Studying Abroad

I'd suggest you head over to youtube. There's heaps of videos from foreigners living in Japan who have tips, as well as videos from people who have been on exchange. Also, there's tons of websites to help you study japanese. Here's some that I know have some popularity; - Memrise: It's a learning website for a variety of things, including languages. People can create their own lists to use as well as use other's lists. It uses a flashcard based system, which means it's probably not that great for study on it's own, but it can be used in combination with other study methods. - Tae Kim's Guide to Learning Japanese: A website that focuses on the grammar and sentence structures of the japanese language. It can be somewhat hard to understand sometimes, but is a really good way to learn new structures and vocabulary. Someone made an offline version for mobile phone use, so I used to read a chapter or so while I waited for the train. (^v^) - Lang-8 : A blog-type website where you can write in the language you're studying and native speakers will comment and correct it for you. In return, you do the same for their posts. It's very helpful to practice writing in Japanese. Also, I think it very much depends on which college you go on exchange with. I've heard some colleges actually send their students over there for free! If you go through an exchange company, however, expect it to be pretty expensive.

I participated in my university's study abroad program so I have a little experience as well. First, figure out if you college has any type of international studies office or study abroad programs. That will probably be the easiest way for you to start applying and they can offer a lot of help with things. You might even get lucky and have your tuition waived for that semester, as my school did. For choosing your program, there's probably quite a few options. My college offered three different Japanese universities in different areas. One was an international school where classes would be taught in English and there was less required knowledge of the language. The others taught classes in Japanese and you were more immersed in the language and culture. Either way, it is definitely best to take a few classes in Japanese. Some areas may be more English language friendly than others.