Transformative learning hinges on navigating cognitive dissonance; thus, intercultural competency assignments and experiences need to be integrated into study abroad/away courses to help students process and make sense of the cognitive dissonance such an experience provides. Assignments, therefore, need to consciously and intentionally triangulate learning by addressing the read (course readings), the lived/observed (conversations, interactions, activities, excursions, observations about public portrayals of culture, etc.), and the compared (home culture vs. host culture). The hope is to improve students' experiences so that semesters abroad are consistently deep, enriching, and intellectual as opposed to simply an extended tourist sojourn. This article documents the process by which I designed for and assessed, via an in-depth analysis of students' texts/writings, students' transformation of their intercultural competency skills and development. In addition, I compared students' works from two differing semesters to evaluate whether transformation in intercultural competency is inherent in the nature of study abroad or must be explicitly taught and cultivated. My Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) project corroborated the almost ten years of research that confirm our fears: exposure to another culture is not enough; studying and living abroad does not necessarily lead to increased intercultural learning. Meaningful, integrative, "learning-laden," and transformative study abroad experiences hinge on students' ability to make sense of cognitive dissonance. Intercultural competency assignments, therefore, need to be fully and intentionally designed and integrated into such experiences, and evaluated to document such growth.