A phrase that I heard a lot growing up was, “If I had known then what I know now…”

The phrase rarely had an end – it was left to the listener to infer what my father would have done in his youth with the wisdom of age, and as I climb further into my third decade of existence, I find myself uttering the same nine words and trailing off in a similar manner. Therein lies the frustration within the blessing of age: the knowledge of how to better without the ability to go back in time and actually do so. But anyway, if I had known then what I know now… 

… I would have gone to college abroad.

By the time I started the second semester of my sophomore year at the University of Maine, I knew that I wanted to study abroad. I had visited a friend in the UK over that Thanksgiving break and fell absolutely in love with it.

I did my research and applied to a program called GlobaLinks Learning Abroad. My family was incredibly supportive, but had no idea how to guide me through this process, so, on my own, I figured out how to apply to the program, the university in the UK, and for a student visa. I spent many hours searching the internet, emailing the study abroad advisor at my university and filling out mundane paperwork (while juggling 5 classes and two part-time jobs), but in September of 2013, I stepped off the plane at Heathrow Airport in London and into an experience that would fundamentally change me.

I graduated from UMaine 5 months later, and went on to receive my graduate degree from Middlesex University in London. I also lived and worked in schools throughout the UK and Ireland in the years following, returning to the US in 2019.

 

****

On the front of my fridge in January of 2025, I have Christmas cards from Matt, Aleks and Kelsey, friends I met during that semester abroad. I’ve gone to weddings – plural! – of the friends I made during that time, I’ve stayed friends with them as they’ve met their partners, found their careers and callings as doctors, government officials, engineers, etc., and seen them begin families of their own. This might not seem like an accomplishment to those of you still in high school or college, but ask a parent or sibling a few years/decades older, and they’ll attest that, once the ease of proximity is over: once you move out of your college town, your friends move to different cities and get jobs, meet partners and have children, maintaining friendships takes effort.

These people are more than Kodak moments… These are my humans; I will have space in my heart for them until the day it ceases to beat, and I am so blessed to have had the opportunity to meet them, which I never would have done had I not studied abroad. 

All that being said, if I knew then what I know now, I would have done it all in the UK. There are so many additional benefits that have nothing to do with character building or social development: tuition is generally less expensive (also typically including room and board!) than US universities, degrees are accepted in the US (excluding certain degrees that require specific licensing like medical and psychological fields), and a student can obtain a Master’s Degree in their subject in four years as opposed to six years in most places in the United States. If I had started my collegiate career in the UK, I could have had a Master’s Degree by age 21.

There are many prestigious and respected universities in the UK and EU beyond Cambridge and Oxford: King’s College London, University College London, Trinity College in Dublin, University of Edinburgh, University of Bristol… This is just a small sample of universities ranked not only the best in the UK, but in the world. 

While I can’t promise that you will also find lifelong friends, I can promise that there are opportunities abroad for a rigorous and robust education at a competitive price. The possibilities are many, the architecture is flawless and the accents are just as good as you hope they’d be.