Is anyone's dc meant to be doing a year abroad next year?

[geraldmeers]

My dc is meant to be studying at a North American university for a year from September. Both home and overseas uni are operating on the assumption that it will go ahead, but I think we can't really know until perhaps a month beforehand, so can't sort out travel, accommodation, etc. On the other hand dc is not sure how late to leave all the preparation. I know nobody can give me a yay or nay on whether it will go ahead, but I'd be interested to know if anyone else is in this situation and what are your thoughts?

@Chemenger. DD has applied to do French and Spanish at university. She has decided on her firm choice, but has yet to make a decision about her insurance. I am wondering whether any of DD's possible choices are the university that you have been unimpressed with re your DD's Spanish. I am guessing you don't want to post publicly which uni. Would you be willing to PM me?

I think Latin America is the big problem here. Foreign Universities are different in terms of how they operate and what their communications are like. Some are quite chaotic. I would not choose a uni based in links with Mexico.

I remember when DD was looking at year abroad. Her MFL Department was clear: working with German and Swiss universities was perfect. Nowhere else was easy to deal with and the student experience was variable. Utterly true as it turned out. Switzerland for French was easy from start to finish - Italy! As you might imagine! The highest world ranked university in Italy was chaotic. The uk universities do what they can but they cannot change decades of ineptitude.

We have exchanges with Italian universities that go like clockwork, but they are based around engineering research projects, not more general year abroad exchanges. The Italian system is very different from ours. US ones can be difficulty because our student need to do specific courses and they never guarantee places, their own students can do things the next year or do summer school to make things up but ours can’t.

DD has spoken to students who’ve done the Mexican exchange in previous years, and apparently it was great, without COVID. Also DH works at least partly in the US so that (was) going to mean she was on the same side of the Atlantic. Of course he can’t enter the US at the moment either.

Some of the universities in Italy take thousands of DC every year on exchange. After Switzerland, where DD went first, it was down to the students to do more or less everything in Italy. So: find accommodation, agree a programme of study, never be sure if a lecturer would turn up, navigate continual changes of rooms, virtually nothing laid on by the university as an induction, snow stopped everything. Then there was an insistence that uk students had to pass all the university exams in their options whilst telling other students they didn’t have to sit any exams at all but then saying they did with no notice. All with a threat of not signing the required certificates of study. DD wasn’t required to pass their exams. There were inconsistencies from start to finish but Italy was fun despite the annoyances.

I think any student doing a year abroad has to be resourceful. I have no doubt that if it was just fine previously, Covid has changed everything and its difficult to establish what the issues are from university to university.

Hope your DD hears something positive soon! If it went well previously one assumes they do have good contacts with Mexico.

Hi OP, yes DS is also supposed to be going to a North US uni from August.

The US Embassy is not releasing visas and has a very long backlog which means he is unlike to get his processed before he's due to start. Other North US unis have cancelled their international programs but his hasn't. No house booked for next year at his UK uni because he's intending to be away. We just don't know where to begin. There's so much planning to do at short notice, whether he is allowed to go or not.