A Word to Prospective Students of Study Abroad Immersion Programs

I might not be very popular with the OIEC staff after this post, but I think it needs to be said for the benefit of the program as a whole.

When I signed up for this program, the last Spanish class I had was as a sophomore in high school, 1992.  Yeah, I'm that old.  At any rate, I hadn't used my Spanish extensively at all since then.  It was somewhere in the back of my head, but I was nowhere near able to carry a conversation.  Knowing this, I got a hold of some Spanish audiobooks and brushed up on my skills.  It helped a little bit, but it still wasn't a lot.

Here's the point.  The program says that you don't need any Spanish to sign up for the immersion program.  And that's correct, you don't- if you're okay with making your host family and the instructors at the ICLC very uncomfortable and difficult to do their role\job.  This was what happened to me.  My poor host mother, I love her to death, had to speak quite a bit of English to me just so we could communicate about meals, what time I needed to be somewhere or come home, and all of the other things that normally come very naturally in your own tongue.  At school, I would sit and listen to my instructor speak, and would maybe get a few words that I understood, and really just look around to see what the other students were doing.  Some instructors would actually speak some English to me because, if they didn't, there's no way I would have gotten anything out of the lessons.

And that's all my fault.  I'm not blaming anyone for the difficulties I've had.  It's been a wonderful program and I wouldn't trade it for the world.  I just wish I had prepared myself better for the trip so I wouldn't have put my host mother and the instructors at the ICLC in the uncomfortable position of teaching someone well below the level of Spanish they are probably more used to seeing.

Why bring this up now, when I only have 3 days left?  I hope that this blog is used by the OIEC staff to show a first hand account of what the immersion program and field biology program is like.  I think it would be a wonderful resource for incoming students to prepare themselves for what will easily be a trip of a lifetime.  With that in mind, if I could make two recommendations, one to the incoming students, and one to the staff.

To the students, I would suggest that you take even a conversational Spanish course before coming down.  You register for this trip usually in mid winter term, so plan to take a Spanish class in Spring term before the trip.  It will make your life, and your host, and the instructor's, so much better.

To the OIEC staff, I would suggest making sure that incoming students are prepared for what total immersion will be like, and that they plan to have some formal Spanish education before the trip.  I know that you have to get students enrolled to fill the quota so the trip can even go, but I don't think emphasizing the importance of Spanish language training before the trip would have turned off anyone in my group.  We would have made the necessary course changes to be prepared to have a great time here.