Adam Lovell, a junior majoring in Middle Eastern studies, argues that the Office of Study Abroad is not the only way to get a good overseas experience during college.

If you are beginning to look at your study abroad options for next year, and your interests are similar to mine, I imagine you might be disappointed. I just finished my semester abroad and there were two key elements I wanted to get out of my experience: language acquisition and an interesting cultural experience in an interesting place. As a student of Arabic, I looked exclusively at programs in the Middle East. I failed to find a program at GW that fit both of these requirements. All programs offered by GW were either in culturally barren cities or were programs that didn’t offer the level of language study I wanted.