4 Minutes Read
After visiting the study abroad info session, I made an appointment to see one of the study abroad advisors for November six. During the info session, we were introduced to four study abroad programs, USAC, IP, AIFS, and Direct Exchange. USAC and AIFS aren’t based in California so CSU students like myself won’t be able to use state grants to fund our study abroad expenses. USAC and AIFS are both “first come first serve” bases. The available options for a student that is looking to USAC, the available options are one semester, winter, summer, or a yearlong abroad. IP is the official study abroad program at CSU, Chico. It’s more competitive to get in because you are competing against other CSU students from all campuses. IP is a yearlong program, there aren’t any other options available. With Direct Exchange, it’s basically a CSU student swapping places with another student in a different country affiliated with CSU, Chico. The two students will swap places, meaning the CSU student will go to that country and the student from that country will come here to CSU, Chico. The only problem with this is that there must be a student who wants to come over.
All the programs offer different amounts and varieties of benefits. Even though my education is mostly funded by Financial Aid, I decided to meet with the USAC advisor because the USAC program offers, more of a hands-on experience and I don’t really want to mess up my experience abroad. My appointment was scheduled at two-twenty pm with Cecilia Lapolli. I arrived at two- ten pm and I checked in with the front desk. I sat down and observed the waiting once more. There weren’t a lot of students present again just like the other time I was previously in the office. I didn’t have to wait long before Cecilia came out to greet me.
We greeted each other and headed to her office, where she asked me when and where I wanted to study abroad. I answered with South Korea and that I wanted to go in my junior year. We discussed a little about my financial aid and how long I wanted to go. We looked at all the available scholarships that are for study abroad students. Through that discussion, we agreed that the IP program will be most beneficial to me. We looked through the IP program and found that there are two universities that are available for studying abroad in. Yonsei and Kookmin are the two available universities. For the IP program, there are some requirements that a student has to meet before applying for the IP program; students must have a 3.0 GPA, year of departure must be either a junior or senior, and have no records/incidents with student judicial affairs. After going through the general things, Cecilia asked me if I have any additional questions.
I said yes and proceeded to interview her on some questions I had previously made before coming to the appointment. I first asked her what is an obstacle most students face when they go study abroad? Cecilia replied that the most frequent thing students experience is culture shock. I asked more about culture shock and whether is it an immediate thing or does it take time to develop? She answered that it is different with every student, some could happen as soon as they land in the country and some could happen months later. Next, I asked what financial difficulties do students face when dealing with payments to the University or USAC? Cecilia replied that the most common difficulty that a student experiences financially is meeting deadlines when things are due. One of the questions I asked was do I need to attend another info session next year as well. She said that students only need to go to one info session and then they are registered into the system. I asked what is a peer advisor and how do I set up a meeting with a peer advisor? Cecilia explained that peer advisors are more knowledgeable in the specific area that a student may want to go to than a study abroad advisor might know. Meeting with an advisor is more about academics and general stuff. We finished up the meeting and I left the office feeling more confident in studying abroad.
MX Creations Blog 
Leave a comment