Program Reviews

I imagine this is a problem for any program in Florence, but there is very little immersion with API and LDM.

API is great if you have never been abroad before and are nervous, but I felt there was almost too much hand holding.

The accommodations are extremely nice. We had a huge apartment right downtown, within close walking distance of classes... and in a building full of other American students. Yes, the social life can be great, but I didn't go to Italy just to party with other Americans.

The same goes for the classes. The subjects are really interesting, there is some challenge but they aren't overly difficult, but all the other students are American. I had one Mexican girl in my Intermediate Italian class, and the rest were Americans. There is no difference of perspective, except perhaps from your teachers (at least most are Italian).

Overall, there is a lot of support in this program, great housing, interesting classes, and little cultural immersion. My Italian only improved because I had some previous study, my professor was challenging, and I traveled a lot and stayed with Italians (luckily, my roommate had relatives still living in Italy).

Too many of the students go with closed minds and spend all their time partying in Florence's clubs with other Americans and the Italians who party there just to meet Americans. Then they sit and complain that they can't split checks when they go out to dinner or that things aren't exactly like America. I have nothing against sorority girls from Long Island, but they seemed to make up 75% of the students and they had no interest in having any kind of an authentic experience.

Lastly, this is a pretty expensive program. It includes a lot of field trips, including an overnight one in a hotel, but I would have rather paid less and just done those trips on my own. (Again, more hand holding.) The housing must also be extremely pricey. I wouldn't mind living a little further out of the city around actual Italians. I was prepared to live in a tiny apartment, not a gigantic loft.

All of these views are from my experience in Spring 2007, so perhaps things have changed. Just my opinions.

I went to Buenos Aires for an internship in June 2012 for two months. It was my first trip flying solo and my first time in South America too! So yea I had nerves!

My host family was the best! They were the sweetest old couple and reminded me of my own grandparents :)

For one month I took spanish classes at Mundo Espanol and then for the second month I worked at a hostel.

At the hostel I worked Wednesday - Sunday from 8:30 am til 2:30 pm and I helped with serving breakfast in the mornings, and then in the afternoons I would assist the receptionist with reservations and promote day-to-day activities.

Overall I would definitely reccomend this for anyone who really wants to explore a new country or city and experience an amazing culture. I made lots of friends, had great memories and now I feel like it's my second home!

I participated in Aspire by API's program in Salamanca last summer (2011) and had the time of my life. In Salamanca there were other high school groups but our's was by far the best. We had activities planned every afternoon, went on weekend excursion, and had the best directors.

The day started with a few hours of classes at the University of Salamanca. Ignoring the wonderful teachers, just the fact that it is the third oldest university in the world is so cool. Think 1215! The classes were small 15-20 and the teachers very enthusiastic. I loved going to classes because they were interesting and I got to hang out with people (mostly college students) from around the world. I'm still in touch with a girl from Korea.

I stayed with a home-stay and went home for lunch around 2pm. My host mom always made tons of delicious food. At first I felt bad because in Spain it is rude not to eat it all but I talked to her and explained that my stomach can't handle three big courses and a dessert. She understood and gave me smaller potion sizes.

After lunch (comida, for some reason they don't call it almuerzo) I would take a short siesta before going out into the town. We would shop or just hang out for a couple hours until 4-6 depending on what activity was planned that day. The activities were amazing we had cooking, salsa, and painting classes, visited museums, went on bike tours, ect.

Spaniards eat dinner late around 8-10 and it is a much lighter meal than lunch. I would usually go out after dinner but sometimes I would just stay and talk with my host mom or watch T.V. with her. She worried when we went out at night but understood the charms of the city.

Salamanca is an extremely safe city. I walked back to my apartment around 12-1 by myself a few times and felt completely safe. It is a perfect city for young people to be by themselves for the first time.

I could go on and on about how wonderful this program is but I hope you will take my word for it. I wish I could have done another program with Aspire by API this summer but I had to work:( I am planning on attending college in Spain because of this program. Thank you Marc and everyone else behind it.

I participated in Aspire by API's University of Salamanca summer program in 2011, and the summer before that I joined Aspire by API in Paris.

Salamanca is an amazing city, especially for young students studying abroad. It is small and safe, and Aspire by API gives the right amount of supervision to allow for independence while also ensuring security. Nearly every afternoon, API has great cultural activities planned daily to allow for students to get acquainted with the city before they explore on their own. API took us out to tapas restaurants, salsa classes, museums, cafes, and even to see the Spanish release of the seventh Harry Potter movie.

API offers the option to live in either a residencia or host family. I loved living in the residencia because it gave me the opportunity to become great friends with students in other programs and have a ready-made group of friends to explore the city with. However, the students in the host families also had great experiences and enjoyed having their very own Spanish mother. Many of them lived in the same building or on the same block so they were also able to travel the city together.

The University of Salamanca has an incredible summer language program. On the first day of class you test into one of a wide range of levels. The teachers are amazing, the classes are small, and you really get a good handle on grammar, writing, and comprehension. One month after never having taken Spanish before and I tested into the 3rd semester of Spanish at Notre Dame. Additionally, API staff were there every step of the way, ensuring that we were placed into the right classes and had a handle of the Spanish University system.

Finally, weekend excursions were amazing: we stayed at nice hotels, ate out at nice restaurants, took surfing lessons, etc. We traveled to Spanish beaches, specifically Santander. We made it over to Oporto, Portugal and took a wine tour. Then, we explored Madrid and Toledo. Nearby our hometown, Salamanca, we went kayaking and then took a long hike which ended in the adorable ciudad Rodriguez. I have several friends that studied or traveled abroad through similar programs to API and have come to conclude that API is a great deal and a great program. I have traveled with API twice now, and will be studying abroad with them again this summer. I think that this in itself speaks to how much I enjoyed the program.

I don't know where to begin or how to express the impact API Grenoble has had on my life. I'd like to start by stressing that no matter where you study abroad, you are bound to meet wonderful people and make life long friends. Above all, I'm incredibly grateful to have had this experience because through it, I have met my best friend and I know that I have multiple families here in France.

More about API Grenoble. I think that our resident directors are the greatest asset to this program. They help us with cultural discovery, problems with family, problems with french bureaucracy, with homesickness, etc. They are always around to listen to you, generally with chocolates and tissues at hand. It's wonderful because you have both the perspective of a traditional french woman and that of an american living in France. They are kind and caring--it feels as if they are your friends but also your mothers. The excursions they plan are always enjoyable and I leave them feeling like I've learned that much more about the french language, history, and culture.

If you do choose API Grenoble, make sure you do a homestay! I live with a single mother (both of her children are out of the house). She provides me with at least 2 meals a day, but seeing as how she loves to cook I often eat more than that. Most of her friends and one of her siblings are also hosts. So, we often have huge dinner parties and when my mother is out of town, I'm invited over to everyone else's house for dinner. Some activities that I enjoy with my host mom and other host families: dinners, trips to the movies, hiking in the mountains, trips to the country, museum visits, etc.

Some other cool things I've been able to do through API:
1) Volunteering at a primary school--you can either teach english or you can simply hang out with kids during recess and lunch. A great opportunity to practice your french with the harshest (and cutest) of critics.

2)Language exchanges. Every Friday, I go to a café to participate in a group language exchange. We speak in French and English but sometimes you catch a little Italian, maybe some Spanish, and the list goes on. I've become good friends with the people that go, and we meet multiple times a week to practice our French and English.

I could go on and on about this program. But I think what's most telling is that, I have 15 days left and I'm dreading leaving. I can honestly say that I've been able to develop my language skills here but I've also learned a lot about myself. And isn't that the point?

I couldn't have been more pleased with my API Florence experience. The staff was extremely helpful, the city was amazing, the trips were well organized and fun, and the classes were so enjoyable. I learned so much in such a short time and had a blast in the process. Plus, we all made lifelong friends from all over.

Overall, the semester of my gap year spent in Paris with Aspire by API was above average - but not phenomenal. The program is well organized and the school is excellent, however I didn't feel that API did enough for its gap year students specifically. There were very few of us, and we did everything that the college students did - no more, no less. I wish that there had been some separate get-togethers planned for the gap year students, as we definitely had some different concerns than did the college students.

As for living arrangements, I chose to live in the dormitory, and honestly I don't think this was a great choice. The dorm is alright, but not ideal. API does a great job finding host families from what I could tell by visiting friends staying with local families. I also think that much more would be gained (in terms of language, culture, assimilation, etc.) by having opted to live in a home than in a dorm. The the main dorm used by API is intended for American students, so there is not very much intercultural interaction.

While my experience with Aspire by API did not quite measure up to the standard set by my first gap year semester program, this was not at all entirely API's fault. Most of my discontent - and again, it's not that I had an awful time, overall I gained a lot from the semester - came from issues with other students. I do wish that the program coordinators in Paris had been a little more welcoming so I would have felt more open to talking to them, but they mostly did what they could for so many students. When I lost my wallet at 1am, I was able to call one of the coordinators and she was very helpful despite the fact that I had woken her up.

Paris is an incredible city, and I think that any chance to live there should absolutely be taken. Aspire by API has room to grow, but the program absolutely provides for its students and should be considered when planning a gap year.

Studying through API in Buenos Aires was probably the best experience of my life so far. In between the going to class I was able to meet many interesting people from Argentina and also from around the world. The classes that I was able to take varied immensely. There were business classes, history classes,language classes, and even the opportunity to take classes with the Argentine students that were studying there.
A normal day consisted of going to class and then just exploring the city. There are so many interesting things to do in Buenos Aires. There is a zoo next to Plaza Italia, while I was there there was a large book fair with books from all around the world.
API is great because they let you travel when you want. You are required to attend a majority of you classes by the university, but API allows you to go on weekend trips. They do also have some sponsored cultural trips to an estancia, or ranch, and when I was there we went to Iguazu to see the falls and visit a nature conservatory.
Argentina is also a great place to study because the people are very friendly. Yes, the do appreciate it a lot if you attempt to speak Spanish to them, but there is a large population of people in Buenos Aires that speak both Spanish and English so you will be able to find your way without too much trouble.
API has a short program that they put the students who are arriving through. This program talks about the history of Argentina and the culture. It also informs students about how to be safe while they are walking around and out at night and the normal stuff that you would want to find out about a country. Yes, crime does happen, but the support staff from API was always helpful to the students that they were in charge of taking care of throughout the semester.
I cannot stress enough how much I enjoyed this program. You were normally able to find anything that you needed within your community, and anything that you could not find the support staff was able to help you find.
The last thing that I will leave you with is the food. I really enjoyed the food. It was a lot of meats, chicken and beef, and there was a lot of rice and bread as well. The food is not spicy like many people think all Spanish food is. In fact, one of the host families of my friends would always warn him whenever they put black pepper, something that is used all the time in the US, on the food because to them it was spicy.
Overall, I really enjoyed this program and would definitely refer anyone, friend or otherwise, to go to Buenos Aires through API.

Although living abroad was at the top of my priorities in life when I arrived in Costa Rica, I never once took it seriously. I felt it was more of an obligation to my travelself than the student in me. If it was going to happen, it would unfold organically, as part of my travel experience, and not something I was going to go out of my way for.

I arrived in Costa Rica more than a week before the semester began - to get a scope of the area, the culture, and the language. I had absolutely no Spanish in my arsenal (which should never stop anyone from going anywhere), and wanted some first-hand stories before the inevitable Orientation, where we'd be equally fresh meat to be cleaved. Within days I was staying with a local on the rural Caribbean coast. It would shape the rest of my experience in Central America, which went far beyond a semester in San Jose.

The host family was for the most part wonderful, and in that neighborhood I have friends whom I've gone back to visit long after school was out. Be careful of the maids, however. My first few days in the home of my hosts, more than a little bit of plata - cash - went missing. It showed up later, after a diplomatic inquiry, in a very peculiar spot.

It would behoove the student to be clear with what they wish to eat while living with their host families. Usually one will end up with traditional Tico fare - rice and beans with meat or fish, and occasionally plantanos - friend plantains, which are very popular (and for good reason). However, there are subtleties that go misunderstood sometimes, such as the idea that if something has a US American label or stigma attached to it, that all people from that place love and consume it. Coffee is a perfect example: Costa Rica produces arguably the best coffee in the world (I didn't drink it until I moved there, so delicious and rich is it), yet ticos may go out of the way to buy Folgers Instant coffee (at far greater expense than the higher quality local stuff) because they may think their students may prefer it. As a result of such confusion, for weeks my roommates and I were subject to hot dogs and Fruit Loops for breakfast, which is not good for vegetarians about to spend four hours in an intensive Spanish course (sugar crashes at 10 a.m. sharp). We first thought it rude to revise our wanted menus - do not make this mistake.

Also, another important note is that the families are being paid relatively good money to take care of you, and some entrepreneurial folks do student housing for only that reason. On more than one occasion friends of mine (including a roommate of mine) left the originally-assigned host home for one that suited them better. Do not hesitate to ask for this if you want it.

The API program directors, Esteban and Francy, were consistently available if not present, and communication was not a problem. Over the course of the semester, however, some of the other students in my program and I discussed issues with how the money was handled by API; for example, on 'mandatory' trips (which were understood to be 'all expenses paid' by our program fees), we were obligated to pay for meals, even those we all ate together on the way to our destination.

None of us thought this fair, as we felt that if the trip was mandatory and we'd already paid for transport and accommodations, why were meals not included? Freedom of choice was one reason given, which was valid, but in this case a per diem would have provided for that and alleviated some negative feelings.

One essential piece of information which needed to be more clear upon class signups was how the credit distribution works: in my case, I was under the impression that when I signed up for a Spanish class, I would be in the class for the duration of the semester. It turned out to be a one-month intensive class, followed by a month-and-a-half of the elective classes I signed up as auxiliaries.

As a result, when the uni class ended, I signed up for a local language course in my neighborhood. It was perhaps the best decision I made in San Jose - a direct injection into the local culture. It was exactly what I was looking for in my semester of study abroad, and it had very little to do with university at all. Not having read the fine print before my trip made my experience the richer.

My experience in Costa Rica was unique to the lot of them, and saw myself as a special case there - I was 25 and had just started university. Many of those I met were about to graduate, and barely old enough to drink in the States. In theory, it does not sound unreasonable - I wasn't the oldest student there by any means - but it made connections more difficult and tenuous. I was well past my party-all-night days (unlike, for example, my roommate, who saw our apartment next to the host home as the perfect place to host parties), and found the opportunity to integrate into the local culture rather than the imported one as less a challenge than escape.

With regards to safety, one must understand that San Jose is not an inherently safe, or particularly friendly, place. The people are generally kind, but the city dulls its beauty with fear, and bears a sad amount of 'security' gates and guards. There are graffiti stencils everywhere around the city that read 'Imaginate San Jose Sin Rejas.' Imagine San Jose without bars. Give it a shot, but be careful where you walk. And, a small piece of advice: don't walk into Barrio Cristo Rey, especially with a backpack full of valuables. You might walk out of the neighborhood with your life, but not with your stuff. To the adventurous who might read and think 'exaggeration', try it. Go ahead.

There were beautiful aspects of my study abroad experience, while others decidedly less so. Many of the former had little to do with the program directly, but would not have happened were it not for every element, including my choice to go with API, falling into place like it did. Such as in travel, and life.

Would I recommend this program to a friend? I would mention it to them. I would tell them what I knew about it, and suggest they look at all of their options. I arrived in Costa Rica because I spun a globe and my finger landed near its Caribbean coast. An API brochure just happened to have Costa Rica listed in it. If I had done more research, perhaps I could have found something more preferable - I heard both positive and negative reviews of other programs, and in my opinion, API's features fell somewhere in the middle. But I didn't, ended up where I did, and given the chance to do it again, I would without hesitation.

This program was great for me, because I chose (and was accepted to) the immersion with Spaniard students option. If you can't get into this program, Salamanca might not be the place to go. API is great, but if you want to meet students from there, the best option is to take class with them. If you're looking for rewarding but tough academics, this is also your only option (although the spanish classes that API provides are great, because the teachers really know what they're doing and try to make class interesting).

API allows for a lot of travel, and even takes you many places which is a plus, we went to Paris for free as well as Barcelona. It was so exciting. And the directors and counselors we had contact with were so welcoming and understanding and always available for anything we needed. This was definitely the plus of the program.
Salamanca itself is a great, but small city. You can walk literally everywhere. So if you're a big-city person, you might like Madrid more, but I personally felt safer than ever in this city and no taxi fare ever!
In general, the problem isn't with API, its with the level of spanish you go with on this program. I would recommend it for high level spanish speakers who want to improve their 'Spain' spanish, and take classes seriously.