Gap year

As part of the initiative to make gap years more accessible for more students, the GYA surveyed schools in 2013 to learn more about admissions policies and how those include information about taking a gap year and how to defer admissions in order to make a gap year happen. The 2018 update allows us to look closely at the trends in higher education admissions and have a discussion about what it looks like to have a 'gap-friendly' institutional admissions procedure. This poster addresses the project history, emerging themes, results, and the current state of the project.

With overwhelming evidence that a planful and structured gap year bears fruit in student development, there is still a body of literature supporting 'academic momentum.' We agree that momentum is important to human development and student success. Because we believe that momentum from one developmental experience to another is important, partnerships between gap year programs and higher education admissions is critical for bridging those transitions. The significance of inspiring 'gap-friendly' higher education institutions means that more students and their families can consider a gap year as part of their goals and vision. 

Cite this: Flowers, S.M.F. (2018). Gap Year Association higher education admission and deferral policies project. Poster presented at the 2018 Association for Experiential Education + Gap Year Association International Conference: Orlando, FL.

As the quote goes, it is better to build strong children than to repair broken men and women so we need to address the transitional types of skill building and preparation for the adult and working world that can happen in our organizations. We frequently refer to our work as pedagogy but we fall short of capturing the uniqueness of learners who are not children. In adult education, we use the term andragogy, but there is another layer of learning that happens in between; the citizen building of the Ephebus—the youth.

If our goal is to foster the whole learner, the robustness of programming that involves cultural, social, and out-of-doors education is just as important as the literacy and numeracy of college attendance. In order to build the strong leaders of tomorrow, we must sow seeds of the skills and dispositions necessary for fully-fledged and contributing members of our society.

We know that “academics” and “education” have nuanced differences and there are principles and models that will help us to understand the opportunities that our programs can offer. Too often, we hear youth criticized and young people accused of ill preparedness for the adult and working world. All the while, schools chip away at the non-academic programming that is precisely the sort of education that young people need in order to bloom. Mapping out the practices of ephebagogical teaching stands to impact teaching and learning in, secondary levels, post-secondary, and transitional development programs.

Cite this: Flowers, S.M.F. (2018). Leading the budding citizen and emerging adult. Presented at the Association for Experiential Education + Gap Year Association International Conference: Orlando, FL.

For a considerable length of time it was generally accepted to students to go directly to university or college after school. Only in 1970’s in the United Kingdom appeared the phenomenon of “gap year”. Before we dive into the research we have to clearly understand the meaning of this phenomenon (Desforges,1998).
A gap year is a semester or year "off," customarily portrayed as a break from school. While there is no age constraint for taking a gap year, it is usually done between the last year of school and university. Understudies will look for an enhancing involvement overseas, such as interning, educating, volunteering, or learning new languages.

This research-based book highlights the impact of gap years on young adults, principally those in the U.S. We used a blend of quantitative and qualitative data with 280 alumni of gap year programs. We also used a competency model and data from SHL to compare UK "gappers" with those who participated in our survey. One of our major findings was the extent to which gap years impact employment satisfaction among millennials.

This report was prepared for the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations to throw light on the growing trend of taking a 'gap year' between school completion and commencing university study. It looks at  the characteristics of those taking a gap year, the activities undertaken in the gap years and subsequent study and employment outcomes. The report also investigates whether there is any evidence that young people were taking a gap year in order to qualify for Youth Allowance payments.

This qualitative study examined the 18-24-year-old population of undergraduate students at one northeast, public university who participated in a structured gap program between their secondary and post-secondary schooling. Data were collected in three phases. Study participants emerged from an initial questionnaire that invited participation from the eligible university population of 3,355 students. Data included survey responses from 100 students, interviews with four respondents, and a case study of one informant. The four student interviews occurred on the university campus in audio recorded, face-to-face appointments. One of the interviewees, Caitlin, became the focus of an instrumental case (Stake, 1994) that reported the factors that led to her gap decision and her experience within the Student Conservation Association. Caitlin’s case was based on her survey responses; interview data; follow-up interview data; and photos, postings, and journal entries from her social network account which she maintained during her gap period and her university experiences. Additional narrative data about Caitlin’s case resulted from interviews with other informants to whom Caitlin provided access. The findings detailed the pivotal events and critical features of structured gap programs, evidence of personal development, and the factors of access and support involved with attending a structured gap year program. Informants gave evidence that structured gap year programming provided them with the opportunities to build resilience, become self-directed, relate to people, find independence, and define their passion. Findings reveal how participation in these programs fosters dispositions indicating greater likelihood that the student will enroll in college and persist toward degrees. The findings also give reason to both high school guidance and college advising programs to consider the role gap programming may serve in addressing the ephebagogical needs of the emerging adult and spur post-secondary institutions to appraise the extent to which they endorse and credential these experiences for young people.

The paper titled “PLEASE MIND THE GAP! (In-) Consistency in Gap Year Volunteer Tourism - From Rite of Passage to (Unwanted) Cosmopolitanism” was accepted for a stand-up presentation at the 7th Advances in Hospitality and Tourism Marketing and Management (AHTMM) conference, which was held in Famagusta, Cyprus between July 10 -15, 2017. The full paper can be found in the Conference Proceedings: p. 14-33.

Gap years are a popular rite of passage amongst school-leavers who opt to take a year out from education in order to travel around the world. Volunteer organizations became one of the fastest growing sectors of the tourism industry, offering students the opportunity to see the world, grow up, and think about future prospects and reflect upon the question: “What do I want to do with my life?”. Therefore, gap years and voluntourism can be considered as a liminal phase in one’s life. However, the reputation of volunteer tourism (often coined: voluntourism) is under pressure as students start to turn their backs on these gap year experiences for various reasons: because they doubt the value of their help to local communities, to earn money to pay increasing university fees, etc.

This poses a question whether ‘gappers’ and ‘voluntourists’ are not becoming unwanted travelers, who consider themselves (unjustified?) cosmopolitans1? An increasing body of scholars argues that gap year volunteer tourism might well have good intentions, but does more harm than good. Eventually the question can arise whether this phenomenon is not a postmodern form of pilgrimage, mainly achieving personal aspiration levels in sacred liminoid, and whether it is not ego-centric rather than altruistic?

This paper wants to address various themes of the course ‘Anthropology and Travel’ (KU Leuven) such as rites of passage, tourism, spiritual journeys, (im)mobility, unwanted travelers, cosmopolitanism, and critique towards the convergence of gap year volunteer tourism.

During the phase of emerging adulthood between the late secondary and early college years, students are in their greatest need of a teaching and learning philosophy that matches their development. Pedagogy is a philosophy of teaching children and andragogy addresses the teaching and learning that happens in adulthood. It is now time to discuss ephebagogy; the teaching and learning that happens for young people in late secondary and early tertiary settings. In this developmental phase students need environments that offer relevance, revelation, responsibility, and relationships. During emerging adulthood and budding citizenship the learners need experiences that are relevant to who they are and who they will become. They need the world revealed to them in ways that brings the outside into the classroom and takes them outside of the classroom. Responsibility for their own learning and the responsibility to choose how learning will happen and how it will be assessed are important to a group coming into their own citizenship. Last, relationships between students, teachers and the world of which they are a part are the social element to make learning stick.

Cite:

Flowers, S. (2014). A philosophy for teaching and learning in emerging adulthood. New Horizons for Learning Journal, 11(1). Retrieved from http://jhepp.library.jhu.edu/ojs/index.php/newhorizons/article/view/343

Blind students in or approaching higher education often consider taking a gap year from higher education to receive comprehensive adjustment-to-blindness training at a residential center. This article seams together existing bodies of literature and explains how and why such training can be a helpful and productive option for a gap-year experience for blind students, especially when that training is provided under the Structured Discovery model. Many of the features of Structured Discovery training in a residential environment have already been designed in ways that preempt the common fears about gap years. Training at a Structured Discovery center fosters personal development, which pays dividends in career development. This article also discusses factors influencing the decision to go to training and the benefits of seeking training as early as possible in the career process.

Аннотация. В статье раскрывается потенциал волонтерской деятельности в процессе жизненного и профессионального развития в целом и в период нового для нашей страны явления - годового перерыва в учебе (gap year), в частности. В ходе проведенного исследования 208 студентов-бакалавров 1-2 курсов Смоленского государственного университета окончивших школу в период пандемии Covid-19, автор приходит к выводу, что явление «gap year» малопопулярно среди российской молодежи, а волонтерство в это период не ассоциируется с самостоятельным видом деятельности, способным оказать влияние на будущую карьеру. Однако, при грамотной организации деятельности по информированию и сопровождению молодого человека, начиная со времени обучения в школе и заканчивая выбором направления деятельности в год перерыва, высока вероятность осуществить верный выбор профессии.
Abstract. The article reveals the potential of volunteer activity in the process of life and professional development in general and in the period of a new phenomenon for our country - the gap year, in particular. In the course of the study of 208 undergraduate students of the 1st-2nd courses of Smolensk State University who graduated from school during the Covid-19 pandemic, the author comes to the conclusion that the phenomenon of "gap year" is unpopular among Russian youth, and volunteering during this period is not associated with an independent activity that can influence future careers. However, with the competent organization of activities to inform and accompany a young person, starting from the time of schooling and ending with the choice of the direction of activity in the gap year, there is a high probability of making choose the right career.

Rooted in Scandinavian tradition that dates back to the 1850s, taking a year off to learn non-academic skills proves to increase the non-cognitive skills of students who are unsure about whether to enter university or pursue other adult opportunities. In helping emerging adults to decide on next steps, it is important for educators to inform families about the benefits of a structured break from academics. While commercial, American gap programs bear tuitions that rival some colleges, it is easy to dismiss the opportunity as something only wealthier families can afford. Join a presentation about the history of folkehøjskole, the opportunities for cost-free American gap, and the stories of four young people who made the most of a structured year off. Included will be a discussion of the implications for students to capture those experiences for credit and reduce their college debt.

Citation: Flowers, S.M.F. (2017, January 5) Scandinavian folkehøjskole and American gap year: What a year off does for college readiness. Presented at Maine Educational Opportunity Association 34th Annual Conference, Orono, Maine.

The Danish Folkehøjskole started as a measure toward adult education, social justice, national identity, and liberation of peasantry in the mid 1800s. Its modern iteration is a Nordic-wide system of transition schools for 18- to 24-year-old learners as they decide whether to enter university or the workforce. Ubiquitously accessed, the folk high school structure translates in five ways to offerings found in the United States, namely the commercial gap year industry and the non-profit public service corps. The translation does not happen without some elements lost, however an examination of the intersections and the potentials begins an important discussion. 

Cite:

Flowers, S. (2015, April 10). Scandinavian folkehøjskole & American gap year: Cultivating the emerging adult. Paper presented at Harvard University Graduate School of Education 20th Annual Student Research Conference, Cambridge, MA.

This qualitative study examined the 18-24-year-old population of undergraduate students at one northeast, public university who participated in a structured gap program between their secondary and post-secondary schooling. Data were collected in three phases. Study participants emerged from an initial questionnaire that invited participation from the eligible university population of 3,355 students. Data included survey responses from 100 students, interviews with four respondents, and a case study of one informant. The four student interviews occurred on the university campus in audio recorded, face-to-face appointments. One of the interviewees, Caitlin, became the focus of an instrumental case (Stake, 1994) that reported the factors that led to her gap decision and her experience within the Student Conservation Association. Caitlin’s case was based on her survey responses; interview data; follow-up interview data; and photos, postings, and journal entries from her social network account which she maintained during her gap period and her university experiences. Additional narrative data about Caitlin’s case resulted from interviews with other informants to whom Caitlin provided access. The findings detailed the pivotal events and critical features of structured gap programs, evidence of personal development, and the factors of access and support involved with attending a structured gap year program. Informants gave evidence that structured gap year programming provided them with the opportunities to build resilience, become self-directed, relate to people, find independence, and define their passion. Findings reveal how participation in these programs fosters dispositions indicating greater likelihood that the student will enroll in college and persist toward degrees. The findings also give reason to both high school guidance and college advising programs to consider the role gap programming may serve in addressing the ephebagogical needs of the emerging adult and spur post-secondary institutions to appraise the extent to which they endorse and credential these experiences for young people.

Cite:
Flowers, S. (2016, March 25). Development in the gap: A case study of the emerging adult in structured gap programs. Paper presented at Harvard Graduate School of Education 21st Annual Student Research Conference, Cambridge, MA.

When a student has the freedom to traverse into the unknown—leaving books and comfort zones at home—lessons of an arduous year of trailblazing in the Adirondacks become the resilience to trek through a 15-week semester, a 9-month school year, and a 4-year degree program. A heavy pack becomes the weight of multiple assignments and the persistence to come out on the other side. A swarm of black flies becomes the noisy demands through which a successful student develops their grit. A handmade bridge becomes the construction of identity and the way forward. Taking a gap year does not mean a year off, it means a year on and it can mean all the difference to a successful college student. Higher education institutions understand the importance of resilience, persistence, grit, and identity, and institutional deferral policies are critical to ensuring that students have their best chance to arrive at school ready to learn and ready to achieve their academic goals.

One day, a man set his heavy sack down and rested near a traveler who also had a heavy sack at his feet. To the other says one, “Oi, I’m tired. I just don’t know what to do with all these hammers.” In response, the other says, “Oi, as am I. I just don’t know what to do with all these nails.” As organizational leaders, how often do we find ourselves so close to a solution? Demand for degreed citizens is on the rise and higher education is changing. Our response to this challenge is a social movement and the way we are going to get through this is with relationships, story, strategy, and action (Ganz, 2010).  A higher education administrator sat to lunch at a regional conference next to an experiential educator and said, “Boy, am I puzzled and I just don’t know how to increase our enrollments and impassion my students to engage them in their academic futures.” To this the colleague said, “Boy, me too and I just don’t know how to increase our numbers and inspire my participants to keep going and ride their momentum.” A social movement begins with identifying the untenable situation to which we have a claim. Building the relationships between change agents, telling our stories, creating a strategy, and putting it all into action is how we create the conditions to change lives. Are we sitting next to our solution?

Cite this:  Flowers, S.M.F. (2019, April). Folkehøjskole, gap year, and first-year experience: Leading for social movements. Paper presented at University of Southern Maine Thinking Matters Symposium, Portland, ME.

Androscoggin County wants secondary school completers to celebrate decisions. Students completing their high school diplomas are encouraged to hashtag #AndroscogginDecides and call out the decisions they have made to enter college, university, gap programs, apprenticeships, military service, work force experience, or another developmental opportunity that will help them to build the skills and dispositions for an adult world.

Cite:

Flowers, S.M. (2016 Mar 27). Graduation brings a time for decisions. Lewiston Sun Journal, p C9. Retrieved from http://www.sunjournal.com/ news/columns-analysis/2016/03/27/graduation-brings-time-decisions/1893709

The Scandinavian countries have a model of school called the folk high school that stared in the 1850s. Today, these are schools accessed by 18-24-year-olds as transitions programs between secondary school and either the work force or high education. The practices of these schools is most closely matched to the United States gap year industry and there may be indicators that this helps our students make more solid gains in their college attendance.

Cite:
Flowers, S.M. (2016). Folkehøjskole: A Scandinavian model can help our students succeed in college. New England Journal of Higher Education. Retrieved from http://www.nebhe.org/thejournal/folkehojskole-a-scandinavian-model-can-help-our-students-succeed-in-college/.

It is asserted that gap year activities have positive contributions, such as analyzing the current situation, evaluating potential transition scenarios, and gaining new abilities that facilitate career transition, to the qualified workforce that decided to change their career paths due to job-related dissatisfaction with a sound and accurate implementations. In this study, volunteers who took a break from their professional lives and worked abroad for Non-Profit Organisations due to personal or professional dissatisfaction while working in the area related to their academic education were examined. Also, the reasons for a gap year, causes and incentives of career transition, benefits acquired in the gap year, and career transition after the process were investigated. The sample group was selected from the professionals that joined the European Volunteer Service projects for 4 to 12 months. In the data collection process, semi-structured interviews were held with the sample group of 17 people who were selected in accordance with the predetermined criteria. The results showed that gap year has positive contributions to career transitions.

One day, a man set his heavy sack down and rested near a traveler who also had a heavy sack at his feet. To the other says one, “Oi, I’m tired. I just don’t know what to do with all these hammers.” In response, the other says, “Oi, as am I. I just don’t know what to do with all these nails.” As organizational leaders, how often do we find ourselves so close to a solution? Demand for degreed citizens is on the rise and higher education is changing. Our response to this challenge is a social movement and the way we are going to get through this is with relationships, story, strategy, and action (Ganz, 2010).