappointed with it. The short length of the immersion classes ““ two weeks long compared with the minimum of four weeks we have to take in Berlin ““ didn’t provide enough language training to communicate with professors and students.
Partamian also said she is unhappy with the academic climate at the university she is attending.
“The students here are apathetic, and that makes the professors uninterested as well,” she said.
Still, she said she plans to stay in France for the remainder of her program and take the opportunity to travel.
Which brings me to my last bit of advice: if you do end up going abroad, and I can’t recommend it highly enough, make sure you give yourself time to enjoy it. Travel, explore, learn the language, meet the locals.
Whether you have four weeks or 12 months, while you study abroad, the language and the land around you ““ they become your university.