You’re a student at university bombarded with assignments, projects, deadlines, and exams. But every so often, or every 20min, you open up Instagram and see pictures of Paris, Tokyo, and Hawaii, wishing you were there instead. Well, I have a few solutions to help you travel the world even as a broke-ass student.
During university, I’ve lived and studied a year in Tokyo, a year in Copenhagen, and two years in Vancouver. Throughout this time I’ve also travelled to Taipei, Toronto, San Francisco, Seattle, London, Cambridge, Stockholm, Amsterdam, Berlin, Prague, Budapest, and Vienna, on my own with my own planning and own financial funding. And with these tips, you can definitely travel more than me.
- Use Your Home University’s Programs
- Apply to Other Universities’ Summer Programs
- Get Internships/Co-ops
- Join Student Clubs and Societies Trips
- Teach English for Room and Board
Use Your Home University’s Programs
This is first priority. If you can study abroad via your home university’s exchange program, then you get blessings and safety protection from your home university. You get to transfer your credits back, get some sort of financial support from your university (ie. scholarships), and go abroad with other students from your home university. And if, somehow, a global pandemic occurs while you’re abroad, your home university will make sure you make it home safely.
TODO:
- Check your home university’s exchange abroad website
- Exchange programs can be for the entire university or a specific department.
- My home university had a large exchange abroad program for all students, and also one for only engineering students. I asked them why it was split, and the reason was that engineering students usually have lower GPAs than business or arts students so they wouldn’t be able to compete for exchange spots. They also wanted to have partnerships with technical universities for engineering students to study at.
- Study different partner exchange universities
- Usually you can only apply to 3 exchange universities and have to rank them. So out of the hundreds of partner universities, you need to choose the top 3 you want to go to, and then fight for a spot.
- I recommend choosing a university with 3 criteria in mind:
- 1. Location
- The whole point of studying abroad is to experience living in another city/country/continent. You want to be somewhere that you want to explore and immerse in the culture. Choose somewhere you’ve always wanted to live in for a couple of months!
- 2. Courses/Professors
- Though it’s fun travelling and exploring a whole new world, you’re still taking courses to complete your degree, so check if there are courses at that university that intrigue you.
- Are the courses interesting? Is it something my home university doesn’t have? Are there amazing professors there that I’d like to take classes from or sit in to their classes? Would I like to work in one of the professor’s research team? Are there good resources there?
- Make sure you can transfer your courses back, this is super important if you want to graduate on time.
- 3. Living Expenses
- Is the place you’re choosing an expensive city or cheap city. Check how much a cup of coffee is there, or how much a McDonald’s meal is.
- Know your budget. If it’s a pricey city, apply for as many scholarships as you can, not only from your university but also from your home city and country. There’s many scholarships out there for students going abroad.
- 1. Location
- Note the application deadlines
- Usually you exchange abroad in 3rd year, so you could be applying in 2nd year or first half of 3rd year.
- Usually there is a GPA requirement. Find the GPA you need for the universities you’d like to go to, and work hard in your first two years to make sure you GOT it!
Apply to Other Universities’ Summer Programs
If you want to do summer courses abroad to 1. travel and 2. advance in your studies, applying to other universities’ summer programs is the way! Just like how your home university has summer courses, other ones do too. It’s easier to apply to these because it’s not a “proper semester” and there’s less competition.
TODO:
- Usually you have to apply directly to the other university and figure out with your home department how to transfer your courses over.
- The process is not as smooth as doing it through the exchange program, so you’ll have to do a lot of work yourself.
Get Internships/Co-ops
Everyone should do this anyways. Internships and coops are crucial during your university degree. If you want to gain some experience in your field and boost your resume, you should be applying to companies or research teams as an intern/co-op. But why not do it abroad?
TODO:
- Find and apply to companies that you’d be interested interning for. They might have an office near you or abroad that you’d like to work at – try applying and see what happens!
- Note the deadlines. Internship applications almost always have a deadline, companies will admit and train interns in batches at set times during the year, usually corresponding to your semesters or summer.
- Prepare for interviews, it’s very competitive to apply as an intern.
- Figure out if the company will sponsor you to go abroad or you need to figure it out. It’s not the end of the world if you have to figure it out, they are paying you while you work.
I’ve had friends do internships in Seattle, Toronto, Silicon Valley, Japan, and Germany. I’ve personally done an internship in Copenhagen during the summer after my study abroad there, and worked part time at a startup while studying there which gave me opportunities to travel all over Europe to represent them at different conventions, all paid for! There are tons of opportunities out there, you just need to search for them.
Join Student Clubs and Societies Trips
This is a fun one! A lot of the time the student clubs/societies at your university hold trips that are partially sponsored by the university and have a discount for students. You don’t need to join clubs for the sole sake of travelling, but definitely join something you’re interested in, and it’s a bonus if there are trips!
TODO:
- Check out your university student club and society page.
- Find clubs you’re interested in and look at their website or FB page for events they do. Show up at one of the events!
- Usually you can also see in a past calendar if they host trips and how much they are.
My department’s student society (ECESS) holds an annual week-long Silicon Valley trip to visit around 10-15 tech companies there. The trip is partially sponsored by the department and has a student discount. I’ve been fortunate to go on the trip twice, and we had many cool company tours, met incredibly intelligent people, and got to explore San Francisco, San Jose, and Stanford University!
I’ve also been on a week-long sponsored trip to Cambridge to compete in an annual collegiate Go competition. Though I didn’t go with my university, I found out about this competition through the president of the Go Club when I was a member. He recommended it and said it was kind of niche but a super cool opportunity. There was a Taiwanese billionaire who loves Go and decided to host this competition in different countries every year, covering all costs except the flight ticket. It was a no brainer!
In my last year of university, I joined the debate club just to practice some public speaking. I met a bunch of smart, witty, and fun people that taught me how to debate. I found myself on another sponsored trip to Seattle for a debate competition there, we rented a house and had so much fun!
There are so many more clubs out there (ie hiking/camping clubs) that have super cool trips/competitions/experiences, and they’re always welcoming new members. Try it out and you’ll make some lifelong friends.
Teach English for Room and Board
If all else fails, you can always teach English. There are many programs for students to go abroad and teach English in Thailand or Vietnam for a place to stay and food. Though you won’t earn much money, it’s all about the experiences and I’ve met people that have completely changed their perspectives after coming back from these trips. They come back more kind, aware, and happy.
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