Making It Fresh

Education abroad has traditionally been seen as something that students pursue only when they become juniors or seniors, but administrators are increasingly encouraging sophomores and even freshmen to go abroad: The Institute of International Education’s latest Open Doors report shows that 3.9 percent of U.S. education abroad students were freshmen—up from 3.1 percent the decade before.

Although the duration and type of these efforts varies according to the needs and goals of the universities, they are united by indications that sending students abroad earlier brings more benefits to both the student and the institution.

Doing It Differently

Reflecting the wide diversity of U.S. campuses and their reasons for sending students abroad, their initiatives cover a wide spectrum of approaches. Some institutions, such as New York University and Florida State University (FSU), utilize branch campuses and overseas study abroad sites to allow students to spend their entire freshman year abroad. FSU freshmen can spend their first year at one or more of FSU’s four study abroad sites in the United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, or Panama. Students can complete their general education requirements and then receive in-state tuition for the remainder of their education at the main campus in Tallahassee.

Other institutions use their own overseas sites to offer short-term first-year programs abroad. Freshmen at St. John’s University, for instance, take a seven-day trip to the institution’s campus in Rome and study abroad site in Paris as an experiential component of a full-semester course.

St. John’s University has also used its first-year abroad