On Feb. 23, the Study Abroad Program Fair was held on campus in the Pioneer Student Center in an attempt to get students involved in studying abroad. Some booths not only had country information but also a UW-Platteville student who had visited the country to share their experiences and incite on what they knew about that country.

UW-P offers many exchange programs like Seville, Spain; London, England; Rome, Italy; Nagasaki, Japan; Suva, Fiji; Wuhan, China and Newcastle, Australia, which were represented at the fair. These programs allow students to exchange from partner institutions for a semester, a year or during the summer.

Photograph by Lacey Vandermeer
Jenni Krahn, animal science major, and Molly Mroth, graduate assistant, discuss traveling.

If UW-P does not have a country a student is looking for, they are encouraged to go through other programs offered at different schools. Not only Abroad Programs, UWP’s International Exchange Office, UWP’s Study Abroad Office, Confucius Institute, College Consortium for International Studies programs, Short-Term Faculty-Led program and International Business Resource Center programs.

“Studying abroad has been the best decision I have made within my college career,” AJ Dexheimer, communication technologies major, said.

Dexheimer said he learned more about himself by studying in Fiji than he thought he could by just staying here in Wisconsin.

“Our school has a great program to go through, it’s well organized and very friendly,” Dexheimer said.

Jennifer Krahn, animal science major, is very involved with the on campus study abroad program, after studying in Holland for a year. She currently works as an intern for the study abroad institute.

“Everyone needs to travel and see another part of the world because, not only does it look good on a resume, but it’s a lot of fun,” Krahn said. “It’s a great experience to meet new people; really find yourself.”

The program fair had a good turnout. A lot of students who were already interested came and found out more about what they were looking for. Students also received more help in where they wanted to go.

There were new students as well that were wanting to go abroad but didn’t know a lot about the program, so these students ended up receiving a lot of information about what they were looking for.

Russell Braby, the marketing and outreach specialist for the UW-P Study Abroad Institute, said that students who couldn’t make it to the fair should go onto the Web site or come talk to one of the student representatives who have come back from studying abroad to give more insight. The Study Abroad office is located in 122 Royce Hall.

“We can find programs for all majors and to any place a student would like to go,” Braby said. “There are a lot of great opportunities within the program.”