raegeo

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So far raegeo has created 78 entries.

Independence! Freedom!… But in my house

The following post was written by Global Gap Year Fellow Val Orozco.

One of the biggest goals I had for my gap year was to become more independent. Growing up, my family was the center of my life (and still is, to be honest). During senior year, hearing about how my friends were ready to move out and do their own thing, away from their parents made me want to explore my life outside of home too. I just got back to DC from spending almost two months at home for the holidays, and it was so much harder to leave than when I first got here.

I’ve been working at the Youth Leadership Foundation in Washington, DC for about 6 months now. My internship started as supporting the social media team and being a tutor, but it evolved into creating a whole new afterschool program and conference that includes high […]

By |February 1st, 2021|Gappers in the Field|
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Returning Back to Where It All Began

The following post was written by Global Gap Year Fellow McKenzie Roller.

I am writing this from the exact spot I began my gap year: on my bed at home in Avon, CT where I will be for at least the next month. However, I am not the same person I was five months ago. I have met dozens of new people, faced new triumphs and failures, visited new places, tried new things, and have faced more uncertainty in my life than ever before.

When I wrote my first blog post, I had just arrived in Wilmington, North Carolina, not knowing a single person and not able to navigate anywhere without my GPS but hoping to “pop the bubble” that I had grown up in. Through the months that I spent in Wilmington, my bubble exploded, personally and professionally.

Mid-September through mid-December, I had the opportunity to work with the organization Vote.org, […]

By |February 1st, 2021|Gappers in the Field|
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College During a Gap Year

The following post was written by Global Gap Year Fellow, Ander Naugle.

For some, a Gap Year is a time for self-exploration, developing new skills, and enhancing your passions; however, that doesn’t mean you have to completely pretermit the college experience out of it.

For the first part of my Gap Year, I decided to stay in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Here, I was able to tour UNC for the first time (I joke with a few of my friends sometimes by saying I just did a four-month college tour there), as well as gain an in-depth sense of the ambiance surrounding Chapel Hill/Carrboro. Since I stayed in an apartment that was only a 2-mile bike ride to UNC, and most of the students that were originally on campus for the Fall Semester were sent home because of Covid-19, I was able to gain a unique perspective of what life on […]

By |January 30th, 2021|Gappers in the Field|
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Pre-Departure:A Moment to Breathe

The following post was written by Global Gap Year Fellow Jaya Dayal.

Throughout high school, my life primarily revolved around what went on within the walls of my campus in downtown Orlando. At my school of 13 years, where I graduated with many of the people in my Kindergarten class, I discovered things I was passionate about, courses I loved, and a coffee addiction that let me take on more than I probably should have. When school suddenly closed on March 13th, it felt strange to be isolated from the people and experiences that had driven me for four years throughout which I felt I had significantly grown. I was still doing school, and I hadn’t given up on my extracurriculars – but as many of us know, despite the best efforts of educators and administrators, distance learning isn’t the same.

Everyone talks about how college is supposed to be a […]

By |October 5th, 2020|Pre-departure|
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Pre-Departure: It’s All About Balance

The following post was written by Global Gap Year Fellow Rose Houck.

It has been nearly a year since I decided I was going to take a gap year. In this time, my decision has raised many brows as people question what real value I could gain from a year-long academic hiatus. Two years ago I would have never even considered the idea. Back then I had been laser-focused on excelling at everything. I don’t know where it was coming from, but I possessed this (admittedly somewhat obnoxious) natural drive to work really hard because I had convinced myself that if I kept this up then I would be successful one day.

When I moved to Durham my junior year of high school to attend the North Carolina School of Science and Math (NCSSM) I realized my perception of hard work and success was a bit distorted. I hadn’t defined what […]

By |September 17th, 2020|Pre-departure|
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Pre-Departure: Here’s to…

The following post was written by Global Gap Year Fellow Karsen Kennedy.

Throughout my high school career, I never would’ve imagined myself breaking away from the “traditional” path of college immediately after high school and pursuing a gap year. It almost felt wrong and like I was going against everything I’ve been showcased and taught by all my peers around me. Almost as if I was making a huge mistake and wouldn’t achieve the same success of the more traditional path. My name is Karsen Kennedy and I am from Fuquay-Varina, North Carolina. I’m 18 years old and have a family of five; mom, dad, older brother, younger sister, and lastly myself. I am passionate about veganism, animals, the environment, music, history, learning about new cultures, and all things arts-related.

Even though I never imagined this, I have developed many reasons for why a gap year is for me, and it […]

By |September 15th, 2020|Pre-departure|
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Pre-Departure: Uncertainty? Certainly.

The following post was written by Global Gap Year Fellow Kyra Koons.

Usually, writing feels therapeutic to me, so it’s a little bit of a mystery that my body isn’t flooding with relief right now. But I have a few guesses why:

I might be overthinking something.
I’m probably overthinking a few things.
I’m definitely overthinking everything.

It seems appropriate to imagine that my brain is a bingo cage, and my thoughts are the balls that rotate around and around until one slips out, right at the front of my consciousness. They’re already numbered in my mind from most to least important, but then they spiral around and jumble together so that Number 17 might come out before Number 2.

Alternatively (and then I promise I’m done with the metaphors), I’m turning into Abed from the show Community, where I keep thinking of all the possible timelines that my gap year could […]

By |September 14th, 2020|Pre-departure|
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Pre-Departure: Popping the Bubble

The following post was written by Global Gap Year Fellow McKenzie Roller.

I have procrastinated writing this blog post for a few weeks now. This could have been written and posted in a day, but until this moment I had not been able to get myself to sit down to write this, which is so unlike me. If you asked someone to describe me, you’d probably hear words like driven, leader, empathetic, thoughtful…but when it comes to my gap year, those core pieces of who I am have felt a little foggy; they are there, but they are being challenged. That fog, the fog that has made it difficult for me to sit down and put into words how I am feeling about my gap year and tell you who I am, is what makes me confident that I am in exactly the right place.

I have lived in Avon, Connecticut […]

By |September 13th, 2020|Pre-departure|
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