Since ILP is not affiliated with any university, you must arrange all credits directly with your university. Most universities encourage a semester taking classes off-campus whether that’s through online classes or through other methods. We suggest working with your university’s Internship Coordinator to see if an ILP semester would qualify. You can often also work with your academic or department advisor to discuss adapting your ILP service as an internship or to fulfill credit requirements. Some volunteers even take a few online classes during their semester abroad.

If you go that route,  don’t overdo it … The beauty of ILP is that it is not a study abroad, but a service abroad, which is a very hands-on experience. Generally taking more than about 6 credits can be a lot of work to complete while you are abroad. You will only be teaching half of your day, but there are so many things to experience that you probably won’t want to use all of your free time abroad doing coursework in your apartment.

If you need to take credits in order to volunteer with us  (for academic, family, or other reasons) we support you doing so! Just remember that credit cost to your university is in addition to the ILP program fee. Since credits are arranged directly with the university, payment for them needs to be made directly to them.