Today on the pod, your co-hosts Julia and Margo come together to get excited for Gap Year Exploration Month (which begins today)! We discuss the various opportunities this month to #explorethegapyear, and how you can remain engaged through this exciting month of opportunities. Additionally we delve into the somewhat daunting task of funding your gap year. We provide you with various ideas and tools to make your gap year dreams become a reality.

This episode features Sam Ballard, an alum of Dynamy Internship Year's class of 2021. Sam spent both his fall and spring semesters of his gap year with Dynamy, a domestic gap year program based in Worcester, Massachusetts. Sam was able to participate in two very different internship opportunities in Worcester during his year, with his fall semester being at an automotive shop and his spring semester being at a digital marketing agency. Sam shares with us the many insights gained from these two unique working opportunities, as well as more about the structure of the program at Dynamy and how that has not only helped to direct his studies in college this year but furthermore allowed him to develop many useful life skills that have proved incredibly helpful now at college!

Today on the pod we have Kevin Fagan joining us, a gap year alum who participated in Where There Be Dragons' Andes and Amazon semester for his fall term, and then spent the second half of his gap year solo backpacking through Europe. Kevin shares with us some highlights from his semester in South America with Dragons and some of his biggest takeaways from this experience, as well as how that semester helped launch him into more independent travels and adventures for his spring semester. Kevin is a recent graduate of Gonzaga University and is now working in sustainability consulting in the Spokane, Washington area, and as someone who is five years out from these experiences is able to share with us how his gap year continues to impact his passions and career path today.

In 2019, Luke participated in the Tufts 1+4 Bridge Year program with Amigos de las Américas in Cuenca, Ecuador. He lived with a host family and worked at Fundación Crea tu Espacio, a non-profit that aids migrants during their transitory periods. Some of his responsibilities included working at daycare centers for toddlers, organizing fundraisers, facilitating workshops, and assisting with a community-based project to build an auxiliary location for the Fundación. Luke also talks about how his gap year offered him the space to explore his sexual orientation and ethnic identity. tells us why his bridge year was one of the most challenging and rewarding experiences of his life. You can find Gap Year Radio on instagram and facebook @gapyearradio or online at gapyearradiopodcast.com You can email us your gap year questions or comments at [email protected] And lastly you can download our show wherever you find your favorite podcasts, and if you have a moment, we’d love for you to leave us a review on Apple Podcasts so more people can discover Gap Year Radio!

Listen to our conversation with Jenae Edwards, who tells us all about how she filled an unexpected covid gap year with meaning. ⁠ ⁠ Jenae used her gap time to create art and delve deeper into my love of art, while picking up a new skill of skateboarding and learning a lot from the community on her island. She says her perspective of home has completely changed as a result of spending her gap time in the Bahamas...how you wonder? Well take a listen to find out! You can find Gap Year Radio on instagram and facebook @gapyearradio or online at gapyearradiopodcast.com You can email us your gap year questions or comments at [email protected] And lastly you can download our show wherever you find your favorite podcasts, and if you have a moment, we’d love for you to leave us a review on Apple Podcasts so more people can discover Gap Year Radio!

Episode 702 brings you our conversation with Aliza Saunders, a 18/19 alum of Tinvu: Building Justice. Tivnu is a nine-month gap year program focused on social justice engagement. ⁠ ⁠ Participants create a community living together, discovering the Pacific Northwest, and exploring the bond between Jewish life and social justice while working with Portland’s cutting-edge grassroots organizations.⁠ You can find Gap Year Radio on instagram and facebook @gapyearradio or online at www.gapyearradiopodcast.com. You can email us your gap year questions or comments at [email protected] You can download our show wherever you find your favorite podcasts, and if you have a moment, we’d love for you to leave us a review on Apple Podcasts so more people can discover Gap Year Radio!

We open our newest season with covid gapper Dan Schmidt who has a super interesting gap year story. As a creative, Dan expanded his professional skill set by spending a large chunk of his year as a videographer for the Adventures with Purpose YouTube channel. He helped bring the channel from 250,000 subscribers to over 1 million, all while traveling the country, learning to pilot drones and solving missing person cases through AWP efforts. Adventures With Purpose specializes in raising submerged vehicles out of bodies of water. AWP got started as an environmental operation but has since helped solve 10 Cold Cases, providing answers and closure for families seeking answers. They have also removed 100+ vehicles from lakes and rivers since 2019. You can find us here at Gap Year Radio on instagram and facebook @gapyearradio or online at gapyearradiopodcast.com You can email us your gap year questions or comments at [email protected] And lastly you can download our show wherever you find your favorite podcasts, and if you have a moment, we’d love for you to leave us a review on Apple Podcasts so more people can discover Gap Year Radio!

Today on the pod we are excited to have Ethan Knight, founding director of the Gap Year Association. Julia and Margo take some time to talk to Ethan about the history of the Gap Year Association (GYA), his personal path that brought him here, the meaning of life, climate based gap years, and the current state of the field after a challenging pandemic year.  You can find Ethan and his colleagues at the Gap Year Association online at https://www.gapyearassociation.org/ or on Instagram and Facebook @gapyearassociation.

Today on the pod we have Vanesia Dedmon joining us to share about her semester with Carpe Mundi in Spring of 2019 in Spain and Morocco. She shares with us some of her biggest takeaways from her time abroad, as well as a few highlight memories from homestays and trekking in the Atlas Mountains of Morocco, to a week on foot on the Camino de Santiago in Spain, to name a few.

Maytal Agasi took a gap year because she wanted to break out of the classroom and have an adventure in the real world. And boy, did she! Maytal spent her gap year working on a sustainable farm in Israel with Eco-Israel, traveling and participating in service-learning projects in East Africa with Carpe Diem Education and working closer to home as well. Maytal tells us that her gap time away from formal education gave her an outlet for the first time in her life to learn effectively.  Through these experiences, her ambitions shifted completely. Originally aiming to major in art history, her time in Israel transformed her into a proud environmentalist and permaculturalist. Her experience in East Africa offered her a chance for a big adventure -  to travel in a new place while learning about the culture through ethical service projects and homestays.  Maytal took her gap time a couple years ago, long before the pandemic upended the way we can travel. She tells us how her gap time prepared her for the challenges of the pandemic and how she took the pandemic disruption as an opportunity to have another adventure.  You can find Eco Israel at https://eco-israel.org/ and Carpe Diem Education at carpediemeducation.org. You can find Gap Year Radio on instagram and facebook @gapyearradio or online at www.gapyearradiopodcast.com. You can email us your gap year questions or comments at [email protected] You can download our show wherever you find your favorite podcasts, and if you have a moment, we’d love for you to leave us a review on Apple Podcasts so more people can discover Gap Year Radio!