American Grad Students Studying Abroad

Ivy Coach is in yesterday’s “Wall Street Journal.”

Ivy Coach was featured in yesterday’s “Wall Street Journal.” A piece by Jillian Berman entitled “For U.S. grad Students, Overseas Schools Beckon” focuses on how some American students have chosen to pursue graduate degrees outside of the United States. And why? Because there are more English-language graduate school programs abroad to choose from these days, the courses are less expensive, there’s a mystique about studying in, say, Europe. Who knows why some students are choosing to pursue graduate degrees outside of the United States.

At Ivy Coach, we only help students applying to American institutions and with only a couple of notable exceptions (we’re looking at you, London School of Economics and Political Science), we discourage American students from pursuing graduate degrees abroad. As Berman reports, “Even if the school meets all of those criteria, students may still struggle to translate their degree into a job offer in the U.S., says Brian Taylor, the managing director at Ivy Coach, an admissions counseling company. ‘We don’t recommend students to apply to these schools because in most cases they’re going to return, and their employers aren’t going to have heard of these schools,’ he says. That can be true even if the student got a good education and the school has some prestige abroad, he adds. ‘You shouldn’t have to make your case for why your school is good. That means you’re already on the defensive.'” We couldn’t agree more. Oh wait. It seems we’re agreeing with ourselves.

To any American thinking of pursuing their graduate studies abroad, we urge you to read this piece in “The Wall Street Journal” at least twice so that you have a firm understanding of the obstacles you’ll face with that graduate degree from Switzerland. No offense to Switzerland. We love chocolate. And cheese!

Are you an American grad student thinking of studying abroad? If so, we’d love to here what’s motivating you to study outside of the United States so post your Comment below and jump in on the conversation.