Studying Abroad (Hopefully)

My host family from Brazil and me in Rio de Janeiro.


As my first year of college begins to come to a close and as all my friends have started signing their leases for their apartments or finding roommates for their new dorms next year, I have found no housing for myself in Iowa City. Instead, I have started running a lot of errands with the study abroad office in the Old Capitol Mall.

My e-mail is filled with messages exchanged between my academic advisor and me, my UI study abroad advisor and me, my financial aid advisor and me, and my study abroad program advisor and me. It is such a hectic mess, but hopefully it will all tie up together.

I decided to study abroad for my fall semester of sophomore year because of many reasons:

  1. I studied abroad in high school and it was life changing. I took a gap year between my junior and senior year and was an exchange student in Brazil for a year. I lived with a host family and learned Portuguese and it changed my life.
  2. I would’ve loved to study abroad in the spring since it means that I get to be in Iowa while it’s warm and while the football games are going on, but the fall courses offered abroad were the ones that lined up with my major the most.
  3. I chose to study abroad in Italy because I promised myself that before I died I would learn five languages, the only languages that I am missing so far is French and Italian. So, Italian here I come!
  4. My friend studied abroad in college in her fall semester of sophomore year and she said that it is better to study abroad earlier than later, so here I am following her advice.

I really hope that I can study abroad. The University of Iowa offers so many amazing study abroad programs and they have their system set up so that if you study abroad the financial aid that you receive in Iowa also applies for your program!

So far I am in the tiring phase of applying and running errands, but in the end, it will all pay off and I will (hopefully, knock on wood) be studying my booty off in Italy!

PS. Big shout out to all the kind advisors at the University of Iowa.

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