AIFS Abroad Avis 

I just finished my intern experience in Florence, Italy with AIFS and I had the time of my life! Living and working in Florence for 3 months was a dream come true and it was an amazing group of 10 girls in the program! While the work experience was great one of the best parts of interning in Florence was the friends I made while there. All 10 of us got along so well and were ready to travel and adventure together the whole time. We were able to take amazing day and weekend trips throughout Italy and the surrounding countries. I have so many cherished memories and laughs from my time in Florence and I would immediately do it all over again if given the chance!

Berlin is a really wonderful and historic city to live in. My German is basically nonexistent and I still felt like I was able to get around fine. The AIFs staff are very supportive, and the organized actives were well structured and thought out. If you weren’t interested in some or all of the activities, you didn’t have to participate and there was plenty of time to do your own thing around Berlin or travel throughout Europe. I didn’t particularly enjoy my academic experience at Humboldt, there were a few good classes but also a few really awful ones. So, if I could do it again I would probably do the AIFS program with Freie Universität academic program.

The Sydney program with AIFS is fantastic; I would recommend it to everyone. I participated in their internship program in 2023 and couldn't have asked for a better experience. Sydney is an extremely safe city with friendly people. Traveling is easy, and there are so many things to do in Sydney and Australia. Our Australian mom for the program, Andrea, is just as amazing and made the experience even better. As for the internship, I loved my experience working for the finance team in a non-profit. Also, the housing is very nice and in a great location.

I had an amazing time during my AIFS Abroad Internship program in Florence! There was a group of 9 girls total, all from different areas in the US, and we all ended up becoming so close throughout the program. The staff provides exciting group events and excursions (bike tours, pasta making class, etc), so there is plenty of opportunity to have fun and meet new people. As for the actual internship component of the program, it's great to get real world work experience while getting to live abroad! During the initial process of internship placement be VERY clear with exactly what you want so AIFS can match you to your future company as best as possible. They have a lot of great connections and companies that they can match you with!

My experience with AIFS Abroad was overall great. Beyond a few superficial issues, namely with the housing, I have no complaints. I felt supported through the entire process, from application to exit. The onsite coordinator, Greta, was amazing. Any issues that I ran into were quickly and efficiently resolved with her help.
One complaint that I have involves the classes that I was enrolled in with the program. The instructor for GE 301 was not as involved as I would have hoped for, and the frequency with which he released assignments proved to be detrimental to the overall accomplishment of said assignments. I would have hoped that there would be a schedule for when assignments would be opened that spread them out over the entire semester. Instead, the first was not available until mid October, the next almost a month later, and the rest opened all at the same time a few weeks after that.
Nonetheless, my experience was amazing and I would highly recommend AIFS to others.

The AIFS staff possessed a plethora of knowledge regarding Salzburg and the surrounding area. They created a safe and welcoming environment for students to explore Europe. Simultaneously, they provided a wonderful variety of stimulating courses, many of which were unique to Central Europe. This balance created an enriching experience for me - I greatly enjoyed my time in Salzburg.

I graduated college in May 2023 and never got the chance to study abroad. I decided to be an intern with AIFS in Italy and it was the best decision ever! I learned so much, and the program made it so easy to live in another country. I would definitely do it all over again!

Staff was great and helpful. Housing was decent for the price and well-maintained.

The people I met and the AIFS staff were super helpful in making this experience unforgettable. I was able to create some long lasting bonds with my peers and employers and I cannot wait to visit all the new people in my life!

The staff, communication and field trips

apartment with no storage space and a mini fridge for 5 girls. cleaning lady didn’t clean. i could’ve found a place for myself by myself and it would’ve been cheaper. too much bureaucracy. classrooms had so much echo. no schedule communication until the week of.

My experience with this trip was pretty positive! The professors, namely Professor Hilman, were very engaging and I felt like I actually learned quite a few things about Italy. As far as apartments go, we had a great location but our landlord was terrible at communication and would never get back to us about broken utilities in the apartment. For that reason it became a frustrating trip, but overall the good outweighed the bad.

Every thing was fantastic with AIFS. We were a bit confuzed when we had a cocktail party, as all students and faculty were told it was a welcome dinner. Mixing up students from other programs was a bit confusing. I did like the dinner with the director, was very personal and great ice breaker. The classrooms at U of W are horrible to teach in, they need some sort of sound mitigation, to to much echo. Videos and films are impossible to watch. The AIFS classrooms need also blackout curtains. Housing concerns were numerous for students,eg black mold complaint etc. Trips were well organized and guides were helpful to get into venues. Headphones were always an issue....all students should be given their own for lenght of program. Some of the Italian guides were very hard to understand for the American students. The tours should always be interactive, not just lectures, and should be limited to 1 hour max....with a period of time for exploration on their own, prior to re-grouping. Transportation was excellent, busses, subway, trains etc. All staff were excellent.

AIFS is the best! This is my third study abroad program with them and they consistently make every aspect of the experience organized and memorable!

The people I met were the reason for my rating. Aifs could’ve done a better job with apartments all around. We could’ve all been closer together at the least instead of being scattered, it’d be nicer if everyone was closer to the study center too. My apartment alone was significantly in worse condition than the others. I saw many apartments and all of them I would’ve rather lived in. Coordinators need to see the apartments for themselves in person before students arrive.

One of the struggles that I had entering this program is that I was under the impression for a long time that it was going to involve enrollment in a real Spanish University. Only upon attending the orientation pre-departure did I realize that it takes our college professors and bring them to teach us abroad. This was a bit of a disappointment that I did not feel was clarified from the start. The issue with this set up of studying abroad is it forced me to stay mostly confined within my American bubble of companions, where we all had the same workload, group projects, excursions making it hard to learn how or when to incorporate ourselves into the culture. Sure, I made some Spanish friends and talked to strangers, but those moments were short-lived because at the end of the day I had to resort back to my peers who I was spending most of the day around in class and on trips, naturally. I feel the program could have provided better opportunities to get to know locals our age on a meaningful level, and they could benefit from us as well. Specifically, if we collaborated with them on something educational or social or intellectual. It would be nice to know that I have real, solid connection with someone from a different country after this semester abroad, but I can’t say that I do. On the other hand, I had good experiences with the pre-paid excursions and the trips included on the program. They were extensive and provided us with great guides and authentic experiences.

I have loved my time in Barcelona. Traveling throughout Europe has been amazing and immersing into the Spanish Culture has also been a fantastic experience. AIFS has been great with everything. All the activities and everything that has been set up in general has been great!

Studying abroad through AIFS has been on the of the most unique and eye-opening experiences of my life! Staying in Barcelona and learning about Catalonian culture, history, and cuisine has been an incredible experience.

I had the best experience here in Sydney with AIFS. I met the greatest friends and it is crazy to think I only met them all 4 months ago because now we can’t imagine living without eachother. This has been the time of my life & AIFS helped make this so easy for us. Our advisor Andrea was the best and all loved our “Aussie mum”.

I went abroad to Sydney, Australia for a three month internship with AIFS. AIFS helped me to find a company that would fit best with my work interest as well as found a great apartment for us. The location of the apartment was very central to my internship as well as close to public transport, making it easy to get around. My advisor, Andrea, was more than helpful throughout the whole process and made me feel comfortable and help adjust to the big change of being in a different country. There were a few trips planned throughout the program as well including a winery trip and a trip to the Royal National Park. It was cool to be able to meet people within the program and get to do activities together to have other people that are in the same boat as us being abroad.