Some of our DD's ideas of what to do with this time (aside from the internship with the NPO, listed above):
1. learn one (or more) foreign languages unto basic proficiency, and maybe practice as a volunteer translator. Her interests here are in Spanish and ASL. She has some minimal experience with both, and will have had two years of German at that point.
2. intensive instruction at a (different) musical instrument-- she plays piano now (going on eight years) at a late-intermediate/early advanced level.
3. Arts and Humanities-- take art workshops, work on writing skills, etc.
What I don't know is whether a plan which doesn't have any real external structure/oversight/benchmarks is going to fly with colleges and universities.
Everything that I've heard about gap year plans indicates that institutions prefer (rather strongly) that student plans include things OTHER than "me-me-me-me" self-indulgence/self-improvement. So "yes" to Ugandian orphanage building, but "no" to the grand tour of the continent. If you KWIM.
She'd like to travel, but realizes that for her personally, this is likely to simply be impossible for now, particularly since travel to the developing world is an ABSOLUTE no for medical reasons. Her age is part of the reason for other travel restrictions, so it isn't that she won't EVER be able to do a semester abroad, or study at Oxford, or something. Just not now. The problem for her is that aside from the language barrier, she'd need one host family in about ten million in order for it to work. At fifteen, we are not okay with her being 'at the mercy of' someone else in managing her medical needs on a daily basis, even assuming that she could GET to such a host family safely (which is itself a significant hurdle). We'll know in another few months whether or not this is something which CAN be done with sufficient preparation or not.
