I'm going to be in France relatively soon for an art/art history study-abroad program. It's my first trip to France, though I have done some international travel. I only speak a little bit of French, and I am from Florida.

Right now i'm trying to figure out what the major differences between flying into ORY or CDG would be? It looks like many people doing the program would be flying into CDG but ORY looks very tempting to me from an airlines-offered perspective (I want to fly on OpenSkies). Thus, would you say an American with only a little French could navigate from ORY to a dormitory alone if everyone else flys into CDG without it being a major hassle?

The program says the dorms are at..

Perhaps someone could provide some advice on where those are and what sort of commute from the two airports i'd be looking at? The program mentions a chartered bus for people arriving between a given time frame and then providing directions via RER to anyone else outside the time frame. At the moment i'm assuming that all refers to CDG - though ORY connects to the RER as well, no?

Also, anything else you can think to tell me about living in and around Paris for a month?

Your advice is greatly appreciated

ORY is closer to central Paris than CDG. One easy routing is ORLYVAL to Antony station (last stop on that line) on the RER B, and then a few stops north to St. Michel, would get you very close to the 93 Blvd. St. Michel address mentioned. The others are not too close to that one. If you have a lot of luggage, the route above would NOT be very convenient. A taxi might be the most efficient routing.
A Carte Orange (weekly or even for the month, depending on the date of arrival) would be very useful in navigating transportation in Paris.
If you go to www.ratp.fr (and select English) you can easily navigate that sight and even place departure and arrival points and get a full itinerary of the optimal routing to your destination. There are hundreds of guide books about Paris. Some are oriented for people who are students--go to any large bookstore and browse the shelves.

Tolbiac isn't that far from Orly...Having said that, I don't know why you'd want to fly OpenSkies, especially if you need to stay in Paris for a while and then return to the US...I highly doubt OpenSkies will still be flying this time next year...

Nonstop premium economy is a pretty compelling reason if not tied to a (non-BAEC) frequent flyer program. I don't see BA axing OpenSkies (all the other all-premium airlines were stand-alones), but even if they do, so what? They'll just route you through Heathrow on BA in WT+.

Even if that were the case, the OP would in all probabilities be rerouted on BA, so hardly a major issue.
[edit] aamilesslave beat me to it![/edit]

ORY is a little more "French" and a little less international than CDG. That said, it should still be straightforward. For Tolbiac, the easiest and cheapest route would involve taking the jetbus to the Villejuif Louis-Aragon subway station and then direct on the subway for 5 stations.
The bus leaves every 12 to 20 mins for Gate H from Orly Sud (gate E from Orly-Ouest) and takes about 15-20mins to make it to the metro. One way trip is �6.40. The odds are the driver may only speak French or bad English but that should not be an issue.

For cite universitaire, you have a choice of either Orlyval+RER or Orlybus to Denfert-Rochereau then RER to Cite universitaire (Orlybus might even have a stop bear cite universitaire but I am not sure). For St-Michel, pretty much the same except that from Denfert, you go in the other direction to the Luxembourg stop (or perhaps the St Michel one?)

True. I have to say I do have a major LHR-phobia, so the mere thought of that possibility would be enough to upset me!!
But if you want to fly premium eco, I guess there aren't too many choices out there....

Well, it would be a T5->T5 connection, so pretty painless.

One thing the OP should be aware though, if (s)he starts his/her trip in Florida is that, afaik, Openskies does not interline in any way, shape or form with anybody, not even with OW (and not even with BA themselves, afaik). So baggage would have to be reclaimed and re-checked in JFK and plenty of padding should be allowed as there is a risk of losing your ticket if you don't turn up by check-in deadline due to a delay to the Florida-NYC flight.

Jetblue fies non-stop TPA-JFK first flight of the day at like 8am. Openskies leaves at 5pm. I figure that's a safe cushion.

Really it's a matter of getting a comfortable ride on a student budget when i dont have the miles or status. I normally hop around the US on WN which has done nothing for my CO or United miles. Thus BA and EC sound like a pretty good deal. Pricing for just steerage-class-econ on CO is actually more expensive then prem+ (for all intents and purposes, business class in the US) for my travel dates. So for just a few hundred more (the TPA-JFK connections) i'm making a big jump in flight quality over the Atlantic.

I did the math, and even flying the day before and getting a cheap night at JFK or something would cost within a reasonable amount of CO-econ via EC prem+. To me, it seems prem+ is a better choice.

A short flight up the east coast of the US really isn't even worth a first or biz ticket, it's the TATL i want to be comfy on. Did econ once on DL to Gatwick from Newark and with a 4 hour delay on the tarmac i was not really happy about it nor comfortable.

Side note: If anyone is willing to donate points/miles/vouchers to support my education I'm all for that

If I were you, I 'd see whether you can score a tkt on Icelandair. That should break your trip nicely....

Icelandair all-in TPA-PAR rt is $4,578 in standard econ.

I would never plan less than a 24 hour cushion when trying to connect JetBlue to ANYTHING important. Just head over to the B6 forum and search for irrops. JetBlue may be a fine airline to fly when the sun shining, but for winter travel, I would not trust them at all.

They don't fly to TPA, so that price probably includes a few full-Y domestic segments on a US airline. Try Orlando instead.

Good to know. So the stop-over on the night before and a cheap priceline room it may well be

And just to clarify - i'm technically returning from Venice, and for some reason the program "strongly suggests" flying out of VCE. Though it appears there's not many options from VCE that routes easily back to TPA, so i figured i'd reverse my plan on the way back and hop from VCE to ORY via Myair ($60) and spend the night or catch EC back to JFK.

Long story short, i need to do TPA-PAR arriving June 1st and departing July 6th VCE-TPA.

My current plan is B6 TPA-JFK, EC JFK-ORY - spend a month in Paris, take a train to Venice and see the Biennale - fly Myair VCE-ORY, EC ORY-JFK, B6 JFK-TPA. All-in should be about ~$2000 and that's in prem+. AirFrance and Continental were both ~$1,600 in econ.