When French-Swedish national Adèle Fensby and her twin sister graduated from high school in France, they didn’t know what they wanted to study or which career path to pursue. So at 17 years old, with their parents’ financial support, they planned a gap year in Sweden studying English at the University of Gothenburg.
A gap or bridge year is an experiential year — which can involve volunteering or traveling — that some students take before college. For prospective international students, this is also an opportunity to determine whether studying overseas is really right for them.
[Read these reasons to earn a bachelor’s degree overseas.]
At Gothenburg, Fensby says she and her sister interacted with international students of all ages, cultures and backgrounds and grew their English and Swedish language skills. After the gap year, her sister returned to France to study law while Fensby chose to study political science at Uppsala University in Sweden.
Paul Sunde, director of admissions at Dartmouth College, says following a gap year, students “tend to be more mature, to have a broader perspective and to be more intentional about their coursework.”
Here are three reasons prospective international students may want to consider a gap year.
1. Overseas volunteer opportunities: Beyond allowing them to gain new knowledge and support causes, volunteering abroad during a gap year can help prospective international students see how they adapt to living in another country.
Ethan Knight, executive director of the nonprofit American Gap Association, says some gap year benefits for prospective international students are “improvements to personal awareness, career savvy and preparedness, academic preparation and improved understanding of global citizenship.”
Numerous volunteer opportunities are available for prospective international students. The AGA website has a searchable list of accredited gap year organizations, which help students plan and organize their gap year experience.
[Determine how a gap year can make a student successful.]
Gapforce in the United Kingdom is another resource that offers structured gap year programs, including volunteer projects and extreme expeditions, and works with students to determine their career and learning goals.
As volunteers, students learn about operating in a different environment outside their comfort zone, says Marcus Watts, Gapforce’s managing director. This could be by teaching in South America or working as legal assistants in community law practices in Cambodia and Tanzania. He says students develop their own confidence and understand that “the first step to success is to actually do something.”
2. Time to identify passions: A gap year can help prospective international students explore their passions, including giving them hands-on experience in various fields of study.
Brazilian national Henrique de Freitas had planned to travel abroad during his undergrad studies. But after learning about the Princeton Bridge Year Program at Princeton University, which offers incoming freshmen nine months of university-sponsored service, he took a gap year to explore the field of economic development in Ghana.
Through a BYP scholarship, de Freitas worked in Ghana at a local nongovernmental organization on grassroots projects, such as personal finance and fundraising; at an American economic development company on a project sponsored by the U.S. Agency for International Development; and at a middle school as a teacher.
“With direct experience, I had the opportunity to mature my plans of going into economic development from simple ideals to firsthand empirical decisions,” says de Freitas, who graduated from Princeton in 2015 with a bachelor’s in engineering.
For Thai national Khwanhatai Kongkapetch, a gap year allowed her to explore new perspectives and learn about herself. She received a scholarship for a yearlong program in Ecuador through the nonprofit Global Citizen Year, which equips high school grads with global skills through international immersion experiences.
Living with a host family, she worked with the local government office, helping to organize community activities for the elderly club, and also worked at a local school.
“I managed to immerse in the community and fully become a part of it,” says Kongkapetch.
She says the experience influenced her academic studies; she’s now a double major in international studies and Spanish, with plans for a secondary education minor at Luther College in Iowa.
[Find out where the best global universities are in the world.]
3. Ability to explore: Prospective international students can also spend their gap year traveling internationally and determining for sure whether studying or working overseas truly interests them.
Abi Reynolds, from Chester, England, already planned to study in the U.S. at Dartmouth College. But she first wanted to travel, deferring her enrollment until fall 2017.
She spent the first half of her gap year working in the U.K. and then in early March began her travels. Her experiences have ranged from visiting students at a school in Cambodia to exploring the underground tunnels of C? Chi in Vietnam to trekking the evergreen rainforest in the Khao Sok National Park in Thailand.
“I’ve tried to experience every aspect of life in this region,” says Reynolds, who plans to study medicine and possibly work overseas.
Apart from exploring Sweden, Uppsala University student Fensby also used her gap year to visit Uppsala and speak with students and staff to determine her next steps.
Fensby says without the gap year, she “would never have found out about my current program, and I would not have had the appropriate Swedish and English level to enter the program.”
Although Fensby and her sister were young when they left for Sweden, she says she has no regrets. “This extra year gave us more time to choose our studies and the tools to succeed in our current programs,” she says.
See the complete rankings of the Best Global Universities.
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Consider a Gap Year as a Prospective International Student originally appeared on usnews.com
