Student Life

Housing & Meals

BCA Barcelona host families play an integral role in helping students learn more about Barcelona, Spain, and the various aspects of Spanish culture. We place one student per family to optimize language and cultural learning. Students often point out living with their family as one of the highlights of the program. The location of the housing varies with some families located near the campus and others a bit farther away. All students will have access to the subway or bus system for easy transportation to the university and around the city.

Students do not have to pay for their lunch--all three daily meals will be provided by your host family. BCA students usually praise the Spanish home cooking (based on the Mediterranean diet), and enjoy most of their meals at their host homes. Alternatively, according to the students’ schedule, families will provide them with a packed lunch to eat on campus.

Local Transportation

Barcelona has an excellent bus and subway system (Transports Metropolitans de Barcelona or TMB for short) that provides easy access to all parts of the city.

Sports Facilities

BCA students have discount access to the University of Barcelona's sports facilities including gyms, athletic tracks, tennis courts, fitness rooms, open-air sport areas, a heated swimming pool, soccer and rugby fields. Students may also choose to join any of the numerous gyms in the city that offer a wide range of facilities for reasonable fees.

BCA Educational Excursions

• The several day Art and History trip at the beginning of the semester is a distinctive feature of BCA Barcelona. During the first semester, the academic trip takes place in Leon, Astorga and Burgos, in the North of Spain. In the spring, the group goes to Andalucia, to the cities of Granada, Sevilla and Cordoba.
• In addition, excursions organized by BCA have included day trips touring the medieval town of Besalu and the Olympic lake of Banyoles, visiting Cistersian monasteries in Tarragona, exploring the volcanic area of Gerona, cooking a traditional "calcotada" in a Catalan country house or visiting Picasso's museum in the land of his first cubist painting.
• During the semester, as an integral part of classes, BCA organizes visits to relevant political or historical sites of the city. In the past, students have visited the History Museum of the City of Barcelona, the National Museum of Catalunya, the Miro Museum,  Barcelona’s City Hall and the “Palau de la Generalitat” (the Catalan government headquarters), among others.
• BCA Barcelona also organizes a social gathering during the semester for its students and the University of Barcelona students who have studied in the U.S. through BCA.