My home for the summer, Florence, Italy

Author: Cameron DeMott | Majors: Marketing and Supply Chain

This summer I was fortunate enough to spend 5 weeks studying abroad in Florence, Italy. While having the best summer of my life immersing myself in the Italian culture, I was also able to gain 3 credit hours towards my major, meet new lifelong friends, and create memories that I will talk about for years to come. Studying abroad was one of the best things I have ever done!

My program’s name was Summer Business, Arts, Humanities, Italian Language and Culture in Florence, Italy, and it was through a program called API, or Academic Programs International. I found this program through the Hogs Abroad Program Finder. This was very helpful because of the filters you can select. I suggest the advanced search if you know more specific things that you want, like location and other parameters. I knew I wanted to study in the summer, so I selected Italy or Greece and included my area of study. I found the API program and I chose it because it was in the location that I wanted, and because they offered a class that would count towards one of my majors in Marketing. Quickly, I was so impressed with the organization of the program and the tremendous help from all their advisors. Once arriving in Italy, they meet you at the airport and bring you to a hotel where you meet the other students. There were a few more orientations in person which were very informational about the country, our classes, and our safety. API also set up multiple dinners and events the first week for all the students to meet each other and our roommates. Throughout the duration of the program, we were in constant contact with our three advisors on anything that we needed help with or if we needed advice. There was also an emergency hotline API number that we could call 24/7 which made me feel very safe if that call was ever necessary. I cannot say enough nice things about this program, and I would recommend it to anyone!

The class I took was Wine Business and Marketing and it was through the Lorenzo De’Medici University. We had class Monday through Thursday for about 2 and a half hours each day. It may seem like a long time, but the professors give you about a 15-minute break in the middle to either go get coffee or walk around, and it helps to split the class up and give your brain a break. I really liked this schedule because it gave us the option to go on longer weekend excursions since we had Friday off. The class was very similar to an Arkansas class with a little bit of lecturing every day, and some student presentations near the end of class. My professor was Italian, but he spoke perfect English and helped his students succeed in any way he could. This class will be beneficial to my future and academic goals because it gives me an advantage by learning about another side of marketing that not many people know or have been educated about.

Weekend excursions were one of my favorite parts of studying abroad. The Italian train network was very convenient and easy to use because it connected all the major cities. During the 4 weekends that I was there, I was able to travel to Sienna, San Gimignano, Cortona, Modena, Pompeii, Venice, Milan, Cinque Terre, Sorrento, Capri, Pisa, Nice, Bologna, and Monte Carlo. I absolutely loved that I was able to see different regions of Italy, from the beauty of the countryside farms to the coastline beach towns. While on our weekend excursions, we participated in historical tours of the towns, food and wine tastings, a true Italian thermal bath visit, and many boat rides! My favorite experience was going in the Blue Grotto! The grotto was beautiful and pictures just can’t do it justice. Other than it being gorgeous, getting into the Blue Grotto is an entire experience in itself. The entrance to the Grotto is very small, so only these certain small paddle boats that hold 4 people are allowed to go in. The rowers of the paddle boats go around the other big boats to find passengers to take into the grotto. Since it’s such a popular attraction, there are about 30+ boats waiting in line for their passengers to see the grotto, and it’s a frenzy for whoever can find a paddle boat first. Once you get in the paddle boat, then you make your way to the entrance where everyone has to lay down in the boat because the entrance of the Grotto is so low to the water level. But once inside the Blue Grotto it is magical and like nothing I’ve ever seen before!

This past summer was amazing and life-changing! My advice to anyone is to get out of your comfort zone and consider studying abroad. Being there for the summer semester was the perfect amount of time where I was able to feel like a local in Italy, but it also wasn’t too long to where I got homesick. My roommates, who I met on the first day, have become some of my best friends and we already have plans to have a reunion in Italy when we all get older! Experiencing the Italian culture and living in Italy for a month was something I didn’t know I needed, and I would do it again in a heartbeat!