The University of Exeter is one of the top universities in the United Kingdom and has a well-established 20-year relationship with USF. It is a member of the prestigious Russell Group, a consortium of the top universities in the United Kingdom. Students on the program will enroll as an exchange student at the University of Exeter, live the life of a UK “uni” student living in campus housing alongside other USF Honors students on the program, and take three courses (or “modules,” as they are called in the UK) that can count towards USF major and other graduation requirements. Three Exeter modules (9 USF credits) are included in the program cost. To find out more about the university, explore the University of Exeter website.

For a quick introduction, check out these videos: 

• University of Exeter, 2030
• A Student's Guide to Life at the University of Exeter
• International Alumni reflect on their experience at the University of Exeter
• International Student Experience at the University of Exeter
• This is the University of Exeter

Student Housing

Honors students on the program will live in student housing on the University of Exeter Streatham campus. Each student will have their own private room and adjoining private bathroom. Private rooms are part of a shared suite, which includes a shared kitchen for preparing meals.

Student Life

You will discover a rich array of opportunities within the University of Exeter, the city of Exeter, and the wider southwest of the United Kingdom. The Exeter Students’ Guild is a key feature of student life at the University of Exeter. From academics to sports to outdoor adventures, these student Clubs and Societies give students a fast-track connection to a diverse array of experiences and friendships. To find out more about the student experience, follow this link to  life at the University of Exeter.

The Semester in Exeter program offers two Honors courses that invite students to interdisciplinary undergraduate research related to human well being. As “self-interpreting animals” (to use a helpful phrase from the social theorist, Charles Taylor), human existence is inextricably linked to our capacity for meaningful experience and meaning-making activities. Human well being is determined by the quality of our meaning-making and the experiences it shapes. Our aim is to contribute to both the theory and practice of cultivating human experience. 

All students in the semester in Exeter program will enroll in the research seminar Wonder, Wander, and Belonging: What Living and Studying Abroad can Teach about Choiceworthy Human Experience. This seminar explores the nature of human meaning-making with respect to education, personal growth, and leadership. Students will draw on their own first-person experiences during the program to make contributions to educational theory and practice in both the formal contexts of higher education and informal contexts of life-long learning. 

The Honors seminar, Flourishing: Cultivating Persons, Cultures, and Environments of Well being is a second optional seminar that deepens and expands our research on human meaning-making to focus on the personal, culture, and environmental conditions that enhance the capability of cultivating choiceworthy human experience. The seminar provides opportunities for engaged-research, working with community partners to enhance both personal and collective meaning-making within organizations and to support the cultivation of healthy publics. 

Both seminars make ample use of our weekly group excursions exploring England as (1) a common experiential base of analysis (i.e., clarifying the structures and contents of experience), (2) a “laboratory” or “studio” for developing, testing, and refining the skills and techniques of leadership and participation with respect to crafting choiceworthy experience, and (3) as a historically rich and globally connected culture from which to draw illuminating case studies that inspire, challenge, and hone our ideas and practices. 

Both Semester in Exeter Honors courses invite students to consider the nature of understanding, meaning-making, and the cultivation of choiceworthy experience with respect to personal growth, contribution to the common good, and authentic leadership/professional development. For the best experience in the program overall, taking both courses is recommended. The courses are intended (1) for students of all majors, (2) to be flexible in content and assignments to invite individual interests and all academic trajectories and professional aspirations, and (3) to enhance the extended study abroad experience in the United Kingdom. 

Honors Course Descriptions

Wonder, Wander, and Belonging: What Living and Studying Abroad can Teach about Choiceworthy Human Experience

This research course will be taken by all participating Semester in Exeter students. Grounded in the fields of Phenomenology (the study of experience) and Eudaimonic Ethics (ethics concerned with well being), and drawing on the resources of Psychology and Education Theory, this research seminar aims to make contributions to (1) experiential learning pedagogy facilitating young adult personal growth and life-transitions in higher education, and (2) sustainable practices of life-long learning and leadership/professional development.  
 
The third United Nations Sustainable Development Goal seeks to “ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages,” and the fourth goal aims to “ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote life-long learning opportunities for all.” Meeting these goals involves clarifying the meaning of both “well-being” and “quality education.” The common characteristic feature of learning in the context of both research and education is the skillful disruption of settled meaning and successful subsequent meaning-making. All new discoveries and experiences produce meaning-disruption and initiate a process interpretation. Utilizing the Eudaimonic Framework for Choiceworthy Interpretation (EFCI), our research focus on three “attunements” of experience that enhance meaning-making activity in contexts of meaning-disruption and life-transitions: wonder, wander, and belonging. We investigate these three modes of experience by way of three formal phenomenological structural clues to the constitution of human experience (Project, Practice, and Soma) and three “sites of investigation” (Food, Field, and Friendship).  

This course crucially depends upon its being offered in the context of an extended study abroad program in England as part of an exchange program with the University of Exeter. Living and studying abroad provides for an abundance of occasions to feel and reflect upon the experience of wonder, wander, and belonging and how these enhance meaning-making and choiceworthy experience in both formal education and life-long learning/leadership. Our weekly travels together throughout southwest England provide common experiences with our sites of investigation (Food, Field, and Friendship), which enable the translation of theory into practice. By moving our research and practice increasingly out of the seminar room and into the field over the course of the program, we anticipate taking these ideas and skills into life beyond higher education and to a life-long journey of learning and leadership.

To maximize program accessibility, the Semester in Exeter program, this seminar can be taken as an IDH 3100, IDH 4200, or IDH 4950.  Assignments very for each course number that reflect corresponding Honors and USF general education learning outcomes. 

Flourishing: Cultivating Persons, Cultures, and Environments of Well Being

This optional research seminar elaborates on themes and ideas developed in the first seminar by inviting students to an Engaged Phenomenological research project with opportunities for collaborating with community partners to enhance skills, cultures, and environments for meaning-making within organizations and to support the cultivation of healthy publics. Our focus in this seminar shifts from authentic personal meaning-making to authentic public meaning-making.  
 
We explore the many contexts for collective meaning-making as a cultural phenomenon and distinguish “authentic conversation” as a special mode in which the real freedom of choice and the intentional cultivation of choiceworthy experience are enabled. Drawing on Amartya Sen’s and Martha Nussbaum’s Capabilities Approach to Human Development, we articulate the real freedom for “authentic meaning-making” as an essential capability for human well-being and identify “conversion factors” that potentiate authentic meaning-making in both personal and collective contexts. These social/material conversion factors provide an array of potential contexts within which the Eudaimonic Framework for Choiceworthy Interpretation (EFCI) can be successfully deployed to enhance transformative authentic collective meaning-making conversations. 
 
In the context of organizations and communities, public authentic conversations that are sustained by community leaders and cultural habits, enhance the ability of individuals to successfully engage in personal meaning-making activities that lead to real freedom and reflective rational/emotive endorsement. Our aim is to contribute to the theory and practice of leadership within authentic communities and organizations.  

To maximize program accessibility, the Semester in Exeter program, this seminar can be taken as an IDH 3600, IDH 4200, or IDH 4950.  Assignments very for each course number that reflect corresponding Honors and USF general education learning outcomes. 

Each week, students on the program join Dr. Benjamin Young on an excursion to explore England. These trips are woven into the Honors coursework and often involve a meal together. The list below provides a sample of possible locations. 

• Royal Albert Memorial Museum
• Home-cooked meal at Dr. Young’s apartment & film screening
• Exeter Cathedral & Library and Archive
• Walk Along the River Exe
• Redcoat City Tours
• Exeter Guild Hall
• Darts Farm
• Dartmoor National Park
• Exmouth & Jurassic Coast Walk 1
• Powderham Castle
• Walk from Branscombe to Beer, Jurassic Coast Walk 2
• City of Bath
• St. Ives
• Literary Walk at Lynton and Exmoor
• Salisbury Cathedral & Magna Carta
• Stonehenge
• The Eden Project

Genshaft-Greenbaum Travel Scholarship

• $6,500 (All students accepted to the Honors Semester in Exeter program are also awarded this scholarship)
• This award is not subject to limitations based on prior participation in a study abroad program
• Award amount may shift based upon a student's total financial aid award package 

Program Cost for Spring 2025

• $13,250 + tuition for Honors courses
• In-State Tuition: All students on the program, regardless of residency status, will pay in-state tuition price for both university of University of Exeter modules and USF Honors courses

Included in Program Cost

• Coursework at the University of Exeter (up to 45 Exeter hours – about 9 USF credit hours)
• Housing for the program's duration
• USF on-site faculty members
• 24/7 emergency support
• Program related site-visits

Not Included in Program Cost

• USF tuition for Honors courses
• Passport / visa fees
• Personal expenses
• Meals
• International airfare
• Transportation not included as part of the itinerary
• 16-25 Railcard
• Student activity, lab, or ID fees assessed by the University of Exeter 
• Supplies

Other Sources of Funding

Please note that scholarship deadlines may vary and students may need to commit to a program before they know if they have received a scholarship.

• Gilman Scholarship: Students eligible for a Pell Grant are also encouraged to apply for the Gilman Scholarship, which can award up to $5,000 in funding towards a credit-bearing study abroad program.
• University of Minnesota's Study Abroad Scholarship Search database
• Adventures In Education
• Careers & Colleges Scholarship Search
• The Center for Global Education
• College Board Scholarship Search
• Diversity Abroad
• GoAbroad.com
• Institute of International Education Study Abroad Funding
• International Education Financial Aid
• International Scholarships
• International Student & Study Abroad Scholarship Search

• Wander: A collection of walks in the southwest of England, by Sierra Shellabarger 
• An Exeter Experience, by Emily Fredrick
• Pilgrimage Podacast, by Katy Pfeiffer
• Cultural Pathways in Exeter 2020 Gallery
• Semester in Exeter 2020 video, by Ana Rooney