As a Language Assistant there is no guarantee of being placed in a city even if it was your first choice. Living in a small town could however be one of the best parts of your year abroad experience... I received my arrêté de nomination in early June and excitedly googled the name of my future hometown - Lunéville, Nancy-Metz region. So I found out that Lunéville has a population of 20,000 - just a little bit less than Nancy’s 105,000, the city I had hoped for. But over the course of the 7 months I really did grow to love living in a small town along with its (sometimes bizarre) idiosyncrasies.

Anita Barton-Williams is studying French and Spanish at Nottingham Trent university, and is spending her year abroad in Strasbourg, France, and Ávila, Spain. She says, "I want to shed light on the experiences I have had as a young black woman abroad. I want to be able to give advice to other Black people and ethnic minorities on what to expect upon starting their year abroad as I, as well as several of my fellow Black Trent students, have encountered racism on several occasions and feel it is a topic that needs to be brought to attention." Here is her advice.

Lying on the beach soaking up the Spanish sun with not a care in the world, but just as the sand starts to creep into your hair and you take a deep breath to inhale the sea-air, you remember that project you have to do for University. Suddenly the experience becomes nothing like you had envisaged when you chose your degree programme 3 years ago and were promised a fun-filled time abroad. The reality of an impending University deadline hits you and you’re forced to dump the beach towel, screw the lid back on the sun lotion and head inside to start the essay you thought would be a lot easier to churn out when the time came.