Bon Voyage

This summer, 24 students will travel to Great Britain and France as a part of the 2012 UCBA British Study Abroad program. The group will be led by Professors Sue Sipple and Eric Anderson.

Most of the students will depart from Cincinnati on June 10th and return on July 5th. However, some students have opted to explore Europe on their own and will return at a later date.

There will be two courses available for the students to enroll in during the summer. Both professors planned courses and trips that will bring their classes to life.

Dr. Sipple's literature course will focus on American expatriate writers living in Europe between the two World Wars. "I'm really looking forward to visiting the places the writers we'll study lived and work," said Sipple. "We can sit in a Paris café where Hemingway wrote parts of The Sun Also Rises, or stand on the doorstep of the place where Gertrude Stein lived and people like Pablo Picasso visited. We can visit the reading room in the British Museum where Ezra Pound read and wrote. That will be amazing!"

Professor Anderson's media course will focus on the impact media can have on cultures around the world.

A significant portion of the 2012 UCBA British Study Abroad program consists of both required and optional field trips that will occur throughout the trip's entirety. London, Paris, Westminster Abbey, and British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) Studios are among the mandatory excursions the group will participate in. The Summer Olympic Facilities, Palace of Versailles, and the Paris Jazz Festival are additional obligatory destinations.

Students may choose to take advantage of additional field trip opportunities including visiting the Eiffel Tower, Buckingham Palace, and the Louvre Museum. The Tower of London and the Victoria & Albert Museum are other available options.

Although most of the participating students are from UCBA, there are some from UC Clifton Campus as well as other colleges. The students participating in this year's program have extremely diverse backgrounds.

The cost of the British study abroad program this year is around $3500, which includes airfare, room and board, transportation, and admission for all the field trips. However, there are many opportunities for students to gain financial aid. Students can apply to scholarships offered from both UCBA and UC International at the UC Clifton Campus.

In preparation for the program, participants are required to attend a total of four pre-trip meetings that will provide more information about studying abroad. These events will additionally give students the opportunity to socialize with other members of the program before embarking on the trip. The meetings consist of the UC International Orientation on April 21, a behavior workshop on May 5, a pre-trip social activity on May 19, and the Bon Voyage Potluck on June 3. More information about these activities will be provided closer to their occurrence.

As the days dwindle before their departure, students participating in the 2012 UCBA Great Britain Study Abroad program anxiously await a trip that they will not soon forget. For more information about the 2012 UCBA Summer British Study Abroad program, visit http://www.ucblueash.edu/saec/great_britain.html.

http://www.ucblueash.edu/saec/great_britain.html