Why Should Every College Student Take a Gap Year?
I want to start by asking you all to imagine something for a moment. Imagine you get a free year. A year of no classes, no homework, no 9-5, no responsibilities. You can do whatever you want, go wherever you want. Where would you go? What would you see? What would you do? What do you think you might learn about yourself and the world around you? Spoiler alert - you would learn a lot. There are endless opportunities out there in the world just waiting for you, and as college students, now is the time for you to go and explore before you get tied down to a career, a mortgage, or a family.
I graduated high school during covid. Up until then, I thought I was going to end up in New York City studying music business. I didn’t see marriage or kids in my future at all. I thought I had it all figured out. But because of Covid, I decided to start online school and stay at home until things started going back to normal. I didn’t love staying in Rhode Island. I didn’t love online school. So, I wanted to try something else.
After my freshman year of college, I started the Disney College Program. What was supposed to be a summer internship between freshman and sophomore year turned into a year and a half of nothing I would have ever imagined. A week into my internship, I met my boyfriend. We basically had a months long free vacation at Disney, if you really think about it. Then, we spent the next few months after the program traveling. We stayed in Hawaii for two weeks, New York for a week, DC, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Savannah, Los Angeles, The Carolinas. The list goes on.
I moved to Georgia to be with him less than 5 months after my internship started. I was a waitress for three months. I learned a lot about confidence and speaking to people and I also learned that I absolutely hated the food industry. I was terrible. I got fired. I worked 60 hour weeks at a couple of different print shops. I learned how to use a bunch of big machines. I sliced my nail off using a large cutter. I drove a forklift. I learned how to embroider. I am still trying to learn why Georgians drive like that. Point is, I learned a lot.
During this time off, I realized that I missed school. I ended up falling in love with SCAD and now I attend their Atlanta campus pursuing my degree in graphic design. I also found a job that I absolutely love in the industry I want to be in. I am very happy with where I am right now, and I wouldn’t be who I am or where I am at all if I hadn’t taken a gap year. That being said, based on my personal experience and research on gap years, I believe all college students should take one.
I understand that taking a gap year can be scary. People are reluctant to take time off because of what their parents and society in general might think. According to the survey of 16 students I conducted in this class, more than half said they believe their parents would be unsupportive of a gap year - rounding off at 56%. There might be pressure from your family, or even from yourself, that you need to jump into your career immediately. There might also be some nerves concerning the financial impact taking time off may have. However, taking a gap year is not as scary as you may think, and can actually have incredible impacts on you. I surveyed my entire Speaking of Ideas class at SCAD, and although most of them said their parents would be unsupportive, 79% of them said you think taking a gap year would have a positive impact on them, but only 3 out of 16 of them actually took time off. The answer is already right there. Are you living your life for you, or for your parents?
Everybody should take a gap year because you can travel the world without having many responsibilities, you can gain new skills and knowledge, and you can learn a lot about yourself.
Now, I’m not saying it’s feasible to spend an entire year staying in 5 star resorts all over every country in Europe while not having a job. That’s not realistic unless Bill Gates is your dad or something, which I’m assuming is not many of you. During most of my “time off”, I had some sort of income coming in. There were a couple months where I didn’t work at all. But for the majority of it, I was exploring jobs that were interesting to me and what I wanted to get into when I start my full time career. Even if it was just freelance jobs for a couple of months, I allowed myself the time to develop as a designer and production specialist that I would not have had if I was in school full time.
If you are able to have your parent’s house as your home base and not have to pay rent, you can travel a lot easier than you probably think. Travel to places where you have friends that you can stay with. Or if you want to go somewhere where you don’t know anyone, you can stay in hostels for as low as $10 a night in some countries. Opt for buying groceries and cooking at home instead of eating every meal out. Put your artwork online. Sell prints, apparel, or freelance! Get an online job. This is income that you can make from anywhere, and you can choose your own hours as a freelance artist. And if you’re not an artist, there are probably a million ways you can monetize your own skills.
There are also programs designed for students interested in taking a gap year, or people just looking to volunteer in other countries. Worldpackers is one of the main programs. They specialize in work exchanges, volunteering abroad programs, and gap years. Once you create an account, you can begin searching for programs that are interesting to you. They have everything from goat farms in Italy, to decorating hostels in India, to music concert production in Australia, painting, photography, babysitting, teaching English, and thousands of other opportunities all around the world.
For most programs, you spend a few days a week volunteering and you get free housing, free meals, free transportation, free laundry, free tours and excursions, and dozens more amenities. There is truly something for everyone on Worldpackers that allows you to travel the world. You won’t be tied down to a job or the amount of time you have to be somewhere because you can decide how long you want your program to be! Some programs accept volunteers for as little as one week, but you also have the option to stay many months longer, if you prefer. There is really no responsibility here. It can truly be no pain all gain.
However, taking a gap year becomes harder as you get older. It’s not impossible, but there are many other factors you have to think about as you get further into adulthood. When you graduate and start your career, most jobs won’t exactly let you take 6 months off to travel. When you have a mortgage to pay, you probably won’t be letting your house just sit empty while you’re in another country for a few months. When you’re married and have children, you can’t just leave your family because you want to go to Bali. The time to take a gap year is now when you don’t have to worry about those things.
Everybody should take a gap year because you can gain new skills and knowledge.
You may pick up a new language. You may learn how to play an instrument. You may discover a career path or a hobby you didn’t even know existed before. According to Seamester, “A productive gap year can also impart valuable life skills that will stand out on resumes and college applications,”. Some of these soft skills include communication, team building, leadership, and cultural awareness. Hard skills learned vary based on how you spend your gap year.
As I said before, new language skills. You may also gain skills and knowledge in cooking, wilderness training, painting, customer service and hospitality, blogging, farming, or whatever else you decide to focus on. Getting certified in different areas such as scuba diving, along with all of these other newfound skills add diversity to your resume and boost your chances of getting a good career after college, and can even help with getting scholarships for school.
Everybody should take a gap year because you can learn a lot about yourself.
Most college students are either in, or about to enter our 20’s. And it’s no secret that nobody our age really knows what they’re doing, what they want to do, or who they are. You may have a pretty good idea, but you don’t know everything about yourself. Not even close. Your 20’s are the time to figure it out.
According to NOLS Blog, a nonprofit global wilderness school, “By stepping out of your daily routine and embracing new experiences, you'll embark on a journey of self-exploration. During your gap year, you'll not only explore your interests and curiosities, but also discover your strengths and weaknesses, learn how to overcome challenges, and develop essential life skills.” By partaking in a gap year, you are able to gain a global perspective, become more independent and responsible, push yourself to new experiences, all while learning more about who you are and what you want in life. This time is so crucial and there really is no better time to figure yourself out and explore all the opportunities the world has to offer than right now.
Gillian Muller, an alumni from the Gap Year Association, shares her story about volunteering abroad. She says, “During my gap year, I joined the GVI Whale & Dolphin Marine Conservation Program in…Spain. We did beach clean-ups, went out on a boat to collect animal data, and conducted land surveys. There was also plenty of free time… to explore the area or just simply relax. …Taking a gap year has fueled my desire to travel internationally and influenced what I do during my travels. I learned that I really enjoy participating in volunteer work, feeling like I am contributing to the community. It’s helped me discover that maybe I don’t want to go into a STEM field or do research, but maybe head in the direction of humanitarian work, or something in the liberal arts,”.
Makenna Elges, another alumni of the program, says, “During my gap year, I took part in Irish Gap Year’s Adventure and Leadership Program. During this program, we spent loads of time in the beautiful Irish outdoors. We hiked, surfed, learned new wilderness skills, and put them to the test… The woman I am today would not exist without my gap year. By seeing more of the world and separating myself from what I have always known, I found who I truly am… By getting myself out of my comfort zone, I was able to really see my true colors through how I react to unfamiliar scenarios and challenges that inevitably come along with exploring. There is only growth from there. I learned how independent I can be, how capable I am, how to be patient and kind to everyone, and most importantly, that I can trust myself,”.
As I come to a close, I want to reinforce that everybody should take a gap year because you can travel the world without having many responsibilities, you can gain new skills and knowledge, and you can learn a lot about yourself. I hope that now you are now inspired to go give yourself a break, travel, see the world, and find out more about yourself.
If you are interested in taking a gap year, please visit any one of these resources to learn more. The Gap Year Association will be able to connect you with a consultant who will work with you to find a program that is right for you. Whether you want to do the Disney College Program like I did, travel Europe, volunteer in another country, or even just spend a few months at home working on yourself and your art, you will learn so much and be so grateful that you took this time off. And now that summer is coming up, it is the perfect time to get a taste of what an entire gap year might look like without committing to a full year or long period off. Start with just going to the beach for a weekend. Pick up a new hobby. Figure out what you might be interested in. You’ll be happy you did.
To learn more about my experience on the Disney College Program, watch my videos here!
Bibliography:
Worldpackers.
https://www.worldpackers.com/.
This website is a resource for people interested in gap years, work exchanges, and volunteering abroad. They have programs all over the world in hundreds of different focuses. These opportunities allow volunteers to travel and gain experience working in different parts of the world for no cost, and include amenities.
Meighan, Mike, “12 High-Demand Skills You’ll Build During a Gap Year”, 27 April 2024.
https://www.seamester.com/blog/12-high-demand-skills-youll-build-during-a-gap-year/.
This is a blog post on the Seamester website. Written by the executive director and co-founder with over 25 years of experience running gap year and study abroad programs, this article talks about what skills you can gain from taking a gap year and how they can help you boost your resume.
Shunney, Molly. “25 Skills You Can Learn While Taking a Gap Year,” Accessed May 2024.
https://blog.pimsleur.com/2019/08/23/25-skills-you-can-learn-while-taking-a-gap-year/.
This is a blog post written on the Pimsleur website. She talks about skills you can learn while taking a gap year in different areas, such as farming and scuba diving. In comparison to the last blog post by Mike Meighan, Molly focuses more on hard skills.
NOLS Blog. “Why Take a Gap Year: 8 Gap Year Life Lessons”, 6 July 2023.
This is a blog post from a nonprofit global wilderness school that seeks to help people step forward boldly as a leader. This website features gap year programs, and therefore, their blog is dedicated to encourage those who may be interested in taking one. This article discusses the 4 different types of gap year programs they offer as well as 8 lessons you can learn from participating in one.
Gap Year Association.
https://www.gapyearassociation.org/.
This website goes over the basics of what a gap year is, all the way to having a list of accredited programs. They also have gap year consultants and a blog. According to their website, “The Gap Year Association is a community committed to advancing the gap year movement through standards of best practice, professional development, research, resources, and advocacy with the ultimate goal of empowering more people to access transformative gap year experiences,”. You can browse all gap year programs or fill out a form about what specifically you are looking for, and they will contact you with some options. They also have alumni stories - two of which are featured in my speech.
