EF Gap Year

During my EF gap semester, I was able to travel to some of the most beautiful places in the world, meet some of my best friends, and work on environmentally-focused projects in several different countries, all while improving my Spanish and learning new words in Quechua. I also had the opportunity to do this program under a Digital Media fellowship and my EF experience allowed me to get a taste of the life of a traveling videographer/documentarian, which I am eternally grateful for. The whole experience is one that I will happily and gratefully carry with me for the rest of my life.

The four week program to Costa Rica through EF was amazing! Staff from the very beginning are friendly and professional, and everything was very well organized. We weren’t just sightseeing, we were doing a lot of learning about Costa Rica culturally as well as learning about sustainable agriculture and doing service work. The team dynamic was amazing. Our tour guide and our EF team lead helped create such a great team environment. I made excellent friends that I am keeping in touch with. We all felt grateful for our chance to be there to connect with people as well as each other. Thank you, EF!

I was so worried about college and my next steps in life after I graduated high school in 2022. I decided I wanted to take a gap year and see where life takes me. In the fall of my gap year, I found EF’s website and fell in love. I decided on the European discovery since I always wanted to go to Europe especially France and Italy! I worked and saved the next few months and in April of 2023, I finally flew to London and met my fellow travelers. And I can’t put into words how amazing it was. I had a great group and tour leaders who made the experience so much better! I felt supported 24/7. It was affordable with insurance plans, a phone bill plan and great hotel/hostel accommodations! I felt safe at all times. We had amazing dinner reservations, wonderful tour guides in the cities we were at and special activities such a cheese factory, a cooking class and more!
I will be returning to EF on my next trip!

I loved this program! It was great for developing independence while still having group events, and access to guidance and support. I also loved taking Spanish classes at EF Malaga; the teachers teach in spanish regardless of your level, which at first made me nervous but actually, I loved! I learned soo much in the short time being there, and am definitely more confident with my Spanish skills. I also loved how we got to travel to Madrid, Sevilla, Valencia and Barcelona! Overall great and would definitely recommend!

I attended the EF Gap finder as a fresh college graduate and this program was everything I could've wished it could be. Although many of my fellow travelers were recent high school graduates, we all came from many different walks of life. This program was perfectly structured to ensure we saw the many highlights that the various European cities had to offer. From seeing the Northern Lights, to taking a cruise along the Seine river overlooking the Eiffel Tower, to tasting authentic Parmesan cheese in the Parma Region of Italy it was perfect. Not only did I learn so much about all of these amazing places, I made incredible lifelong friends who I continue to keep in touch with and am making plans to see again very soon. EF took care of everything so I could sit back and enjoy my trip knowing that everything would be taken care of. The trip was a perfect combination of structured activities and free days, in which you can spend how you choose, which included for me a trip to Stonehenge and a day trip to Dresden in Germany. I would absolutely recommend this trip to anyone wanting to travel, even if they had no real prior travel experience. I would relive my gap semester again in a heartbeat.