1 . Universities are expanding opportunities to spend a year overseas, meaning that not only language students benefit from time spent in another culture. Amanda Harper, head of placements and Bath University, says going abroad offers students the chance to widen their cultural horizons and develop an international network of friends and contacts.

‘One of my science students learned to dance salsa and speak Spanish during his year in Costa Rica,’ she says. ‘The students mature and their confidence increases. These changes are unquantifiable in terms of marks are the time management skills, presentation skills and ability to deal with the world of vastly improved when they come back from their placements.’

As it becomes increasingly difficult to stand out in the graduate job market, a year’s experience in another country could be what separates one student from others with the same results. A survey for the confederation of British industry found that fifty six percent of employers were not satisfied with graduates’ foreign language skills and forty percent were dissatisfied with candidates’ international cultural awareness.

Most overseas placements are taken in the third year of university, after which students return for a fourth and final year. Cassandra Popli, 22, who spent a year at California State University in Long Beach, got a job in California which she will take up after graduating from Swansea University this summer. ‘I feel like I have got so much more from that year abroad than I would have if I had stayed here,’ she adds.