CAPA Dublin Fall 2018

I studied abroad through CAPA’s Dublin program for an entire semester.My two favorite things about CAPA’s program is their opportunity to do an internship and the attention they put towards making you feel like you’re truly apart of a community. There was only about 22 people in the program so we all bonded very quickly. CAPA organized so many events so that everybody could become a second family. From walking tours around Dublin on our first day to weekly lunches, movie and game nights, to thanksgiving dinner to side trips to places like Galway and Belfast. CAPA really put effort into making Dublin feel like a second home. Our three advisors were always there 24/7 to make us feel comfortable and safe our group always called them our Irish mom, dad, and big sister. When I think back to why I loved all of my experiences abroad it’s because of the people I was with.

By far the best part of being in Dublin was my internship. Before going abroad students send their resume and a general cover letter to CAPA and they set you up with a skype interview with an internship.I interned for a non profit organization called Fighting Words which was founded by popular Irish author Roddy Doyle. Fighting Words holds daily creative workshops for primary and secondary students. Students come to Fighting Words on a field trip.
In the morning we had a class of primary school children and I took turns with the other interns to teach the workshop where I would go through the basics and foundations of what a story needs such as a main character, title, plot. The kids worked together to come up with the story and they came up with the funniest things like a main character who is a french fry who’s greatest wish is to get a pet unicorn and is afraid of being dunked in ketchup and then they would break off into tables of 3 to 4 where an intern would sit with them and help them finish writing the story and create illustrations.
In the afternoon the secondary school students came and we’d give them a situation such as you’re both in trouble in the principal’s office but only one of you actually did it and then we’d have them improv a scene. We’d type out their dialogue and then we’d get the class to fill in the gaps and create a story and then they’d also break up into groups with an intern to finish writing their own stories. There was honestly no better feeling than getting a hug from a kid or to hear them walking out saying they wanna come back here everyday. It solidify my future career goals to be in education and work with students.
For doing this internship I got 6 credits and I worked 20 hours a week. Once a week CAPA held a night class where we discussed our internship. We learned how to “sell” our internship during interviews and we had to write reflections on our internship and what we learned about the culture. At the end of the semester we had to do a mock interview where we talked about abroad experience. These assignments and the class were where we earned our 6 credits from.

CAPA requires you to take a minimum of 12 credits so I had to take two classes along with my internship. I actually loved my internship so much that I wished I could’ve done it full time but I really enjoyed my classes as well. The first class I took was called Irish History & Culture. We met once a week for three hours. Each class was a 40 minute lecture about Irish history followed by a 2 hour field trip with in Dublin. These field trips included walking tours, visits to Trinity College, ChristChurch Cathedral, Dublin Castle, the Dublina museum, and the Irish Emigration museum. We were graded on our weekly reflection that were 800 words where we had to tie in the lecture from class to our experience on the field trip. The second class I took was a film studies class that also met once a week for 3 hours. We had an hour long lecture and then used the rest of the class for screening of that week’s film. We went through different units of various film genres such as Italian neorealism, French new wave, and road movies at the end of each unit we were assigned a paper where we picked a film to focus on and show how it exemplified that genre.

Being in Dublin was a memorable, life-changing and magical experience.