Semester Abroad

fenwaysouth- I have never had experience with respect to studying abroad and baseball specifically. However, I am friendly with a girl on the softball team at my school and she took a semester abroad during the fall of her sophomore year. I am not sure what her major is but I do know that she spent her time in Rome and loved every minute of it. I could ask her specifically how she went about the discussion with her coach if you'd like.

Having past experience with Coach Walkenbach, he seems to me as though he could potentially be easily approachable with this topic. I would highly recommend your son going to him early in the fall and expressing his interest in studying abroad. Explain to Coach that by no means does he want it to intrude on the team or be detrimental to the program in any way, but the opportunity to potentially study abroad seems like something that could be an amazing experience in his life. Knowing that Coach is an alum and seems to understand the academically geared aspect of a prestigious institution, I have a feeling he has had dealings with such a thing in the past and would respect a player coming to him to discuss the opportunity in the future.

Thanks JH. Yes, I'd like to hear how your softball friend went about this with her coach. I'd also like to hear if it caused any issues with coaches, teammates, etc...once she was back.

Presumably son would do this next Fall (2012), and return for baseball season in the Spring 2013. Thanks again.

My daughter studied abroad in Italy (for art history) and had a great time. Her program was organized through a separate college and some professors went with them. (These seem to be the best)

We did lots of research on these and we read about many horror stories for girls sports programs. These "bad" programs had great looking websites and impressive sounding names like International Association of Sports blah, blah.

Players were traveling around on hot buses to sit on the bench for insanely overbooked tourneys, little to none of the promised sightseeing time, rooms that were horrific, multi-hop flights vs. the advertised direct flights, etc. Lots of bait and switch.

Be sure to talk to several people that booked the same program during the last semester or two. Google for reviews, etc.

Don't forget about student loans and grants. Also, you may be able to deduct from your taxes, or take a credit, the amount you pay for tuition and books, or more.

I think she rented a phone while she was there. May need to get special vehicle, health and life insurance (the program may have general advice for this).

Does PG send scouts to Europe?