College admissions officers flaunt study abroad rates and course credit transfers. At many schools, study abroad opportunities can be the pinnacle of students’ college experiences. Yet, Harvard students rarely study abroad during the fall and spring semesters. Is it due to the lack of opportunity for credit transfer? FOMO if all your friends stay on campus? Pressure to not waste a second of the Harvard education? Studying abroad at Harvard looks different from the average school, but many students still take advantage of international experiences.
The COVID-19 pandemic recently dampened study-abroad opportunities. In the 2021-2022 academic year, less than 6% of all United States undergraduates studied abroad. Even pre-COVID, less than 5% of Harvard students studied abroad during term in 2015, compared with the 23.2% rate at Big 10 schools in 2017. Harvard College’s study abroad website flaunts that “over half of Harvard College students participate in an international experience during their time as an undergraduate.” However, this statement may be misleading, because it could include students who study abroad over the summer or enter other international programs.
Robert H. Fogel ’25 attributes the difference between Harvard and other schools to the culture surrounding study abroad opportunities. “If I look at my friends from home, I’m pretty sure I’m the only one not studying abroad during their junior year,” Fogel said. “I think the reason that I ended up not doing it was simply part of that broader culture. If pretty much all my friends were going to be here at Harvard, it would take a lot to draw me away from all that.”
The majority of Harvard students participating in international excursions capitalize on breaks from school including winter break and summer, rather than the traditional semester abroad experience. Student organizations, such as Youth Lead the Change, Harvard Project for Asian and International Relations, and Harvard Radcliffe Orchestra Foundations, also offer opportunities for students to travel abroad during school breaks or during the summer.
The Independent’s Educational Director, Franny Connors ’26, is considering studying abroad next year but understands why alternative programs are so popular. “There are so many free trips. People who do summer programs can get funding from the Office of International Education.”
Sports teams may also inflate the rate of international student experiences as some go on international trips. Nearly 1,200 students, or 20% of the student body, participate in varsity sports. Over the 2023-2024 winter break, the Golf team went to Australia and New Zealand, and the Women’s Field Hockey team visited Peru. Even if students seek additional experiences to travel and live internationally, taking a semester abroad as a varsity athlete is difficult. Therefore, many choose to go during the summer instead.
Martin Nelson ’25, a member of the Men’s Lacrosse team, studied at the London School of Economics during his first-year summer. “LSE was a great chance to live abroad and get the study abroad experience without sacrificing our ability to train for an extended period of time,” Nelson said. “On our team, and I’m sure all of the others, studying abroad isn’t seen as an option during the school year. I’m grateful that I had the chance to do LSE over the summer.”
Non-athletes also capitalize on summers through Harvard or other schools for study abroad opportunities. Fogel also studied abroad at LSE during his first-year summer. “I saw the freshman summer as a great time where you don’t really have to begin anything in terms of your career aspirations or trying to get a job after you graduate. You were just a freshman, so you have this opportunity to really explore, have fun, and learn in a low-stress environment.”
For other students, a few weeks over the summer is not long enough to provide the cultural and language experiences they desire. “Even if you do six semesters of French at Harvard, it’s just not the same as living in France, where you can speak French every day and become fluent,” Connors said. “It’s also hard to be able to put roots down into place. And then I also want to see other places in Europe. You don’t have much time to do that [in only a few weeks].”
Nevertheless, many students still hold back from studying abroad for fear of wasting one of eight precious semesters at Harvard. Fogel hesitated due to concerns about leaving friends and extracurriculars behind. “There’s often a sentiment that I hear that Harvard is so great. Why would I want to leave Cambridge? What opportunities could be outside Cambridge? And sure, you know, we may have fantastic professors and some of the best departments in the world. But, there’s so much more to learning that takes place outside of those strict definitions within academia, you know, getting to explore a country and interact with people of various nationalities. Those are valuable experiences that many Harvard students won’t have at all.”
Bridget Sands ’24 echoed that sentiment, thinking back to her study abroad experience in Barcelona. “I think back and it almost feels like a fever dream because it was so not a Harvard experience. I learned so much about myself and the world around me in such a different way… This is an experience that you have no idea what you’re missing.”
Credit transfer can also be a concern for students, particularly those with tighter course requirements. Planning credits ahead of time and coordinating with one’s academic departments is essential to making study abroad during the semester a real possibility, particularly for those who change their course of study or who pursue a secondary or citation.
Sands studies Applied Mathematics and was relieved that the department supported her study abroad plans. “Once I realized I could get two credits directly to my major, I was fully signed on because that was my biggest concern,” she said. “Dr. Margo Levine is the Associate Director of Undergraduate Studies in Applied Math. She was amazing in helping me find syllabi and classes that would fit certain credits of my applied math degree, which is huge.”
Betsey Bennett ’24 studies Psychology and studied abroad in Florence. She explains that not all concentration credit is that easy. “In the end, I had to take two classes in my concentration to equal one credit for Harvard, but I was still happy to get some credit.”
Connors summarizes her takeaways from her conversations with other students as she debated studying abroad. “I think there’s kind of an air of regret from upperclassmen and an air of ‘I would never do that’ from underclassmen.”
Term time study abroad is not the norm at Harvard and may never be. Students need to plan far ahead to make it even possible to get credit and be courageous enough to bear the FOMO of a semester away. However, the international travel opportunities from sports teams, student organizations, and summer schools soften the blow of this cultural shortcoming. Students can still soak up their international experiences, even though they might look different from the stereotypical college study abroad.
Hannah Davis ‘ 25 (hannahdavis@college.harvard.edu) studied abroad for six weeks at LSE during first-year summer.