Work&Travel program offers students experience
May 4, 2006 at 00:59la Academy, she went to the U.S. for the first time as a participant in the Work&Travel USA program, which allowed her to earn money and see the country during her vacation. This year, Bondarchuk can’t wait to go back.
“When I went on this program a year ago, I wanted to try and see what it’s like to live on my own in a foreign country,” said Bondarchuk. “Now I want to go, because I liked the experience and I want more of it,” she added.
It’s the combination of English-language practice, international work experience and the learning of a new culture that all make Bondarchuk want to return, she said.
“Besides, it’s a good opportunity to make your own money,” said Bondarchuk, who worked as a waitress in Georgetown, Maryland, for three months. After last summer’s U.S. trip, she was able to buy herself things that she would have had to have saved a year for in Ukraine, such as a laptop, MP3 player, and loads of stylish clothing.
Growing trend
Thousands of other students from all over Ukraine will be heading to the States on the same program in the coming weeks – to work as lifeguards, waiters and housekeeping staff at American restaurants, hotels and resorts.
Insiders say this is a trend that’s growing but will likely reach its peak in the next two to five years.
“Work&Travel USA is the only program in Ukraine right now, which gives an opportunity for both financial compensation and cultural experience in the United States during the summer and is officially supported by the Consular section of the U.S. Embassy,” said Veronika Rastvortseva, general manager of Coliseum, one of the first Ukrainian consultancy and recruitment firms to introduce the program to Ukrainian students five years ago.
According to the U.S. State Department’s website for the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, summer work and travel in the U.S. for international students is one of the cultural and educational exchange programs supported by the U.S. government for the purpose of increasing “mutual understanding between the people of the United States and the people of other countries.”
This program is carried out by private-sector recruitment companies based in countries outside the U.S., who then work with designated companies, or “sponsors”, in the United States. These companies cooperate to help students find places to work, assist them in acquiring visas and other documentation, and then monitor their stay in the United States.
Through the summer work and travel program, full-time international university students can work anywhere in the United States for a maximum of four months during their summer vacation, according to the U.S. Department of State’s website. Their visitor visa obliges them to return home after their stay.
At the peak of popularity
Coliseum started with just one Ukrainian client five years ago, but now the company assists more than 1,500 students, who will travel to the U.S. on the Work&Travel program this summer, said Rastvortseva.
The growing number of Ukrainian students going to the U.S. every summer indicates a mutual interest in the program on both the American and Ukrainian sides – and not just in terms of facilitating cultural exchange.
“American companies are interested in having international students for summer jobs in customer service areas, like restaurants, hotels and all kinds of resorts for various reasons,” said Rastvortseva. “Often, international students fill in the gaps in summer jobs, when the companies cannot either recruit enough local people or when they [the companies] want to pay them less than locals,” she said.
In most cases, however, Ukrainian and other international students receive comparable local salaries, but are preferred by companies because of their high level of personal motivation and sense of responsibility, noted Ratsvortseva. Coliseum has received job offers for students from such respectable hotel chains as Marriott and Sheraton, as well as from airports, casinos and luxury spas, in some cases offering positions with salaries as high as $16 an hour, she said. According to information posted on the U.S Department of Labor’s official website, the minimum hourly wage in the U.S. ranges from $5 to $7.5, depending on the State.
According to her, only around 10 percent of their student clients’ overstay their visas. Only full-time students are accepted.
“Our students are more responsible and take the job, whatever it is, more seriously, because they know they need to return money they’ve invested in the program,” Rastvortseva explained, describing the company’s student work ethic.
Coliseum’s clients on average pay $2,000 into the program prior to departure, which includes fees for English-language interviews, documentation and visa costs, as well as the cash they take with them to cover initial expenses in the U.S., explained Rastvortseva.
However, while the financial motivations of Ukrainian students may make them good employees, Rastvortseva stressed that the goal of the Work&Travel program is not to make money.
“We try to explain to the students that the program’s aim is primarily to help them get to know everyday American life and culture from within,” said Rastvortseva.
“But for many of our student-clients, making their own money while in the U.S. remains their primary motivation for taking part in the program,” she said, adding that depending on the job and hourly compensation, a student can make anywhere from $5,000 to $10,000 for several months of work in the U.S.
Yet cases vary greatly, and Rastvortseva said that her company deals with a variety of clients, ranging from students whose parents want to give their children an opportunity to taste independent life to determined students who work several summers in the United States to pay for their studies in Ukraine.
Tasting adult life
This was the case for Volodymyr Vyzhnyak.
Currently a graduate student at Kyiv Mohyla Academy, Vyzhnyak was able to support himself in Kyiv for two years without his parents’ help because of the money he earned from working two summers in the U.S.
Aside from the money, Vyzhnyak said he also got a taste of life as an adult, taking on responsibilities and doing things he probably would never have gotten a chance to do in Ukraine.
“My Ukrainian friend and I were able to buy a used car for $400 in the States and go on shopping trips for clothes once in a while. We felt like human beings and not like the poor students we are in Ukraine,” said Vyzhnyak, recalling his experience.
Initially, Vyzhnyak and his friend worked at a fast-food cafe on a cruise ship that took tourists from Boston to Cape Cod and then onto the islands of Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard. Most of the ship’s staff were foreign students, recalled Vyzhnyak, who said that he would never have met so many international friends had he stayed in Kyiv.
Later on, the two friends worked as stockers in a supermarket by night and as waiters in a restaurant by day.
“It was tiring, and we did not have time to go out or travel,” admitted Vyzhnyak, who nevertheless calls his experience “fantastic.”
For Alina Bondarchuk, 23, having the Work&Travel USA program on her resume helped her get a job at several language schools when she returned to Kyiv.
“The U.S. experience definitely helps when you apply for jobs in Ukraine, and I felt it personally,” said Bondarchuk, who worked as a waitress during the summer in the U.S. three years ago.
“For me, it wasn’t about money, but rather about an opportunity to travel around the United States and see places like New York, Washington, DC or Virginia Beach,” Bondarchuk recalled.
Rastvortseva of Coliseum believes that the Work&Travel USA program will remain very popular among Ukrainian students until they are welcomed in Europe.“I think that until Europe opens its borders to our students, the U.S. will remain the most popular destination, just as it was in the case of Poland,” Rastvortseva said.