Meet our Students Abroad bloggers!
Every year, third-year students in the Bachelor of International Business program leave Ottawa and the Carleton campus to spend an entire academic year studying abroad at one of our partner institutions.
During the first two years in the program, BIB students take intensive language courses in a language new to them. During this year abroad, students are fully immersed in a country and culture where that language is spoken, developing language fluency, cultural awareness and cross-cultural skills.
Let’s meet this year’s Sprott BIB bloggers who are sharing their experiences with us!
Caroline Pogue – Madrid, Spain
Caroline is in Madrid, Spain studying at Universidad Autonoma de Madrid. She’s no stranger to Europe, having lived in Belgium for a few years as a child, but is very excited to practice her Spanish and experience all that Spain (and the rest of Europe) has to offer. She also looks forward to putting her Spanish into practice and doing some humanitarian work in South America one day.
See what Caroline has been up to in her first couple of months studying abroad!
Jessica Rutley – Vienna, Austria
Twitter: @JessicaRutley5 Instagram: jessicarutley
Jessica is spending her year abroad in Austria where she is practicing her German and studying at the University of Vienna. Jessica is from Berwick, Ontario, a small rural town of about 150 people, but she’s been lucky enough to have travelled to 19 different countries on four continents already! She updates her travel map as soon as she’s visited someplace new and hopes to have visited all seven continents some day.
Check out her first blog post about exploring Vienna!
Priya Balakumar – Guadalajara, Mexico
Twitter: @priya_ab5
Priya is studying and blogging from Tec de Monterey in Guadalajara, Mexico. She took a Spanish class in high school and fell in love with the language. She hopes to experience as much of the Latin culture as she can while she’s abroad and has even signed up for salsa dancing and Mexican cuisine cooking classes!
Follow Priya’s love affair with the Latin culture during her first two weeks in Mexico!
Jessica Tan – Shanghai, China
Jessica is studying at Shanghai International Studies University in China. She already speaks Cantonese with her family and regularly visits Hong Kong, so she decided that learning Mandarin would be the best fit for her. It would not only benefit her in her business education, but it also allow her to connect with her heritage, since her father’s family is from mainland China. Jessica also hopes to explore Japan and Taiwan during her year abroad.
Read all about Jessica’s first few weeks in Shanghai!
Peter Slivin – Buenos Aires, Argentina
Peter has been studying at Universidad Catolica Argentina in Buenos Aires since February and will continue blogging during his final semester this fall. Peter had never been outside of Canada so this exchange was his first time traveling, too! He’s learned a lot about living and studying abroad. Check out all his experiences so far!