Parent’s Guide: How to Support Your Child’s Study Abroad Dreams

It is a well-established fact that more and more students are now aspiring to study abroad. Well, while students’ enthusiasm to study abroad is more than evident, it is highly essential to make the right choice when it comes to pursuing education in abroad. If we look at the present trends, the moment a student enters high school, he or she sets a study abroad goal. To substantiate, they set clear goals for the country they would want to study in, the courses they want and even the universities that they would aim for.

Despite the fact that students these days are very aware of the prospects for study abroad, parents’ participation is equally important. Ultimately, you will be taking care of the finances that go into studying abroad and when you do that, you would not want to make any compromise on the future of your child. So, it would not be incorrect to say that if your child has a genuine zeal for studying abroad and you are more than willing to facilitate it, you need to take the command. 

To elaborate, parents need to ensure that they have an elaborate knowledge of the essential factors for study abroad or they seek professional help for the same. When parents have the right knowledge or go the extra mile to seek professional help from a reputed education consultant, they ensure that their child is making the right choice.

In this blog, we aim to cover the dimensions of information or knowledge that parents should have to facilitate their children’s endeavors to pursue higher education in abroad.  Knowing these basic yet essential details will help you to guide your child in the right direction when it comes to studying abroad. 

1. Know That Studying Abroad Is Not Always Expensive 

A lot of parents may believe that studying abroad is always an expensive affair. However, that is not always true especially if your child is performing academically well with great consistency and has a strong extracurricular profile. To substantiate, most universities and colleges offer merit-based scholarships as well as profile-based scholarships.

This is where profile building comes into the picture. To shed light profile building is a systematic process wherein your child will work on enhancing his or her profile by gaining diverse extracurricular experiences. If your child has a great profile that offers a diverse personality, most foreign universities and colleges will be happy to offer handsome scholarships.

Needless to say, any amount of scholarship will take a considerable magnitude of financial burden off you. In fact, for deserving students, the top universities are also happy to offer wholesome study abroad scholarships covering all expenses. 

2. Get A Profile Assessment Done  

What do you think is the first step towards getting your child’s study abroad journey underway? Well, before everything else starts to unfold, the first thing you need to determine is which country and what courses are the best suited for your child’s profile.

The profile here will essentially mean the academic record and the interest area of the student. A profile assessment gives you and your child a clear picture of which universities and courses your child is eligible for. For instance, let’s say your child has a two year gap after completing his or her high school education.

Now, the student may be eligible for one country and may not be eligible for the other country because of the gap. Hence, it is a mindful idea to be sure of the prospects. 

Profile Assessment may seem a little too complicated and hence, you should consult a credible study abroad consultant to take care of it. 

Once you get the profile assessment done, your child can then narrow down the options with a clear picture in front of him or her. 

3. Be Sure of the Fund Requirements  

Different countries have different fund requirements and norms about fund prerequisites also change from one country to another. For instance, the way you need to go about fulfilling fund requirements for Canada is very different from the same process with respect to the UK.

Having said that, you may want to compare different countries based on how much funds are needed and how easy or complicated the processes for showing the prerequisite funds are. This will enable you to make an informed choice and guide your child in the right direction which will be of course in perfect alignment with your family’s financial outlook.

Now the real question is, how can you learn about the fund requirements and how they vary from one country to another? Again, the best thing to do will be to reach out to a trusted study abroad consultant.  

4. Learn About The Key Documents 

Apart from financial records, there is going to be a considerable list of other documents as well to aid the process of applying to colleges or universities and then visa application. So, before you get the entire process started, it will be great if you can gather the information with respect to the necessary documents needed for university application and visa. 

Again, documentation prerequisites will vary from one country to another or for that matter, one university to another. For instance, studying in New Zealand may require a different list of documents when compared to studying in the UK. 

5. Get The Process Started As Early As Possible 

A key step to take in facilitating your child’s study abroad journey is to get the process started on time. You need to understand that with a plethora of applications received each year, universities or colleges may already have closed the applications for the next available intake.

All in all, if your child has entered grade 12 this year and is aiming for admissions in the next fall, you better start now or look to make a start soon. Getting admissions to the top universities across Canada, Australia, the UK or the USA is overwhelmingly competitive. Even the slightest delay could mean that you miss out on an intake and then the child will have to wait for an entire academic year to apply again. You and your child would surely not want to make such a big blunder, right? 

An early start will ensure that there is enough time for you to consult different sources of information and you get the process started on time. 

So, in this blog, I have tried to cover all the key details that parents need to know and be sure of as they start to think along the lines of sending their children abroad for higher education. I hope this blog was utterly useful.