Should all college students be required to study abroad? Why or why not? by Joanna

Should all college students be required to study abroad? Why or why not? by Joanna - March 2016 Scholarship Essay

As my undergraduate degree passes by me like the blink of an eye, I realized that I was also passing up an amazing opportunity. I decided to visit the Office of Study Abroad at my home university and gathered all the information necessary for studying one semester, to one year abroad. Having a mechanical engineering major however, I was limited to two locations, Spain and Germany. Which, are two amazing and beautiful locations that I would love to visit. With study abroad on my mind, I decided to weigh the different options I had towards continuing my education. There were definitely plenty of positive aspects to studying abroad, such as attaining differently learning styles, grasping different points of views throughout history, and culture experience and appropriation.

By attaining different learning styles, such as if I were to attend the engineering school in Germany, is not only prestigious due to the location, but is beneficial to me as a person in the long term. I am able to apply different styles that would not be normally taught in a school in my country and possibly improve my educational and career goals.

When a student leaves to a different country, they will be able to learn history from a different perspective as well. History is such a complex subject because it has different sides of the story. By learning and understanding different contexts of the same story, the student will be able to better understand the overall picture.

The main important aspect of studying abroad in my opinion is being able to first hand experience a different culture. Learning about different countries and culture are completely different then if you were to be living in in that unfamiliar country. The student will be able to attain the correct cultural appropriation for themselves, and then pass it on to their experience to the people in their lives. This will improve the overall cultural awareness of the location of choice. With culture experience, a student is also able to observe different points of views. This is also important because it allows the student to be able to develop their own opinion and point of view from hearing the different opinions. Through this experience, the student will be able to take into account what was learned, and apply it to their daily life instead of just repeating what was heard from others.

As a Hispanic woman, I can emphasize how critical it is to have diversity in a social system. When a student studies abroad, the gain from the diverse experience will be larger than if they were to stay within the United States. Therefore, I believe that studying abroad should be required from the universities, as long as appropriate measures are taken to aid the student financially. After thinking it through, I have followed up with the correct procedure in order to study abroad in Germany because I know that an opportunity like this could not be passed.