Always wanted to study abroad in another country? Here's your chance....

Before I came to college, I had heard of exchange programs and some other opportunities to study in other countries. I guess being in a diverse country like India my whole life has made me an admirer of different languages and cultural traditions. Coming to a college with a great deal of diversity and students from tens of countries around the world has made me even more of a sucker for linguistics and variety in culture.

Study abroad programs are specialised programs in which a student goes to another country for a specific time period to study language, and/or experience the culture and society. Many US colleges have mutually beneficial affiliations with many colleges abroad and also a ton of scholarships for study abroad programs. One may have options like :

1) Work in an African country like Tanzania with an NGO and study part time with that. This combines studying and an internship. Reason for stating Tanzania is that my roomate is going to do that program next year.

2) Go to Asia to a place like Japan if you're into oriental cultures and languages (Although i must confess that I never really was attracted to pictorial language scripts like Chinese and Japanese because I suck at art and anything remotely related to drawing scares me.). My second roomate is going to Japan in his last year.

3) Go to Europe to a place like Germany. This is what I want to do because I'm taking German language courses and always wanted to speak more German than just the common words they speak in German movies like "Schnell" and "Jawol".

At college, I discovered a vast array of study abroad programs in countries in almost all continents. (Well im pretty sure they dont have colleges down in Antarctica, so exclude that one. Also they say its pretty cold down there and all you'll get to eat is moss, penguin sandwiches and ice).

Well, people may raise a question - Why study abroad when we already know english? Its because every passing day, the firewalls between economies are disappearing and one needs to be a global citizen. Employers especially look at varied traits like proficiency in languages and cultural experiences positively.

I am posting the link to the Ohio state university study abroad site. Interested in how it works and what sort of programs are offered? check it out.

http://oia.osu.edu/component/option,com_frontpage/Itemid,1/

And surely there is one thing that a person can claim after studying abroad; global citizenship, which, unlike a national passport, doesn't expire after in 10 years.

Harit