24 TheLinguistAPRIL/MAYwww.iol.org.ukFEATURESI arrived in Florence in September 2006 forthe third year of my Italian and History of Artdegree at the University of Edinburgh. Theterm dates were finally posted on theUniversità degli Studi di Firenze website fivedays before the start of the course so I wasquite flustered; I still needed to set up anItalian bank account, buy a mobile phone,enrol at the university and apply for mycodice fiscalein order to find somewhere tolive, all without anyone to ask for advice. I didn't know anyone in the city who wasgoing through this process, and I couldn't findanything useful either on- or offline to guideme. It turned out that many of my classmates,who were distributed across the country, werehaving the same problems. Clearly, somethingneeded to be done to make the process lessintimidating. I filled a notebook with sketchesand ideas about my dream website. InNovember 2006, barely two months after Ihad arrived in Florence, I incorporated ThirdYear Abroad Limited and bought the domainThirdYearAbroad.com (TYA).The idea began as an online year abroadguidebook; for each city you could find outabout accommodation, student discounts,enrolment and extracurricular activities tohelp you make the most of your time abroad.But I soon realised this would require a lot ofresearch and that it was the students in eachcity who were best placed to write thecontent. Year abroad students visit the touristattractions and make local friends within theirfirst few weeks. It occurred to me that if theycould pass on advice to future year abroadstudents about how to settle in their city, theycould make a real difference to the future ofthe year abroad and the numbers applying. Idecided to start an information network.Now, universities update us when theirstudents experience problems so that we canwarn other students. For instance, theUniversity of Oxford got in touch when a fewof their students in Paris had scammingissues with the accommodation searchplatform CraigsList, and we sent out an alert.Building a business I found Twitter to be the most useful,student-focused, free marketing tool at thatstage. Using the search term 'year abroad' Icould identify students who were tweetingabout their year abroad-related problemsand send them a direct link to the solution onour site. I also asked them to tell me theiryear abroad destination and sent them auseful link in return. This method received apositive response and prompted manywritten contributions to TYA. When Natacha Cullinan joined us as Editor,she transformed the site, writing freshcontent from her perspective as a yearabroad graduate, recently returned from aLanguage Assistantship in Mexico. She wrotefeatures on banishing the year abroad bluesand long-distance relationships; interviewedanxious parents to garner their survival tips;and researched job sites, accommodationand the best student deals for each country.Meanwhile, I focused on developing thebusiness model. We wanted to find alanguage sponsor and I approached Collins,who agreed to support us despite the earlystage of the business. We then needed tomarket the site better to get more users andencourage advertisers. I came up with fourslogans: 'It's all Greek to me!', 'When inRome.', 'Russian Around?' and 'No Spain,No Gain', and a designer turned them intoAfter completing my degree I got someinvaluable experience working for two onlinestartups, and launched ThirdYearAbroad.comin January 2010. The aim of the site is toprovide free information, case studies, adviceand a networking platform so students canlearn from each other's experiences by openlysharing advice and tips. We want to pass onstudy and careers advice from academics andindustry professionals, and to help solvestudents' problems in such a way that otherscan benefit from our research. We also try tokeep our members up-to-date with eventsand opportunities in the languages world. Surprisingly, getting the support ofuniversities was one of the most difficultaspects of starting the business. I began bycontacting university departments by email,but it was not until we had the backing of theErasmus Programme that they could see wewere a serious enterprise, offering a valuablefree service to students. Yet it was still difficultto get their support. Fortunately, we had atwo-pronged attack: the universities mightnot have been responding but the studentscertainly were, and they played a big role ingetting their departments on board. Lizzie Faneon making a successful business out ofhelping students on their year abroadVenture abroad

Vol/51 No/2 2012APRIL/MAYTheLinguist25FEATURESand talk about the many and varied careersthey can go into with language skills. Recently I have been working on a projectwith the British Academy and the UniversityCouncil of Modern Languages, who need toprove the value of the year abroad in orderto retain government funding. I analysedhundreds of case studies, written bygraduates who studied, worked and taughtabroad during their degree, about how theexperience has affected their lives andcareers. This inspiring project will also make iteasier for me to help students with theircareer plans in future.British workers take only five percent of thejobs in the European Parliament andCommission, even though 12 percent of theEU population lives in the UK. It seems to methat the decline in the study of languages atuniversity has come about because ofmisconceptions about the difficulty andpurpose of a modern language degree, withits 'scary, expensive' year abroad. I believe that modern language degreeswould be more appealing if students wereinformed of the innumerable benefits of ayear abroad; the funding available to them;the value of doing a four-year degree; theextensive range of careers open to them; howmuch employers love year abroad graduates;and the existence of support networks such asours - and that this would help to reverse thedecline in language study in higher education.The year abroad introduces young peopleto new cultures, forcing them to adopt aforeign way of life and giving them aninvaluable understanding of humanity from adifferent viewpoint. It opens up opportunitieson the world stage. Graduates are less afraidto follow an international career path andmore inclined to bring in internationalbusiness for their future employers, bringingthe world closer together.TYA enables students to prepare for livingabroad for the first time; to cope with foreignbureaucracy, the culture shock andhomesickness; to find a safe and affordableplace to live, set up a foreign bank accountand socialise with locals. In the future, I wantthe site to encourage students across the UKto study overseas during their degree, toshow them how small the world really is, andhow they can be the bridge betweencountries by speaking foreign languages andunderstanding other cultures and customs. The site will be filled with inspiring,attainable linguistic career case studies andgraduate opportunities, it will introduceinnovative products and services to make iteasier to move abroad for the first time, andit will offer a networking platform forinternational students to pass on their adviceand the benefit of their experience. The aimis to force the UK to accept the importanceof modern languages and, above all, to turn studying abroad from an option into arite of passage.UNIQUE OPPORTUNITY(L-r from far left ) TYA founderLizzie Fane; one of the site's bloggers,Charlotte Evans (l), in Córdobaduring the third year of her Frenchand Hispanic Studies degree; Lizzie's drawing class in Florenceeye-catching, student-oriented poster andpostcard designs to distribute at universities. We began a monthly newsletter with itemsrelating to each stage of the academic year,encouraging feedback on new ideas andpromoting competitions with year abroad-related prizes, including city guides andvouchers. However, we needed a moredependable business model than advertisingand sponsorship, so I approached aninternational insurer with the idea of creatinga product specifically designed for yearabroad students. A couple of students hadmentioned being unhappy with the traveland emergency medical insurance coveravailable to them, as they viewed themselvesas a different risk from Gap Year students,who are continually travelling with only abackpack of belongings. Over the following year we collaboratedon a new site, YearAbroadInsurance.com,which launched last summer, and which wenow promote on TYA. There are many otherareas in which we hope to develop newproducts. Our new jobs board is launchingsoon and we have the support of EU Careers,so we might be able to begin by offeringplacements in Brussels!Inspiring workMy daily activities at TYA are never the sametwo days in a row. I respond to emails andupdate our social media channels, I createadverts and designs for the right-handcolumn, I upload articles written by our users,and I write blog posts about languages, traveland year abroad-related issues. Universitiesinvite me to speak at their Study Abroad fairsand pre-departure talks so that I can tellstudents what an incredible opportunity it is,Surprisingly, getting thesupport of universitieswas one of the mostdifficult aspects ofstarting the business