Hey! My name is Rocky Seale. I just finished up my second year of college and decided to do a study abroad program with a couple of my friends. Honestly, studying abroad was never something I really considered doing. However, one of my friends told me about a study abroad opportunity, and I had to consider. To start off, my friends and I are engineering majors, so we had to find a program that worked for our degree and would give us credit. We attended the study abroad fairs to get more information on the possible opportunities for us to go abroad. We also had an idea of one that would work for our degree, so we went and talked to the professor and got information about the program. After talking with the professor, we were kind of sold on the program. At this point we had decided on our program and start to prepare for it.
This meant getting plane tickets together and preparing how we were going to get to our program and back. Our program took us to Italy, Slovenia, Germany, and Austria. Since we started in Venice, Italy, we decided to fly into Rome. We did this since we did a three-day trip to Rome after our program ended, and it was relatively easy to train from Rome to Venice. Overall, we did it great; it just ended up being a very long travel day. There is a lot to look into for your travel when going abroad. I would recommend looking at prices around your destination and training to where you need to meet your group abroad. If you plan on doing a little trip after, you may want to look at flying into where you will leave from, too. That is what we did, and it worked out great.
Probably the most stressful part for most people, packing. I tried my best to pack as light as possible since I was told I would have to carry it a lot. Because of this I only took a small suitcase and a backpack. I also tried to leave a little room, so I could get a couple things while I was abroad. I won’t bore you with what I packed. However, I will say look at where you will be going and what the weather will be like while you are there. Every study abroad experience will be different based on the program and time of year. Also look into what you will need to plug things in. In Europe, they use different outlets, and it would suck to ruin something because of this. If you don’t know, just ask your professor.
I highly recommend going abroad if you are considering it. Do not let the planning and everything taunt you out of doing it. It is a great experience, and something you may never get to do again.
