Study abroad program in Vietnam

Students leave with practical and everyday understandings of a country and a people, wrote Higgins via e-mail, adding that service learning and the roommate option have the biggest impact on experiencing day to day life.Higgins was the program director for a Washington, D.C.-based organization’s study abroad program in Vietnam for three years before joining Loyola in July 2009. As a result, he has been able to see the country’s development firsthand. Though he said Vietnam is showing increased global integration, improved freedoms in daily life and rapid economic growth, he also said that the country faces struggles with growing inequality and environmental degradation; however, he is confident the students studying abroad in the country will have a rich experience.

Living in Vietnam can be challenging at times for foreigners, but not so much that students feel overwhelmed, wrote Higgins. Ho Chi Minh City offers a wide range of the unknown for students to explore, while also providing opportunities for the familiar.Linda Ho and Wendy Tran, both seniors, were able to travel to Vietnam for six weeks last summer as part of Loyola’s pilot program. Both Vietnamese Americans, they were grateful for the opportunity to explore the country where their families had been raised.It was my opportunity to see where my parents grew up, said Ho, 22, a psychology major.

Vietnam is more than just war. When I think of Vietnam, I think of culture, food and my family back home.Freshman Catie Vernon was happy Loyola had initiated the program, but said she has plans to study in Europe instead.It’s a good step to take to have that available for people,said the political science major, but I think it would be really hard to adapt to their language and culture. I honestly don’t know that much about Vietnam besides the war.Both Ho and Tran are quick to promote the county.

The spirit of the Vietnamese people is just so infectious, said Tran, also a psychology major.It’s different than Europe, but why not force yourself to be in a challenging environment where you have peers who are experiencing the same thing? Ho said.Another plus for many students is the relatively low cost of the program.It’s low-cost but big adventure, said Day. It’s one of the least expensive ways to study abroad but one of the most rewarding experiences you’ll ever have.Freshman English and theatre major, Chris Thoren is already toying with the option of spending a semester in Vietnam.In America, Vietnam has been so demonized because of the war, and the American perspective on it doesn’t do the country justice, said the theater and English major. It would provide a perspective that history books can’t and one that you can’t gain in an American classroom. There’s no simulation for going to Vietnam.