Program Reviews

Uruguay is a place like no other. I may have come here at the wrong time of year (it's winter), but if I hadn't I wouldn't have been able to work at a place that really enjoy.

I'm a college student, and most internships that are out there for people at this level just have you shredding papers and getting coffee. At International House I got the polar opposite. They had me observing classes, working with teachers, running workshops, and substitute teaching. I actually have teaching experience now, which is amazing and surprising from an unpaid internship. It helped that I'm a native English speaker, but they actually had me working and were using my abilities and asking for how I felt about the classes and what my feedback was about them. I actually felt like a valued member of the school. How often can you say that you feel valued at an internship?

Overall, it's been a great experience and I wouldn't trade it for anything.

My trip to Barcelona was a fun one, and one that would not have been possible without Adelante Abroad's affordable prices. I would tell those looking at this program that you do get what you pay for. It's not exactly the fanciest or best internship jobs, but if you're looking to do some work abroad while also enjoying the experience on the cheap, you've got the right company. I'll list my pros, cons, and tips below.

Pros:
- Very affordable program
- Friendly staff; while small, if you call them up during business hours they are quick to help you/inform you about things.
- The people you meet on the program are all very wonderful. You have a sense of comraderie because you're all in the same boat, and going through the language school together really helps.
- The internship can often be very relaxed, which gives you a lot of time to explore where you are and really enjoy your time abroad
- I loved the language school; Kingsbrook was a great place with many new faces and people to meet, and was a great way to really gear up for my stay.
- I had a great experience with my housing. Marta was very sweet. Housing can be a bit of a mixed bag though, depending on your situation. Adelante is a smaller program than you think, so it is much more likely you'll live on your own with the apartment owner, or with one other roommate. I lived independently with the apartment owner and had a good time. Two of my other friends had to switch though because of this woman name Rosa who had previously gotten bad reviews from other people. But everyone else had relatively chill experiences with their apartment owners.

Cons:
- Perhaps the most notable of my experience was that the small staff seemed to be a bit disorganized, particularly when setting up my trip experience. I was not informed of my housing placement until 3 days before I left for Barcelona, when I was according to their website supposed to be informed no later than two weeks before I left. This goes double for my internship placement; not only was I informed late about that as well, but it turned out to be a completely different internship than I had requested. That second part was fine and partially expected (they had not promised I'd get my first choice) but it would have been easier to plan for had it not been so late.
- My internship was not as substantial as I would have hoped, but it's kind of a mixed bag depending on what you request. I worked for an LGBT group, but because it was in Barcelona, the heritage and importance of the group in particular was that it was a Catalan group. Adelante advertises Barcelona as if it is a place that Spanish is used commonly, I believe they say it is "the language of business." While I was able to communicate in restaurants and around town, don't be fooled: Catalan is EVERYWHERE and you will be having to parse it out a lot of the time. If you don't engage in Spanish first, people will speak to you in Catalan. They are proud of their culture/language and will use that first and foremost. This proved to be kind of odd at my job though, because that was a big part of their heritage and pride, so myself and my friend were the odd ones out for not speaking Catalan. That made the placement a bit weird as well.

Tips:
- In Barcelona, expect to speak Catalan and here it/see it everywhere.
- It is advertised/said that you'd probably be staying with a lot of people in your apartment, but it's much more likely you'll live on your own
- Reach out to Adelante by phone rather than by email during their office hours; it's quicker that way.
- Have lots of fun!

I never truly felt completely independent until this experience. My internship placement did not have much work for me so I created a lot of work for myself so that I can grow within my future career. I also wanted to branch out from the people in my program and started to use a traveler's app to meet traveler from all over the world and it helped my branch out of my shy shell. Overall being abroad has made me fearless.

My internship was with a Physical Therapy clinic in Madrid and I absolutely loved the experience. It was much more hands on learning than I could do in the United States. I was able to apply techniques like massage therapy, ultrasound, and go to observe surgeries. The physical therapists I worked with were energetic with their patients and very helpful as they explained to me each of their techniques. They were patient and understanding with my intermediate level of Spanish. If I did not know what they were saying right away they would take the time to explain more to make sure I understood. One of my favorite memories at the clinic was when one of the physical therapists asked me if I could ask the other doctors for a cushion. I misheard the word for cushion in Spanish so I went around the office asking the doctors, “Donde esta el culo?” Once everyone was done laughing at me, I found out I went around the office asking doctors where is the butt. Needless to say I was pretty embarrassed, but everyone thought it was hilarious and it will definitely be a funny story I will remember forever. Overall, I loved my time here in Madrid and I thought the program was fantastic. I learned more Spanish by speaking it everyday with the people I worked with and gained valuable clinical experience in a different culture.

I interned in Madrid for the past two months through the Adelante Abroad program. Adelante essentially sets everything up for you prior to arrival including your internship placement and housing and then you are basically on your own. My girlfriend and I both took part in the Adelante program and were able to live together in an incredibly nice apartment set up by Adelante in a very nice neighborhood of Madrid. It was definitely a relief having an apartment with zero issues, making Madrid instantly feel like home.
The adelante program starts off with two weeks at the Eureka language school where you are completely immersed in Spanish, with zero english speaking allowed in the school. Having very little Spanish background prior to this summer I was definitely overwhelmed in the first 15 minutes at Eureka, but that went away by the end of the first day and I really enjoyed the school and lessons. I actually wish there was someway that the program could work in additional time at Eureka into the 8 week program rather than just the two weeks in the beginning, but I understand that would be difficult with the internship hours the last 6 weeks.

I have a fairly unique major in college, making it somewhat difficult to find an internship placement in Madrid, but Adelante placed me with Sotavento Consultores, a financial consulting firm doing market research analysis and I was very happy with my experience at Sotavento. I was basically independent on my own projects for the entirety of the six weeks interning at Sotavento, allowing me to take on as much as I wanted in terms of workload. The work place is certainly different in Spain than the United States, but Im very grateful to have had the opportunity to see how business is conducted in Spain and to give insight on business in the United States.

I did a significant amount of research before traveling to Spain and decided to purchase an Eurail pass for traveling on weekends and I am incredibly glad I did. I was able to spend two weekends in Barcelona, a weekend in Valencia, San Sebastian and Granada as well as a day in Segovia all without worrying about the cost of point to point train tickets. My time traveling on weekends was definitely one of the highlights of the trip, and I would recommend other Adelante candidates do the same as you will have plenty of time to explore Madrid during the week days after your internship and in the one or two weekends you spend here when not traveling. Spain is a beautiful country and each region looks and feels entirely different, definitely something worth experiencing.

While Madrid was not my favorite city I visited in Spain, I was very glad I chose to do the Adelante program here rather than another city for several reasons: 1)Spanish is much more common in Madrid than other cities. From my experience, it appeared that Madrid had much less English speakers which made learning and speaking Spanish much more important and necessary, something I definitely wanted from an abroad program. While in Barcelona I felt like I heard more English than Spanish or Catalan, definitely not the case in Madrid. 2) Madrid is centrally located in Spain. It was very convenient to be within a 5 hour train ride of every city I wanted to visit, making it possible to see as much of Spain as I did. 3) Madrid is the heart and hub of Spain. From a professional point of view, Madrid definitely had the feel of a big business city most similar to what a businessman is likely to encounter while leaving home for work in the U.S, giving me additional experience in how best to navigate big cities, which is infinitely different than what I grew up around.

The Adelante program is definitely not the typical summer abroad experience from what I read about from other programs online prior to choosing Adelante, but that is not a bad thing. The cost of Adelante was definitely cheaper than any other programs I came across, and this is probably due to the independence the program includes. You will feel as connected to Adelante or as independent in a foreign country as you choose. My girlfriend and I essentially had no contact with Adelante aside from the weekly or biweekly emails they send, and I was completely okay with that, while I understand others may want more of a structured program. If structure is what you are looking for than Adelante probably is´nt the right program, but if you want to get a real world experience in a foreign city where you can basically do what you want when you want to do it then I would recommend Adelante. I was a big fan of not having oversight while abroad as it forced me to figure everything out on my own. Adelante was definitely the best program for the best price for what I was hoping to get from a summer abroad, and without a doubt the most valuable experience I´ve had in my life. Having never been abroad aside from the Caribbean, I was very nervous to leave the U.S, but as im getting ready to leave Spain in another day I cannot wait to figure out where I will travel to next.

This trip has been fantastic! Between the hands-on class work and the riding classes, this has really been a once in a lifetime experience. It's the perfect amount of time, not too short that you don't get to learn anything about the country and not too long that you get home sick.
The teachers here were fantastic, friendly and very knowledgeable. I would definitely recommend this program to any equine science student looking for a study abroad program.

This summer I was able to intern in Madrid through Adelante Abroad who set up my placement & housing in this beautiful city. Even though my original placement was not what I wished to do, they were able to find me another placement that fit my needs better & that I could intern at. Overall, my experience was great & I would recommend interning at Madrid because of its great atmosphere & enriching culture!

I am a pre-vet student that was interested in gaining experience in veterinary medicine that would help boost my resume for vet school application. At first glance the Veterinary Medicine Research and Observation Program looked like everything that I could have asked for. My family and I looked up reviews like these and only saw one that was of any concern. Adelante “explained” to me that this review had no factual base. Please don’t let them do this to you about my review.
Before leaving for Scotland I received a document that outlined my responsibilities. It stated, “During your visit, you will have the opportunity to see and participate in animal research at the Welcome Trust Critical Care Laboratory for Large Animals. You will have the opportunity to observe the care of horses and other large farm animals and observe modern techniques being used in clinical case management in the large and small animals undergoing major surgery and visit with our research teams and staff and other animal care clinics.” Unfortunately, the only one of these responsibilities that we were allowed to participate in was to observe modern techniques being used in clinical case management. Even more limiting was the fact that our supervisor in-country stuck us solely in the anesthesia department with little hopes of exploring other departments. This lead to a very boring experience spent standing around in one place.
The first two weeks were very educational as we worked alongside knowledgeable fourth year students and learned a lot of valuable new information. The next four weeks were a nauseating repetition of the same introductory information as new fourth year students came to anesthesia for the first time. I did my best to contact our in-country and out-of-country supervisors to speak with them about other opportunities to see something other than anesthesia. Our in-country supervisor was very inaccessible by phone and email and our out-of-country supervisor put us into contact with another clinic but we were never allowed to go and visit it.
As it may now be clear, we were unable to make contact with anyone who could tell us where to go, what to do, or what was new to see. This frustration ran over into the foretold responsibility to participate in research. Of the fourteen days that were outlined to us by our in-country supervisor as opportunities to research only two of them were actually semi-productive research days. These two days only came about because I did the investigating MYSELF to find the research center and show up there IN HOPES that I may be able to speak with someone face-to-face. When I contacted Adelante to see what if anything we could do to not miss any more of these research days than we already had and how to better access our in-country supervisor their response was, “The ‘research days’ on the schedule you received are new to us” and “in past placements, ‘research days’ were never a part of the program.” This simply does not match up with the list of responsibilities that ADELATE gave us; it CLEARY STATES that we would get the opportunity to research!!!!!! Adelante suggested that we camp outside our in-country supervisor’s office or to ask reception where he was. What good would sitting outside his office all day do other that force us to miss observation of surgeries in the hospital next door?
Fortunately, I did enjoy getting to know the residents in anesthesia because they were incredibly nice and did their best to make our experience enjoyable. I also enjoyed all of the tourist activities that we got to do on the weekends.

When I first arrived to Edinburgh, the first thing that stroke me was how friendly and supportive the citizens were. It immediately built up the excitement I had to spending 6 weeks in the city. On top of that, the accommodation that we were assigned to couldn't have been more convenient: right off the Royal Mile; the historic heart of Edinburgh that is filled with tons of things to see and do. The landlord was also extremely helpful in terms of recommending which tours we could trust. The observation program was phenomenal: the other interns had different levels of experience and came from diverse background so it was great to share our insights and perspectives on distinct experiments that we conducted.

Additionally, since I wasn't yet familiar with the process of data analysis, the professors were very helpful in guiding us through the softwares to accurately conduct experiments, collect the data and then analyze it with specific guidelines.

Traveling around Edinburgh was quite easy and I highly recommend purchasing a bus card (Ridacard) as it significantly facilitated the daily journeys and allowed me to explore around Edinburgh. There's also a bus station that has daily trips to other cities such as Glasgow, Aberdeen and Dundee for decent prices.

There were tons of activities to keep me busy in the city after our days at the lab; from film festivals to free museums to dance classes...... Meeting people is then not so difficult and you can quickly feel like you belong to the city.

If you are a person that likes to walk around beautiful scenery, explore hidden gardens in addition to loving research: what are you waiting for? This is your chance to improve your skills and challenge yourself socially! Oh and keep in mind that wee means little :)

I wasn't entirely sure what to expect headed into this program, but I definitely got everything out of it that I was looking for. The central living location was awesome for exploring around Edinburgh & our landlord was incredibly friendly and accommodating. The internship itself blew me away and was exactly the sort of experience I was looking for. All the interns and I had a lot of independence in planning our schedule at the University and working with the staff to create our own unique plan. Being we all came from different amounts of research backgrounds, it was nice that the professors tailored each of our experiences to be more specifically suited for our individual needs while still covering a range of the research process (running participants, coding data, learning new software, developing study ideas, etc.). Being in Edinburgh as well was phenomenal because there were plenty of easy ways to travel allowing me to visit the highlands, Glencoe, Loch Ness, the Isle of Skye, Manchester, and I even took a weekend trip to Venice. I would definitely recommend this program to any individual who loves a high level of independence and is looking to further enhance their research abilities-- you will not be disappointed!