Is going on Exchange Worth it?

At my school, you can only do in exchange while you are in your junior year. However, it might be detrimental because the credits transferring policy is really messy and might result in a waste of time. Also, junior internship is very important and being away might work against my favour.

3 Comments
 
Best Response

Depends on what you want and who you are.

My take? Definitely go away or do something in Junior Year. When will you be in college again, young, energetic and around so many peers and so much ability to explore and see/learn new things and places?

The answer is: Never.

When will you be able to sit behind a desk and push buttons/get coffee/do excel etc for stuff that doesn't really matter and get paid in exchange? The rest of your life...

Think about it this way. Do you KNOW that you'll get an internship? Do you KNOW that it will lead to an offer? Do you KNOW that you'll like it (or at least learn a lot/give you some guidance)? Maybe you do, and that's awesome and this is what you want. Maybe you really want/need an offer because you have loans to pay off or some other financial need. Or maybe you are just stoked about working and want the best chance at getting a job...

The same questions could be asked about the exchange program. Do you KNOW that you will enjoy it? KNOW that you'll meet cool people/learn a lot, explore etc?

You have to answer these questions and see what is most important to you.

All things equal, I would not exchange my exchange semesters (I did more than one) for anything. I would not have some of the phenomenal friends I have today or even my job. My life would be totally different and probably kind of boring. But that's just me...

Good Luck

I used to do Asia-Pacific PE (kind of like FoF). Now I do something else but happy to try and answer questions on that stuff.
 

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