NYU prides itself on giving students relatively easy access to each of its 14 study abroad sites. In fact, NYU was ranked as having sent the most students — 4,481 students across the globe — abroad in the Open Doors 2017 report.

For some, studying in another city or country for a semester is the highlight of their college careers. Others, such as students in the Global Liberal Studies program, are required to study away for an entire academic year.

However, not everyone is attracted to the idea of leaving New York for an entire semester. At the end of their four years, there are still many Bobcats who will have spent every semester at the Washington Square or Brooklyn campuses — and some, like Stern sophomore Nina Yu, are perfectly happy to do so.

Yu said she will likely not study abroad during her undergraduate years. Stern students, she said, generally study abroad during the fall semester of their sophomore year because job and internship recruitment begins during a Stern student’s junior year. Nonetheless, Yu chose not to study abroad because she wanted to acquaint herself more with New York City.  

“Freshman spring is when you sign up [to studying abroad], and at that time, I was working a part-time job, and I was really busy,” Yu said. “I feel like I wasn’t as involved at NYU as I [would have] liked.”

Yu wanted to take her second year of college to become more comfortable living in New York City, and she said that studying here is almost a study abroad experience, as she is from Iowa.

Though she is not studying abroad during her junior year because of Stern’s recruitment timing, she said she thinks a large amount of Stern students still study abroad. “I think NYU in general is a very strong advocate for studying abroad, and I think Stern is no different,” Yu said.  

While Yu didn’t want to study away because she wanted to enjoy New York City, others, like Steinhardt sophomore Tina Zhou, won’t study abroad because the study abroad sites don’t offer courses they want to take for their majors.

Zhou is studying studio art and computer science, and she said there aren’t any sites that offer enough classes for both.

“It would be a waste of time for me to study away and only take one or two courses,” Zhou said.

A New Zealand native, Zhou has gone to school all over the world. So, she said, she is technically already studying abroad by going to a university in the United States.

“I went to primary school in New Zealand, middle school in China and high school in England, so I didn’t really feel the need to study away,” Zhou said. “I wasn’t really aware of how big studying away is until I came to NYU, and I did kind of want to study abroad when I first learned more about it, but eventually it just couldn’t work out for my schedule if I wanted to take the classes for a computer science minor [or] possible double major that I’m working toward.”

Zhou said if she could, she would have studied abroad in Shanghai, China or Florence, Italy.

“I really wanted to go to Florence, but I just couldn’t because [its] course offerings just don’t fit with what I’m studying,” Zhou said. “And Shanghai I also ended up giving up because it was like I could, but I don’t feel like I have to.”

Though studying abroad can be an essential part of studying at NYU, students can find enough company should they choose to stay in New York City during their undergraduate careers.

Read more from Washington Square News’ Abroad feature.

Email Natasha Roy at [email protected].