For most students studying abroad in rural areas or in countries with a favorable exchange rate, eating out in restaurants and traveling doesn't break the bank. But for others, especially those studying in expensive European cities, expenses have a huge impact.
Deciding whether to travel during the weekend or buy another round at the bar is much more stressful when each costs almost double what one would pay in Medford. The price of a specific abroad program, cost of living and exchange rates affect where many students choose to study abroad as well as their experiences once they arrive.
Senior Scott Dodds spent his junior year abroad in the Tufts-in-London program, dealing with a notoriously bad exchange rate in an expensive city. He chose the Tufts program because his financial aid package carried over to the program and he was awarded a study abroad scholarship when he was admitted to Tufts as a freshman.
While he had to stick to a tight budget, between his financial aid package, the scholarship and the stipend given to all students in Tufts abroad programs, Dodds was able to manage his finances.
"You have to prioritize your spending," Dodds said. "The Tufts-in-London stipend was really good — 90 pounds a week. If you buy cheap food and you're not going out every night, you'll have money left to travel, but you have to decide what you use your money for."
Still, Dodds admitted that he spent the money he had saved up more quickly than he expected and that because he chose to study in an expensive city, he traveled and went out at night less than he would have in a more affordable city.
"Since I don't buy clothes and I didn't eat out, I was fine," he added. "The stipend is plenty for food, but if that's all you were living on, you would have had trouble."
Another senior, Katherine Sadowski, had a much tougher time adjusting to the high costs of daily living when she studied abroad through Tufts-in-Paris last spring.
Like Dodds' Tufts-in-London program, the Paris program provided a living stipend. However, Sadowski thought that the money provided was not enough to get by on in Paris, even though housing, breakfast and five dinners a week were paid for by the program.
"Tufts was supposed to give us a stipend to live off of, so I thought I would be fine because I spend frugally here [in Medford] and they said we could get by," she said.
Sadowski said that at Tufts, she would normally have a job and save money by cooking for herself. She said in Paris it was hard to get a job and she wasn't able to cook meals in her host family's house, so she had to go out to eat more often than she wanted to and began running out of money.
"I stopped eating [except for my host family's meals], and my boyfriend said that I came back to school so skinny. Also, I didn't have money to go out, so I just walked around all the time," Sadowski said. "Up until abroad, I had a meal plan covered by my financial aid package."
Sadowski added that she felt that it was a lot tougher to be a student on financial aid while in her Tufts-in-Paris program because she couldn't just spend money and not worry about it.
"People in the Paris program tended to be culturally affluent … For me, abroad amplified the inequality I feel at Tufts. Some students went traveling every weekend and their parents paid for it," she said.
One of the toughest parts of her abroad experience was spring break, when host families were not required to house their students. Sadowski said she felt very stressed over the break because she did not have much money to pay to stay anywhere.
"The kicker is that the program didn't give us our monthly funding [during the month with spring break]," Sadowski added. "They said, ‘You're here on the program for two weeks out of the month, so we're only going to give you half of your stipend.'"
The Director of Tufts Programs Abroad, Sheila Bayne, said she thinks that Tufts programs are a good value and that budgeting and saving are discussed with students before they depart for a semester or year abroad.
"We talk about money issues in general information meetings and when we advise students, [money] is definitely something we take into account," she said.
On Tufts programs, Bayne said that students are given living stipends and directors provide recommendations for cheap places to eat, such as student cafeterias. She advised students that they can save money by traveling less and "living as the locals do," which in turn helps students get to know their new country better.
"If our programs are not working [financially] for someone, we really want to know about it," she said. "But if you have the choice between studying abroad on a shoe string and not studying abroad, obviously you should study abroad."
Additionally, many students choose to study abroad in non-Tufts programs that charge a fraction of the tuition. All Tufts abroad programs charge $25,898 for a semester. In comparison, a semester abroad through CIEE in Berlin costs $15,200 while directly enrolling in the University of Dundee in Scotland costs only $7,312 a semester. However, this is often not an option for students with Tufts financial aid, since their aid packages do not transfer to these alternate programs.
Senior Niklas Kubasek studied abroad in Vienna, Austria through a non-Tufts program called IES Abroad. Kubasek said that he wanted to study in a German-speaking city and most of the cities he looked into were similarly expensive in terms of costs of living.
While IES Vienna does not provide a living stipend like Tufts programs do, the program helps with some costs.
"The program subsidized a few trips … [like] a ski trip in the Austrian alps that was really sweet, and got us some cheap tickets to soccer games," Kubasek said in an e-mail to the Daily. "As far as food [went], we were on our own."
Additionally, Kubasek was still able to keep personal costs down by finding less expensive opportunities.
"The government subsidizes theater pretty heavily so we were able to go to plays and operas for very little money. We never took cabs anywhere and always found good, inexpensive places to stay," he said. "I wouldn't say that costs were so high that it ever negatively affected my experience. I just found ways to use the money I had to have a great time."
