While studying abroad is usually thought of as one of the most exciting times in a student's college career, the experience can vary greatly with the differences in programs, friends, host families and the native culture.
According to many students, one of the most important aspects of any study abroad experience is the ability to interact and integrate with the host culture.
Though many students like the comfort of traveling to an English-speaking country, still others are excited by the prospect of becoming fluent in a new language and learning about a new culture.
According to sophomore Alison Manchester, she plans to travel to Seville, Spain in order to increase her fluency in Spanish. "I really want to increase my ability in Spanish. It is my main reason for going abroad," Manchester said. "I talked to a lot of friends who have been to Spain and they all have had really positive experiences with their host families, and their Spanish has improved as well."
Senior Scott Kniaz agreed, adding that his host family and improvement in his Spanish played the most important roles in his study-abroad experience. Kniaz said that his ability to speak Spanish fluently greatly improved through living with a family in Seville.
"I feel like through living with a family, I got to see so much more of the culture," Kniaz said. "I could watch television with them, see their reactions to shows, and see how they felt politically."
"At meals we had all types of conversations on different topics, like abortion, gay rights or Chinese people. I even got invited one time to my host mom's nephew's baptism. We went to a tiny city in the southwest of Spain with a population of about 500 people - there was tons of paella and a huge celebration."
But for other students, the fact that the language is unknown can be a reason for studying abroad in a particular country.
"I wanted to go to Europe," said junior Ash Gupta, who spent the fall studying abroad in Prague. "But I didn't want to go to a commercial place in Western Europe where everyone goes."
Instead, Gupta decided to travel to the Czech Republic without knowing any of the Czech language before his arrival. "In Prague, we lived in the city center, where a lot of people do speak English, but outside the city, most people don't speak English at all," he said. "We got around fine because we had to do a crash course in Czech when we got there."
"By the end of the semester we got to talk to people in broken Czech because we knew more of the language," he added. For other students, though, living in an English-speaking country has the benefits of allowing them to integrate more deeply into the country's culture.
According to Sheila Bayne, Director of Tufts Programs Abroad, the most important thing for any student to remember when traveling to an English speaking country is that although the language is the same, the mentality and thinking of the native people is different.
"When you go to Australia or the United Kingdom, there are just as many cultural differences," Bayne said. "When the language is similar you don't see the difference as much, but because they use the same words does not mean that they mean the same thing by these words. We try to tell students up front, British people are going to use words that sound the same, but do not mean the same thing."
For some students, however, traveling to an English-speaking country and living with other Americans can take away from the cultural experience. Senior Julie Rappaport who traveled to London, said that living in a dorm setting made it slightly harder to meet the native people and learn about the native culture. "When there are classes with all Americans, there is no connection to British people. It's also extremely hard to approach people when you go out with so many Americans. British people were not excited to get to know us," Rappaport said.
Although Rappaport had a hard time meeting British citizens, during the second part of her program she had the chance to immerse herself in the culture through her job. "I definitely think that because of my work situation, I got to know many British people well," she said. "I made a point of hanging out with people outside of the office. Everyone at my work was incredibly nice to me and patient when cultural barriers came up and I didn't understand something."
"There were only a few moments when I felt really out of place," she added. "For example, because the British drink much more than Americans, on Fridays they would all be drinking bottles of wine in the workplace."
According to Bayne, while there is always something different and exciting to learn in any new culture, it is more rewarding for students to travel to a country where they can learn to speak a different language.
"It is best to learn a foreign language and to use that foreign language in a foreign country," Bayne said.
