Talk:Overseas experience

A New Zealand only term
Is "overseas experience" really a term thats use is confined to New Zealand? (unsigned question)

No it is not - which is why the article has been changed.User:SatuSuro 06:25, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

Also, "An overseas experience is a great way for young people to see the world and decide exactly what they want to do as a job." sounds like opinion to me.


 * In Australia I've only ever heard this term used once - by a New Zealander. It is not an Australian term. Format 01:20, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Page name change
I think it would be a good idea to move this article to OE (overseas experience) as the term used is nearly always OE with a qualification of (overseas experience) if the user of the term does not think that person to whom the comment is directed will understand. A Quick google will confirm this: --Philip Baird Shearer 20:11, 5 May 2006 (UTC)
 * about 110 English pages for "overseas experience (OE)"
 * about 1,300 English pages for "OE (overseas experience"

Merge with Gap Year?
Have made a few changes, and added some more info, but am wondering if this should really be merged with Gap year? It's basically the same thing... true, a gap year tends to be only a year, and an OE is longer, but this is a distinction that could easily be made in one article. We're basically talking about young people going to a different country to live (usually for at least a year). Thoughts? --Mutant 20:43, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure about other parts of the world, but in New Zealand the two are completely different. Gap year would be a year doing something overseas (such as study, volunteer work etc) immediately following school. An OE (as it's called here) is something often done after tertiary study, which is longer, and more about being a tourist. There is certainly a clear distinction between the two in this part of the world. I can't speak for everywhere else though. - Shudda   talk  22:39, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Tweaked
Added a bit more detail, clarified that it's pretty much a Kiwi expression, and what diferentiates it from a gap year.Snori 09:22, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Australia, New Zealand, South Africa
The article claims of these countries that: In all three countries it is common for young people to spend a number of years overseas, during their late teens to early thirties. This period of overseas travel plays an important part in the lives of many by broadening their experience in life - especially important for relatively isolated countries such as Australia and New Zealand.

As if this sort of thing is not done by residents of other nations. Clearly it *is* - like all the English backpackers in Australia. Format (talk) 07:05, 19 March 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't think it's so common for young English people to actually live in other countries. The article clearly differentiates the OE from just having an overseas holiday. --Helenalex (talk) 06:56, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Well no statistics or comparisons are given by this article so it is difficult to say. My problem is this article seems to want to say that, 1. young people from Australia, New Zealand, South Africa take these extended overseas holidays. 2. Those overseas holidays in those countries are named "OE", or "Overseas experience". Problem is, that terms "OE", or "Overseas experience", are NOT ever used in Australia. (People simply use the term "working overseas".) I've googled the term and read several articles (not credible external reference quality though) and checked countless sites: they all say it is a NZ term, many say it is a term unique to NZ; only one (UK) site claimed it was "a NZ and Aussie term." It seems clear to me this is a strong and well known NZ cultural idea. They have firm ideas about what is and isn't a "Big OE" (eg, going to Australia is never considered to qualify as an "OE"). Now those beliefs just are not known in Australia, so not only do we not use the term, the concept does not really exist here either. On checking the history I see initially the original article concured with the other sites, then someone deleted all and any reference to NZ (making it a general article that was redundant with gap year - a general article that does completely and adequately cover the Australian situation), then someone else added back in NZ, but also Aust and South Africa. Seems to be a term, and concept utterly unique to NZ. Let's keep it that was as my recent edits have tended to do. Format (talk) 19:02, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Fair enough. --Helenalex (talk) 09:03, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Australia added
Someone slotted in several references to Australia. I have removed them; they weren't really relevant and clashed with some of the content here (eg "travel to Australia is not generally considered to be an OE"). OE is a New Zealand term and the term is simply not used in Australia by Australians. Someone also added an article about Australians moving overseas (that article did not mention the term 'Overseas Experience') however that was simply a general article about people moving overseas, not the overseas experience type of travel described by this article. For the record I am Australian. Format (talk) 19:43, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 1 one external link on Overseas experience. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20090619042229/http://www.ngatiranana.org.uk:80/ to http://www.ngatiranana.org.uk/

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.

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