New skills, friends, experiences, and opportunities.

My study abroad experience with CIEE met my expectations by increasing my Chinese language skills, facilitating making new friends from both China and the US, and experiencing new cultures and customs. Beyond the obvious benefits of a study abroad program of this caliber, it also provided me with future opportunities in both academic and career for after the program ended. For example, the CIEE program is designed to facilitate networking during the study abroad program experience. I was able to meet local business owners, CEOs of multinational companies, and many other professionals during the 2 month summer program in Shanghai. The program allowed for students to freely explore Shanghai independently on weekends, which allowed me to apply my newly learned Chinese language skills in real world situations to meet locals. I took full advantage of these opportunities, and sometimes would be people at cafes, bookstores, bars, restaurants. These opportunities lead to me eventually obtaining a job with a top multinational real estate company in Beijing after graduation last December. I immediately began working for the company after graduating and i'm already moving up the ladder due to my Chinese language skills. None of this would've been possible without the opportunity during my study abroad program to independently explore. This facet of the CIEE program makes my experience studying abroad unique.