Dear Prospective Fellow

Dear prospective Fellow,

It’s getting late here in Sebikotane, Senegal – the chatter of children out in the schoolyard is starting to dwindle, the loudspeakers are about to break out with the evening call to prayer, and a cool breeze has finally started to trickle into the computer lab, lightening the lingering midday heat. I really should be hurrying home before my host mother starts to worry, but I want to take this moment to write to you, where ever you might be, perhaps scanning through the Global Citizen Year website, flipping through all the official GCY literature, considering taking a gap year, and probably trying to imagine what it would really be like. Fingers crossed the power doesn’t cut again….. › Continue reading

Tags: bridge year, gap year, open letters

Open letter to GCY Applicant

Dear You, Person reading this, maybe even GCY applicant,

Hows life ? Whenever my friends and I talk that’s where we start. Last year at this time, life was centered around school , soccer, and figuring out college . The thought of a gap year started when I was applying for scholarships, and the ones that excited me most were those that focused on travel, experiencing the world, and learning through it. Even after I was done with all the applications, I now had this little bird flying around my head with those ideas, or dreams might be a more appropriate term. Now I have always been a self-professed geek – I love school, learning, and even back-to-school shopping, so this new found obsession did not derive from not wanting to go to school. If anything, it came from exactly that: my “geeky” love for learning. › Continue reading

Tags: bridge year, gap year, open letters

Dear Applicant…

I remember visiting my college last year. I was walking on the campus with some friends, just taking it all in, when we ran into this extremely peppy, extremely overbearing girl. She asked us, “Are you guys going to be students here next year?” Expecting to make a new friend, we responded, “Yeah. We are. How about you?” This girl, completely ignoring our question, goes into this long rant about how she took a year off. “It was the best year of my life. It was amazing. I think everybody should take a year off. We did so many interesting things…” and on and on she went. She practically forced all of us to give her our emails so she could us send more information about what she did. She was like one of those missionaries that go door-to-door to convert you, and all you want to do is slam the door in her face. I can’t tell you how put off I was. This girl was awful. She almost convinced me not to take a year off. Luckily, I was already thinking about it way before I had the unfortunate experience of meeting her. So learning from her, I’m not going to tell you that everybody should take a year off, or that my “bridge year” was the best decision of my life; because truthfully, that’s not true. › Continue reading

Tags: bridge year, gap year, open letters