You have to choose the country you want to go to. Picking the country will be very hard, but picking the university can be even harder. I had originally picked Ireland, but after going through the courses at the university I wanted to attend, I didn't find any matches that worked for my major. Then, I went to my next choice: Australia.I also thought that the only way I'd ever get to Australia would be if I studied abroad there.
There are literally programs for every university in Australia whether you go through Australearn (which I did), Mizzou, Butler, or Arcadia. What impacted my choice was the classes offered. I needed to take certain engineering courses while I was abroad so I could stay on course for graduation. In Australia, you use what they call the "Handbook" which tells you everything about the course and where to find its syllabus; in fact, you'll have more trouble finding the syllabus for courses at Mizzou. If you'd like a guarantee that your courses will come back as you need them to, e-mail the Australian course info to the professor who teaches that course. I did this with almost every class and had to fight International Admissions when they tried to tell me a course came back as something else. They can get it wrong!
Some more small things I can pass on:
- Apply as early as possible, you'll get the best housing options available. I had so many different options since I applied so early, I could have lived wherever I wanted (I chose the equivalent of the dorms here aka a college in Australia). And try to live with locals! You came to their country for a reason, you will learn the most about it through them!
- Try to not pick the most obvious, touristy place in the country. I originally did not want to go to Sydney, but course-wise it was the smartest option.
- Semester 1 in Australia is our 2nd Semester, a "course" is a program or like a sequence for us, a "unit" is a course or class to us, a "college" is a dorm, yes, it's like a dorm and a fraternity combined, and 6 credits in Australia (a typical course) is about 3 to 4 hours credit here.
The biggest advice that I got from another Mizzou study abroad alumni was this:
"You can go on a vacation anytime you want; this is the only time you will ever have the chance to become part of another culture." As bad as I want to see every part of Australia and travel every weekend to different cities and places, I want to be a part of the culture more. You only get to study abroad once.
Hope this helps if you're thinking about studying abroad!
