Opening Up the Gap

As the competitiveness of the college applicant pool continues to soar, and the pressure on ambitious high school seniors to perform intensifies, administrators and students alike opine about the so-called “burn out” effect. Still recuperating from an overly stressful year, many incoming freshmen are ill-equipped to participate in university life.

Princeton aims to counteract this phenomenon with its proposed “bridge year” program: an initiative enabling newly admitted students to pursue a year of international public service before delving into the pressures of campus life. Admission to the program would be on a fully need-blind basis, with financial aid offered to those students unable to bear the fiscal burden that a gap year typically entails. The university anticipates that the program will accommodate 100 students, or about 10 percent of the incoming class.

While the logistics of the program are not fully flushed out, we applaud Princeton’s bridge year program for its attempt to cultivate a more well-rounded college experience. Despite the heavy stigma that gap years carry at Harvard, where many students feel pressure to finish college and enter the job market, a culture encouraging gap years is healthy. Gap years, particularly those that involve international travel, enable students to gain global perspectives that both enrich and inform their subsequent personal, academic, and extracurricular endeavors. For many matriculating students, a year spent in non-academic pursuits offers much needed respite from the stresses and rigors of high school. By providing constructive opportunities to relax and reflect, gap years prepare students for a more meaningful and engaged university experience.

Currently, bridge years are predominately enjoyed by the wealthy, whose parents can subsidize a year of unpaid travel and service work. We hope that Princeton’s program, with its strong financial aid support, will extend this same opportunity to the less socioeconomically fortunate. Increasing diversity among gap year participants will only enhance the insights and experiences which they bring back to campus and share with their peers.

Yet, while the bridge year program shows great promise, we worry that an overly institutionalized and professionally organized gap year may offer students less growth. Individual initiative, spontaneous travel, and heedless soul-searching are what make this time off before college so valuable and unique to each student who partakes. By potentially transforming the gap year into another box to check on the road to a successful career, Princeton’s program may jeopardize the ability of students to shape and direct their own experiences. To this end, we hope that the initiative adopts a flexible structure which provides participants with enough space to pursue their passions.

Although less common than taking a year off before matriculation, partaking in the gap year experience during one’s time in college can be equally, if not more, rewarding. Armed with a maturity garnered by a few years of undergraduate study, students who participate in such a program gain much-needed time to reflect on and organize their lives before entering the workforce. Ultimately, we hope that Harvard, as well as Princeton, will facilitate the transformation of gap years—at all points in the college experience—from a privilege of the wealthy to a learning experience more accessible to all.