Hey everyone! My name is Sarah, and I am the director of the Seoul SPARKS program.
I was also was also one of the Resident Directors (RDs) for the NSLI-Y Seoul program in 2023 and came to Korea as a high school exchange student through a different program when I was 15, so I want to share some tips for how to make the most of a summer in Korea based on my experiences as both a student and a staff member in multiple exchange programs for youth based in Korea.
I originally came to Korea as an exchange student at Kijun Girls’ High school in 2013, and have been living between the US and Korea ever since. I attended Georgetown University for my undergraduate degree between 2014 and 2018. Between then and now, I’ve picked up quite a bit of study abroad experience as both a student and an administrator, so I know a thing or two about how programs work and what students can do to increase their likelihood of success while overseas!
Left: Me as a high school exchange student in Jeonju in 2013.
Center: Me graduating from Seoul National University in 2022.
Right: Me working as a NSLI-Y Resident Director in 2023.
Timeline of My Life
Dates | Location | Description |
Feb 2013 ~ Dec 2013 | Jeonju, Korea | High School Exchange at Kijun Girls’ High School through ASSE International. Started SarahsSeoulSearch Youtube channel. |
May 2015 ~ Jun. 2015 | Seoul, Korea | Internship at Now Action and Unity for Human Rights (NAUH - a North Korean Human Rights NGO). |
Jun. 2015 ~ Jul. 2015 | Taipei, Taiwan | Studied Mandarin on the Huayu Enrichment Scholarship at National Taiwan Normal University. |
May 2016 ~ Feb. 2017 | Seoul, Korea | Studied at Yonsei University through CIEE as a Boren Scholarship recipient. |
Feb 2016 ~ Jun. 2017 | Beijing, China | Studied Mandarin at Beijing Language and Culture University during a leave of absence from Georgetown. |
Aug. 2014 ~ Aug. 2018 | Washing ton, DC | Earned a Bachelors of Science in Foreign Service in Asian Studies with a concentration in International Security and a minor in Mandarin from Georgetown. |
Aug 2018 ~ Dec 2018 | Harbin, China | Took intensive Mandarin classes at the Harbin Institute of Technology through the CET Program. |
Jan 2019 ~ Aug 2019 | Yanji, China | Did a Fulbright research project recording the sociolinguistic landscape of the Korean-Chinese bilingual prefecture of Yanbian. |
Aug 2019 ~ Feb 2020 | Asan, Korea | Studied Korean at Sun Moon University as a requirement of the Global Korea Scholarship program. |
Mar. 2020 ~ Aug. 2022 | Seoul, Korea | Earned a master’s degree in Political Science from Seoul National University as a Global Korea Scholarship student. |
May 2023 ~ Aug. 2023 | Seoul, Korea | Worked as the Resident Director of 44 students at the NSLI-Y Seoul program. |
Aug. 2023 ~ Jan. 2024 | Seoul, Korea | Worked as the Resident Life Manager for Minerva University’s Seoul Campus for 121 students. |
Jan. 2024 | Seoul | Officially launched the Seoul SPARKS program |
In this blog, I wanted to take all of the things I have learned as a participant and observer of exchange programs in Korea and put them in one place.
Here, I’m going to let you know the tips that made a difference in my own life, and that I noticed helped a lot of the exchange students I have helped in Korea and beyond throughout the years. Let’s get to it!
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