The Foreign Service Journal, June 2015

100 JUNE 2015 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL EDUCATION SUPPLEMENT FLO: Staying connected to family and friends back home is important to most travelers. How did you communicate with them throughout your gap year? BC: I bought a SIM card and used my phone, which also had Internet, so I used “Whatsapp” to talk to them; and, occa- sionally, I made phone calls. I got a pre- paid SIM card from the phone company there [Kenya] that wasn’t too expensive, and that’s how I stayed in contact with my family and friends. FLO: One would guess that day-to-day life was not always easy for you. What are some of the challenges you faced, and how did you deal with them? BC: I think the biggest challenge for me was learning how to take care of myself and become more self-sufficient. In the camp experience, all of us had to manage our own laundry, cooking preparations and cleanup. I had to hand wash my clothes every day because there were no washing machines available. Our clothes got so dirty from all of the construction work we were doing. The local staff showed us how they washed clothes, rubbing them together with a lot of force and a lot of soap. After a couple of tries, I got the hang of this and learned how to do it so that my clothes were clean. We would hang our wet clothes out in the Kenyan sunshine, and they would dry very fast. It was also a bit hard in the beginning adjusting to being away frommy family, friends and the comforts of home, but that faded pretty quickly as I got to know my campmates and started to engage in our work and experience the fun adven- tures. FLO: Making sure you had everything you needed must have been a concern. What did you bring with you that you wish you hadn’t, and what did you not bring that you wish you had? “Students should definitely have a good idea about what they want to do during their gap year and stay motivated to do just that.” —Brooke Coskuner • Ninety percent of students who took a gap year returned to college within a year. • Gap-year students show a clear pattern of having higher GPAs than would otherwise have been predicted, and the positive effect lasts through all four years. • National statistics show that half of medical school–minded students are taking at least one gap year. The percentage is even higher (60 percent) for undergrads at high-powered research institutions such as Johns Hopkins who are heading for medical schools nationwide. Interesting Gap-Year Facts from AmericanGap.org