The Scholar Ship

About three months ago, I had no idea I would be joining Semester at Sea. Three months ago, my plan was to join The Scholar Ship, a similar program to SAS, but was affiliated with UC Berkeley. This program, unlike SAS, had a student body composed of international students, while SAS has a student body composed of mostly American students. It was because of the international community I signed up for The Scholar Ship; I wanted to escape UC Berkeley American life for a while. Moreover, I received a large scholarship from The Scholar Ship.

However, two and a half months ago, I received news from The Scholar Ship that the program was cancelled until further notice due to their sponsor pulling out. I think it had something to do with rising fuel prices and their sponsor losing significant amount of money last economic quarter. When I heard this news, I have to admit, I was close to being devastated. I had invested so much time into this program, telling people about the program and reading experiences of participants from the program. I was looking forward to The Scholar Ship, to experience its international community, and to grow as a person. In addition, I wanted to leave Berkeley for a while due to private reasons; I wasn't experiencing anything special and great at Berkeley; in fact, I was bored. I convinced myself tSS would give me that experience.

When TSS was cancelled, I thought I was screwed due to the fact that registration at my university already ended and that I would not be able to sign up for any other UC Berkeley study abroad program due to deadlines. However, long and behold, I thought of Semester at Sea. It was the closest thing to The Scholar Ship, besides not having an international community, which is one thing I was disappointed with.

I contacted the director of admission of SAS, Ryan Roth. He literally saved a bunch of our butts from not having anywhere to go for the fall. Even though the deadline passed for regular admission for the fall, SAS made an exception for tSS students due to the extenuating circumstances. I applied to SAS and I was immediately accepted. On top of that, I received a generous scholarship that almost, but not quite, matched what The Scholar Ship was going to give me. The toughest part, though, of this whole process was trying to get in financial aid and course evaluation forms to UC Berkeley seeing that I was already back in SoCal for the summer. I got through that part, and now in three more days, I'm off to the Bahamas to sail the world.

It was not the plan I had anticipated; I would have hoped for a different outcome. But, I have come to view the positives more than the negatives of the situation. Semester at Sea is still an experience of a lifetime, and I am bound to meet lifelong friends. These two positives are more than enough reason for me to look forward to this trip, and I am looking forward to this trip.

I am not sure yet as how SAS will change me as a person, but I know, I will be a more confident and worldy individual than I am now. I know will open my eyes to even more than I would have ever imagined, and at the end of the voyage, I will probably look back at the voyage and think, "Wow, I can't believe I did this, but I did, and I do not regret it one bit." This is the outcome I hope to achieve, and I have confidence that SAS will do that for me. So until next time,

Alan Shih at Sea