Studying Abroad Issues - Essay Example

Running Head: Studying Abroad Studying Abroad [Institute’s Studying Abroad Introduction Every year, many travel to different parts of the world, in search of better education. Without any doubts, this remains a tough decision for these students and they under go a process of thorough examination of the benefits and costs associated with this decision. People who advocate that studying abroad is not a good option put a lot of emphasis on the risks and costs associated with it. According to them, studying abroad requires a student to adjust into new and unseen environment within no time. One may end up being homesick. In fact, living in a new country with new people means that you would have to leave your culture, food, language, attire, and way of living to adopt the host country’s way of living (DuFon & Churchill, pp. 74-85, 2006). People who have strong associations which their culture, family, friends and surroundings may find it the most difficult part of their live to adjust in a new environment. Moreover, studying abroad requires huge amount of investment and is quite expensive. Many students live alone in the new country thus increasing their cost of living to a further limit. However, this paper aims at proving that the benefits of studying abroad outweigh the costs associated with it. The rest of this paper would attempt the same by presenting a few supporting points. Discussion The biggest advantage associated with studying abroad is that it provides an excellent opportunity to the students to learn English in an entirely different way. Important here to note is that the majority of the students who decide to study abroad take the tickets for countries like United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Sweden or other western countries (Byram & Feng, pp. 14-19, 2006). Clearly, the dominant language in all these countries is English and this gives the foreign students to learn this language from the native speakers of English language. Research has shown that even the poorest speakers of English language, when live for quite some time in a western environment, showed considerable improvement at their skills of speaking and understanding the language. Experts say that there is no better way to learn anything but through constant practice and repetition. Living with new people and surrounded by them makes you learn that new language on the same mentioned principle. Important here to note is that education is not just for the sake of it. The most important goal of education remains to prepare and equip students with tools, approaches and knowledge, skills and abilities that can help them to face their future difficulties and uncertainties. The biggest difficulty that these students would face in their professional lives would be regarding the ruthless marketplace, where they would work (Dowell & Mirsky, pp. 22-27, 2002). The world knows that the market of today is the most competitive and ruthless of all. Organizations feel the pressure of ensuring their survival for which employers want the best possible employees from the market. Now, important here to note is the “best possible employees” would not be someone who fulfills the technical job skills, job requirements, and educational qualifications (Princeton Review, pp. 3-7, 2004). However, employers now search for individuals that have the unique ability of coping up with change, possess excellent communication skills, can think out of the box, and have the courage and boldness to take risks and have the entrepreneurial germs in them. Careful analysis reveals that a person who decides to study abroad somehow successfully completes his or her education in that new environment is more likely to posses these qualities any other person. The first requirement is an individual’s ability to cope up with change. What can be a bigger change in anyone’s life than the change of his country, home, friends, environment, surroundings, education, food, language, dress, and way of living, habits, thoughts, and others? Moreover, what would a bigger proof of his or her ability to cope with change than their good grades, successful completion of the degree and return as the same as he or she was before leaving? (Byram & Feng, pp. 14-19, 2006) The second important requirement is regarding the student’s ability to communicate effectively. An expert once said that “need remains the greatest driver for innovation and invention” (McKeown, pp. 146-151, 2009). A student who may have restricted himself or herself to communicate with others in his or her hometown due to shyness, incapability or other reasons would have no choice but to improve his or her communication skills in order to survive in the new environment. The student’s need for survival and achievement would not only lead him or her to the invention of great communication skills but also many other abilities that would the student in the near future (McKeown, pp. 146-151, 2009). The ability to think out of the box is the third requirement. Well known is the fact that educational institutions of many western countries stress a lot of importance on creativity, innovation, out of the box thinking, originality, and inspiration. Therefore, when these students come back to their hometown, they bring along with themselves the concepts of originality and creativity as an integral part of their value system (Princeton Review, pp. 3-7, 2004). This is how they get edge and a competitive advantage over the other potential candidates. The last point was regarding the courage and boldness of taking risks. Quite understandably, the decision of going abroad to study is certainly a courageous and a risky one. Moreover, if an individual survives and does well in the other country as well then it certainly shows that the person has the quality of boldness in him or her. Studying abroad enables the student with different perspectives and dimensions for looking at any thing and it increases the cultural diversity of an individual. Let us consider an example to understand the importance of respect and acknowledgement of cultural diversity and the advantages of having the ability to look at things from different dimensions. Bavarian Motor Works (BMW) is a German automobile manufacturer, which builds its cars in South Africa, Brazil, United States, and India (Dowell & Mirsky, pp. 22-27, 2002). Exxon Mobil is an American firm, which receives more than 75 percent of their revenues from operations conducted outside United States. Finnish employees no longer form the majority at Nokia’s head quarter, which is a Finland based company; surprisingly, employees from China and India dominate the numbers. Moreover, Nokia’ sales would hamper badly if due to any reasons they close exports to Pakistan, which is situated thousands of miles away from Finland. Ford would find itself in big trouble if there were some disturbance in America-Brazil foreign relations because Ford has its manufacturing plant in Brazil despite the fact that it is an American company (Byram & Feng, pp. 14-19, 2006). All of the above-mentioned examples show that world has now become very small and globalization has brought people from different cultures together not by choice but by need. Gone are the days when managers enjoyed dealing only with the people that were similar and known to them. However, today, a manager from any large-scale company would have to deal with people coming from different races, casts, creed, color, languages, nationalities, ethnicities, religious beliefs, demographics, gender, age, sexual orientation, and others (McKeown, pp. 146-151, 2009). This is why companies now search for people who are, within themselves culturally diverse or have the ability and experience to deal with people coming from diverse backgrounds. Moreover, studying abroad provides the students with different dimensions to look at things that are very much in need during the professional lives of those students (Pellegrino, 2009). People who reject the idea of studying abroad based on homesickness or the difficulties and pain involved in the process are actually not making the right assumption at the right place. As mentioned earlier in the paper, the educational system is a way by which a society prepares its future leaders, thinkers, and entrepreneurs (Princeton Review, pp. 3-7, 2004). Imagine if the leaders, entrepreneurs, policy makers, strategists and thinkers of any society do not perform their job well and when asked, they provide their homesickness, inability to travel to other places and assimilate in different cultures as the reasons for their ineffectiveness (McKeown, pp. 146-151, 2009). Therefore, pain and challenges are necessary for students, to prepare them for the upcoming vicissitudes of the life. In fact, with the hurdles and challenges that they encounter during their educational life, give them a taste of what is about to come during the future years. Moreover, the people who reject the idea of studying abroad due to their high costs involved are watching the picture with a narrow lens and in absolute terms (Pellegrino, 2009). However, viewing the same in relative terms and in comparison would provide us with a better conclusion. Firstly, while making decision for investing in anything, people do not consider the cost alone but they actually compare it with the return of investment and the benefits. Since there are so many benefits of studying abroad therefore, the cost seems to be too little in comparison with the benefits. Moreover, the return on this investment would keep on increasing and would never diminish under normal circumstances (Dowell & Mirsky, pp. 22-27, 2002). It does not mean that everyone should actually study abroad but it means that if anyone has the investment and potential and is willing then he or she should go abroad to learn new skills and diversify their knowledge, not only for the benefit of your own but also in the best interests of the society. References Byram, Michael, & Feng, Anwei. (2006). Living and studying abroad: research and practice. Multilingual Matters. Dowell, Michele-Marie., & Mirsky, Kelly P. (2002). Study Abroad: How to Get the Most Out of Your Experience. Prentice Hall. DuFon, Margaret A., & Churchill, Eton. (2006). Language learners in study abroad contexts. Multilingual Matters. McKeown, Joshua S. (2009). The first time effect: the impact of study abroad on college student intellectual development. SUNY Press. Pellegrino, Valerie A. (2009). Student Perspectives on Language Learning in a Study Abroad Context. Frontiers: The interdisciplinary Journal of study abroad. Viewed March 7, 2010, http://www.frontiersjournal.com/issues/vol4/vol4-04_Pelligrino.htm Princeton Review. (2004). Guide to Studying Abroad. The Princeton Review. Read More