Purdue offers both long-term and short-term study abroad programs that are amazing! But if you are like me and want to commit to a short-term study abroad, Purdue offers many options for those who want to study globally without the full-semester commitment. There are also many major-specific study abroad programs that can expose you to industry and educational opportunities in other countries. In May 2025, I got to participate in a biomedical engineering (BME) trip to Scandinavia, and I’m excited to share more about my experience abroad.
Places, People, & Things
Across the two weeks of the trip, I had the opportunity to visit Denmark, Sweden, and Finland. In each country, we got to visit industry partners like Cook Medical and Novo Nordisk and got to learn more about each country’s culture through food, tours, and exploring during our free time. In fact, one of the best ways we learned about each country was by hopping on a bus, train, or tram and exploring what each city had to offer. While I tend to be a picky eater, I did get to try a lot of new foods, including a Finnish classic – roasted reindeer. We also took full advantage of our museum/attraction passes in Stockholm, stopping at the Royal Palace, the National Museum, and the Vasa Museum, amongst many others.
A New Perspective
While I had been abroad previously, this trip really showed me how much you can immerse yourself in a culture. In Sweden, we met a group of students who were celebrating their graduation, and we spent hours discussing all the cultural differences between our countries, and it’s one of the moments that I really learned a lot about how we can bridge cultural differences despite growing up almost 5,000 miles apart. Sometimes it can show you how much we take for granted when we’re in our own culture that others can find fascinating, and vice versa.
The Class Part
While a lot of our time was focused on immersing ourselves in the culture and BME industry in each country, each of us also completed a project, focused on modeling a specific virus and treatment plan. While in Linköping, Sweden, we met with microbiology students at a local university to discuss the best way to implement a treatment plan into our bacteria model and learned a lot about their healthcare system in the process. While discussing our project amongst other similar topics, it opened conversations with many of the people we met on local and global healthcare happenings.
Purdue Study Abroad Scholarship Opportunities!
As I searched for programs and began applying, I also looked at the costs of studying abroad. I found that Purdue has SO many options for financial support, between summer aid, scholarships, and the Giant Leaps Semester Scholarships. The best part of these programs is that they can also count for college credit, so you are going for adventure, exposure, AND credits for Purdue. I really encourage you to consider a study abroad program, and if you do, my main advice would be to start looking and applying early!
While I discussed the benefits and amazing aspects of short-term study abroad, there are also longer study abroad programs, such as a Maymester (study abroad for the month of May) or participating in GEARE. Check out our Study Abroad website to see the opportunities you could have here at Purdue in this link. You will have an amazing time and make memories for a lifetime – I know I did!
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