UT ranks second in SEC for students studying abroad | Academics

UT is second only to the University of Georgia for the largest number of students studying abroad in the SEC.

One thousand, seven hundred and fifty-three UT students studied abroad in 2023-24. For UGA, that number was 4,125. UT rivals the University of Alabama’s 1,472 students and the University of Florida’s 1,194 students who studied abroad between 2023-24.

UT offers a variety of programs abroad for all majors in various countries during the fall or spring semester, as well as during the mini-term or summer break. Students and professors say they gain valuable skills and experiences while abroad, including navigating new cultures, expanding their perspectives and gaining a better understanding of themselves.

“Everybody grows as a person. You get to know yourself better and you get a different perspective on your own culture,” Harriet Bowden, who is leading a UT abroad trip to Seville, Spain, said.

Some students say their experiences abroad have helped them better appreciate their own culture. Evan Baker, a junior engineering student, studied abroad through a cultural immersion trip in Puerto Rico, where he was reminded of his fortune as an American.

“It opened my eyes to a lot of things about what Puerto Rico goes through being a U.S. territory and a country of its own, because we ourselves have more to say in what goes on in Puerto Rico than Puerto Ricans themselves,” Baker said. “We have so many freedoms and opportunities that other people don’t have.”

Students also develop skills like problem-solving and the ability to work with diverse peers, which make them more marketable in the job market.According to a 2019 NAFSA report, there are over 31 million job openings that require the skills a student acquires while studying abroad.

UT students also gain language skills while immersing themselves in different cultures. Seniors Kate Wainright and Lily Berger studied abroad in Alicante, Spain, in a homestay where their host family only spoke Spanish.

“Having to wake up and remember to speak Spanish — it was a whole adjustment, ” Wainright said.

Wainright became extremely sick for a week while they were abroad. Luckily, she had a strong support system in Spain — her host family even watched “Riverdale” in Spanish with her while she was sick. That support from both her host family and Berger enriched her cultural immersion.

“I still had an amazing experience. I was having to stay at home and really hang out with the family more. It was kind of a unique perspective,” Wainright said.

Many of the UT abroad experiences are meant to complement students’ majors and minors. For instance, Maywyn Haydamack, a UT senior majoring in communications and minoring in business administration, participated in UT’s Communicating Across Cultures program in Dublin, Ireland, in the summer of 2024.

“Being abroad definitely helped a lot,” Haydamack said. “We were able to observationally study how people communicate there and how different it was from the U.S., and all of the similarities.”

Haydamack even created a project on how to start a new company or bring a company to Dublin, using effective communication tailored to Dublin’s communication culture.

Beyond the classroom, Haydamack experienced personal growth.

“It grew my confidence a lot. I never grew internationally by myself,” Haydamack said.

Programs abroad are designed to provide students with time to travel to new places. At Lorenzo de’ Medici, a UT direct school in Florence, Italy, students don’t have class on Friday, allowing them to travel on the weekends. Senior Emma Maaske studied abroad at Lorenzo de’ Medici during the spring of her junior year.

“My roommates and I went somewhere new, like, pretty much every weekend. It is really cool to experience different cultures, eat different food and go shopping in different places, all the time. While still being able to be in Florence during the week, we can eat at lots of different restaurants and go to different museums,” Maaske said.