Study English in USA

Whether you are planning to study only in an English as a Second Language (ESL) program in the USA or you are planning to continue your academic education after completing your English language training, finding the right school/program where you will be learning, improving your English language skills is a very important step. It may seem difficult to find the best school/program and city/state combination, but once you start understanding your own needs this process will be much easier. First you must ask yourself “What I am going to study?” then “Where am I going to study?”, and then “Will I be able to find a program/school that can meet my educational goals?” and last but not least “Can I afford it?”

You may have had a chance to learn English before, but are your English language proficiency skills really sufficient to pursue academic education? Are you able to read a text written in English and most importantly comprehend/understand? Can you properly write/compose essays, papers in English by following the proper grammar rules? Let’s say you can write, read and understand? But can you orally communicate both ways? Can you explain what you mean? And can you understand what is being said?

Unless you can answer “yes” to all of these above questions (and even that is not enough in most cases) you may not be as ready as you may have thought to study in an academic program of study in the USA just yet. Your future academic success in an US program/school depends on how strong your English language proficiency skills are! That is exactly the reason why most U.S. schools may ask to receive and review your official TOEFL, IELTS, or MELAB scores and even admission essays, personal statements before determining whether you are ready to study in a college/university level program or not. Remember that the purpose of tests like TOEFL, IELTS, and MELAB is to evaluate the potential success of an individual whose native language is not English to use and understand American English at a college or university level programs of study. An alternative to taking TOEFL, IELTS or MELAB can be attending and successfully completing an ESL (English as a Second Language) program offered or approved by the college or university you may be thinking about attending.

Although there are hundreds of stand-alone private ESL programs that specialize in teaching English to non-native speakers, there are also hundreds of ESL programs offered by U.S. colleges and universities themselves that prepares the international students to be proficient in English language whose goal is to learn English for further academic purposes.

There are many different types of ESL programs: Short-term (a few weeks long sessions) such as Summer vacation ESL programs, longer term ESL programs (usually a semester- long “4-month” sessions), fast-track ESL programs, semi-intensive, intensive, even super-intensive ESL programs, vocational ESL programs (such as Business-English Certificate programs) or ESL programs for other specific purposes such as TOEFL preparation, or SAT/ACT/GMAT/GRE preparation purposes.

Identifying the right program and the right school is the first thing you will need to do. Once you find the right school/program you should always check to see how small or how big the classrooms are, what is the student-teacher ratio? Remember that less students in a class room per each teacher means more focused attention to each student, which will give you the opportunity to ask more questions, and get quicker response and assistance from your teachers. Also don’t forget to inquire about the accreditation/recognition of the ESL program you may be thinking about attending and most importantly the quality/how well trained the instructors are? Do they hold degrees/certificates in TESOL (Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages) or TESL (Teaching English as a Second Language)? Are they native speakers? Again, all these are certainly quality assuring characteristics of an ESL program, however their importance will depend on what your educational goals are. Assuming that you have found the school/program that is most likely to meet your educational goals, now you should consider the location of the program/school?

According to the Open Doors report 2008, published by the Institute of International Education (IIE) with support from the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, the number of international students enrolled at colleges and universities in the United States increased by 7% to a record high of 623,805 in the 2007/08 academic year.

ESL – English language programs was one of the most 10 popular programs/fields of study for international students in the academic year 2007/08. Tens of thousands of students from all over the world come to the USA to learn and improve their English language skills each year. But where do these hundreds of thousands of international students choose to live and study in the USA? According to the Open Doors report 2008 below listed U.S. States hosted the most number of international students, or in other words they were the Top 15 leading host states:

TOP 15 Most Popular U.S. States amongst International Students:

1 California
2 New York
3 Texas
4 Massachusetts
5 Illinois
6 Florida
7 Pennsylvania
8 Michigan
9 Ohio
10 Indiana
11 Washington
12 Maryland
13 New Jersey
14 Virginia
15 Georgia

Deciding on where you want to study is a very important step. Are you a small town or a big city person? Do you like mountains or the ocean? How about the weather? Do you like and cannot do without sunshine all year round? or do you enjoy cold and snowy winter days? Remember that United States is a very big country, there are thousands of places you could go in the United States to study and that you will have very different experiences based on where you choose to live and study! The location: city/state where you choose to study will affect how affordable or how affordable your total yearly cost of education and other expenses will be! Do a little search on the internet, ask the admissions officers of the school you may be applying to and find out how much it costs to live in that city or on that campus. Add this average cost of living to the cost of education (tuition, fees, books, supplies etc.) and determine if the total estimated cost will be within your budget or not. Remember that smaller cities offer a lower cost of living than larger ones. It may be more economically possible for you to attend a smaller and less well known college or university or ESL program and save money with lower tuition and cost of living. However smaller cities also offer less cultural and touristic activities.

If you like big city atmosphere, where you can find museums, theaters, and lots of shopping malls and if you would like to live near a major airport so that you can travel easily and more frequently, then you may be better off looking for a school in a major metropolitan U.S. city where the cost of living (rent etc.) will be higher. However you can always offset the high cost of living in the big cities by either choosing an affordable school/program and/or renting an apartment with multiple roommates. Also note that you may prefer to live as far from the downtown/city center as possible to be able to found larger apartment at a lower rent cost. If it is the first time you are traveling abroad, or moving abroad temporarily, it may be best to stay on campus or with a host family first. This will allow you to get to know the city you will be living in, while providing you with a safe roof over your head during the first couples of months.

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