Study Away Adds HST Policy

AMANDA HAUSMANN ’21
NEWS EDITOR

In an email sent to Trinity students on Sept. 19, Dean of the Faculty and Vice President for Academic Affairs Timothy Cresswell and Director of the Office of Study Away Jennifer Summmerhays announced a new Home School Tuition (HST) policy that eliminates the study away fee, grants academic credit for all courses taken with Trinity-approved study away programs, and charges students regular Trinity College tuition for studying at any Trinity-approved program abroad. Prior to this new policy, students who chose to study away through non-Trinity programs or Approved External Programs (AEPs) received transfer credit that was not calculated into their cumulative grade point averages and only paid the tuition for their AEPs.  
 While the policy went into effect on August 28, all current Trinity students will have the opportunity to “opt-out” of this policy, in which case they would pay the study away fee of $3,500 for one semester or $4,000 for a year, their grades would be treated as transfer credit, and they would only pay the fees for their specific AEPs. However, as stated in Cresswell and Summerhays’ email, the goal of the HST policy is to “ensure greater equity and access to a fuller range of study away options for all students by allowing them to find programs based on academic fit, rather than cost.”  
Trinity students can now pick between the “eight signature” study away programs as well as additional domestic programs including programs in Chicago and Washington D.C. The programs across the globe span from Asia and Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Sub-Saharan Africa, Australia, Europe, and Latin America.