Study Abroad Funding Recap

Thanks to a new kind of fundraising, crowd-funding, the number of students taking advantage of study abroad opportunities may increase.

This increase may be due, in part, to the fact that crowd-funding uses social media as a catalyst for raising money, and college students are typically social media savvy.

While there are typical financing routes, like scholarships, family contributions, financial aid, and working to save enough money, sometimes students need an even more powerful tool in order to be successful.

"Social media is... one of the biggest catalysts for why this type of funding exists," said Thomas Coke, an expert on the topic of crowd-funding and former crowd-funding securities regulator for the state of Michigan.

Thoughts on this type of fundraising were varied, with one student supporting its potential as a supplement to competitive scholarships, another detesting how it seems like begging for money, and yet another currently running a crowd-funding campaign.