Hey everyone. My friends and I are planning a year RTW. My goal was to do it while doing a low residency graduate school program. It requires me to be back in New England for one week. I thought it might be a good time to catch up with friends and family before heading back out. We'd probably be somewhere in Indonesia by this point...very far away!

So my question is, first, has anybody else done an online or low residency masters program while travelling? And is is madness to attempt it while travelling(I've done my undergrad while working a full and additional part time job so I think I'll be able to handle it.)? Also Does anybody have any experience taking a mid RTW break to go home and regroup?

Looking forward to your input. Thanks.

In my opinion your success will boil down to the pace of your traveling. If you are a slow traveler and have extra time all along the way, then this will work out fine. If you and your friends are whisking right along from place to place, then no. And I am probably talking about slower travel than you are thinking. I would just worry that your travel mates will get bored of a slow pace.

Your priorities when choosing a hostel will become good wifi and some quiet time. Don't worry, they're my requirements also and I seldom have any problem finding them.

For the mid-trip return home, I don't see anything complicated there. Other than the expense, it's a good chance to fine tune your pack and satiate the proverbial home town food craving.

Let us know how it all works out for you When are you going?

Why bother ? Is there a special reason to do Grad School ? RTW is in itself a real educational exerience.

I don't want to stop school I have a plan, a dream and I don't want to lose momentum. Also if I take a year off I'll have to start paying my loans back=P

My travel mates are all for slow travel. That was part of our plan anyhow. One week or so per area making day trips from a central location. We are trying to save the money and go in two years. Probably Fall of 2011. There are three of us. I've decided if they bail on me I'm going to rent an apartment near Rome and just become Italian =D

Depends what kind of program you're in I'd say- I just started in physics meaning I feel happy about getting timing right to head off for a weekend there's so much work! (Well that and they pay me to do it so I had to sign a contract.) If I was just writing an English thesis or something similar though I'd be fine doing that anywhere so long as the adviser was fine with it.

I guess when it comes down to it my advice would be to search out someone in your program in it already who can tell you about the workload etc just to make sure this is manageable, as it wouldn't do to have a nasty surprise. And if for whatever reason you can't do it see if you can start mid-semester or have your timing off in some fashion and travel less than a year. Sort of how my travels are shaping out which is why I recommend it- I finished in January, had six months of travel, now doing a M.S. for a year and a half before another six months to hopefully do the PhD abroad. I'm passionate about both travel and science and couldn't give either up, but the trick is striking balance!

That is good advise Andromeda, thanks. I'm not sure if I'd be able to concentrate on school work while travelling. I guess I have time to think it over. I finish my BA in a year and a half. The masters program will be a transpersonal psychology program, or individualized study of consciousness. I havn't decided which way to go. But I also want to get my doctorate so I'm hesitant to put it off lest I lose momentum. But then again, a year of travel before hand could really enrich my graduate level writing. It's a lot to think about.

I understand about momentum. One of the reasons I'm not traveling more is that I realized if I didn't go back to school now, I never would. Still, my studies are probably much less intensive than yours are likely to be (I'm going to school to become a librarian, or more specifically, an archivist.)

My advice would be to go for it. If it turns out you can't handle the workload, it will become apparent fairly early on. Make some fallback plans if that happens, either to settle down for a bit while you catch up on work (with the possibility of meeting up with your friends later) or even of returning home. And it all depends on the person, and your level of discipline and ability to prioritize (I'm not the best with either). I'm going to grad school, working full-time, volunteering, and attempting to carry on a social life, and it's exhausting. I'm struggling but happy.

I'd also say that with those two MAs in mind, your travels could very well give you a unique perspective that will ultimately make you more developed in your chosen field.

Finally, and this point is a tad pessimistic, a lot can change in 2 years. My program is full of people who went to school to become lawyers or doctors or CEOs, and housewives and musicians and... you get the idea. Your priorities and goals can change a lot, especially at a time in your life (such as midway through college), where you're really still trying to figure all that out. When I was a junior I could have never imagined being in New Orleans, and now I have trouble picturing myself anywhere else.

So if your question is should you plan for such a trip, then I'd say absolutely. Just be open to the idea that situations and your priorities may change and that other different (but equal, there are many things in life that can make you happy, and the goals you set years ago don't always qualify) possibilities may arise.

Also, and this is no knock against the more stationary among us, in the past I've never actually had friends come through when it came to trips being planned in the long-term. Like I said, priorities change, and except for people I've met while traveling, or through traveling sites, the outlook it takes to commit or leave on a whim isn't always easy to maintain over a series of years. If you really dream of traveling, keep in the back of your mind the idea of traveling alone, instead of just settling down in Rome (unless that's what you really want to do.)