Monthly Archives: October 2016

Welcome to OSLO !

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After these presentations of Bergen, it’s the moment for you to discover the Norwegian Capital: OSLO! This green city counts a number of inhabitants of a little bit less than 650 000 on an area of 454 km². One of the important features of this city is that the business center is located in a beautiful area at the seaside. And if you walk further away, you can discover some charming residences.

business center       charming residence

 

Now, I would like to introduce you some of the very famous places of this city.

>  First, the Royal Palace !

royal palce

In this palace from the 19th century lives the current Norwegian monarch: Harald V. He has been named king in 1991. In Norway, the king is the symbol of the unity of this country and he is also the head of the “Den norske kirke” (Church of Noway).

prince

releve garde

Every day, at 1:30 PM, you can see the Changing of the Guard. In appearance very strict, you can get a smile out of this militaries if you dare to approach them…

 

 

 

 

>   The Storting, the Parliament                >  The Operahuset I Oslo

parlement                 opera

>  The Vigeland Park

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With more than 200 sculptures designed by the same artist, Gustav Vigeland, this park is one of the most popular tourist attractions. The common point of all this sculptures of life-size humans is nudity.

And if it’s raining, don’t worry!  The peninsula Bigdoy is something for you then! Indeed, you can visit lots of museums as for example the Norwegian Folk Museum, The Kon-tiki Museum or again the Viking Ship Museum. Thus Oslo is a very cultural capital.

 

Concerning the population, the most striking characteristic is probably… their calm nature! It is not a capital like all the others. The people take time to help you to find your way or to wait the green light to cross on the zebra crossing.

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   And if they want to get away from the city center after just ten minutes of boat ride in the fjord, they can unwind on one of the island of Oslo.

 

To finish, my source of pride in visiting this city was to see “French meals”on the front window of some restaurant…Would the French cook be well seen in Olso ?

In another article, I will continue with the Oslo to Bergen railway, considering it is seen as Europe’s best train journey. So STAY CONNECTED!

University, Finnish excellence.

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Matteo, Audrey and I are exchange students in Finland, during Fall semester 2016, we study in Oulu, one of the biggest city in the North scandinavia.

  • Why I have choosen this country ?

Finland has one of the best educational systems report by a multitude of ranking.

Sans titre

– 66% of students entering higher education, the highest rate in Europe.
– The difference between the weakest and strongest students is the smallest in the world.
– 93% of students pass high school.
– Since 2001, Finnish children arrive in the top positions of international rankings in science, reading and mathematics.

Fact about the teachers:
– They are in class 4 hours per day, and 2 hours of training per week.
– All teachers have a master’s degree, fully paid by the state.
– They are selected among the best 10%.
– Their social status is comparable to doctors’ and lawyers’.

  • The University

In Oulu, we Sans titre 2study in “The University of Oulu” founded in 1958, one of the largest universities in Finland with 16 000 students and 3000 staffs including 251 professors. We are 600 exchange students during this semester.
The University of Oulu is divided into six faculties, my faculty is “Oulu Business School”. With 1400 students and 100 staff members, Oulu Business School is responsible for the University level Business Education in the whole of Northern Finland: the provinces of Oulu and Lapland; an area covering half of Finland.

This Business School is accredited by AACSB International (The Association to AdvanAACSB_accredidationthumbce Collegiate Schools of Business). This accreditation provides internationally recognized, specialized accreditation for business and accounting programs at the bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral level. This accreditation is considered a label of excellence, to get-in, schools must complete 21 criteria such as academic teachers, student recruitment process, to ensure that it provides top-quality education.

Arthur Leblais

 

 

Welcome to Oulu

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Oulu is the most important northern city with a population of 198 804 inhabitants. The City is known for its urban culture and its proximity to the nature. Oulu is located on the edge of the Bothnia bay and it is a vibrant economic hub. This city is an exotic destination for visitor, thanks its proximity to nature and waterways. If you take a walk around the city, you will see the important role that nature plays in the city.

Oulu is known for its many cycle tracks; people ride bikes all year round. The city owns the most important cycling network. Don’t forget your bike if you will go to Oulu. The city center is warm, and along the promenade you will find a variety of cafes, restaurants, malls and souvenir shop.

We will describe with more details the city and surrounding in our future articles.

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Oulujoki

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Oulu market place

Erasmus schedule in Norway and Abroad

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This article is a little introduction of Erasmus’ schedule. Next week I will present my courses more precisely!

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I arrived in Bergen on the 11th of August. From 15th to 21th the international committee, a student association, organized an amazing welcome week with many activities.

 

Courses began the week after, on Monday 22th. Furthermore, at the end of the semester, there is an exam period which depend on your courses. For me, my first written exam will be on the 11th of November. My last exam will be the 6th of December with organizational theory. Some students can finish the semester at the end of November.

So personally I have 4 different courses, each courses give 7,5 ECTS credits and 30 ECTS is needed to pass. I have 15hours of lectures per week. If you plan to go abroad and make an exchange semester or year, it’s a valuable point to take into account. Each school can choose how much ECTS a course will give you. A course can give you roughly from 3 ECTS to 10 ECTS. We basically can think, less courses you have, less work you need to make. But it’s not true.

Some Erasmus’ student need to work hard and some other less 🙂 In my case, I have classes every day except on Tuesday. One of my roommates, Nassim, finish his class week on Wednesday and the other, Savvas doesn’t have free week days. Nassim’s French business school ask for 20 ECTS for the semester, compared to 30 ECTS for most of the people. Last June I has been in Croatia to visit a friend of mine whom is in Erasmus too. He has courses 3 days per week and no homework at all. In the UK a friend has 3 different courses and another in Spain has 6. So, it depend a lot. According to several testimonies, is more simple to have your degree in eastern Europe than in the United Kingdom or Scandinavia. I think it is depending of school reputation and requirement.

In my opinion, next point can make a big difference regarding how much you need to be involved in your courses to pass. In some schools you are mix with local students. It is the case at NHH, we have an important proportion of Norwegians in our class. It’s perfect to discover new people and talk with them. I have a teamwork with two Norwegians in Organizational theory. In this situation you are just “regular” student. But in some other schools, courses are made only for exchange students and teachers can be less demanding. It was the case for Florian, a friend of mine whom went to Riga, Latvia.

At NHH, there are not tutorial sessions, “Travaux dirigés” in French. All my courses occur in amphitheater. We are 200 students maximum, in Organizational theory, in this auditorium.

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Above, you can see a picture of Aud MAX the biggest auditorium in NHH. There are 7 screens and many speakers, it’s impressive. Nevertheless, in each courses we have assignments during the semester plus a final exam at the end. 2 or 3 assistants (PhD students or master students) help our teachers.

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Bye ! 🙂

Fresher week in Abertay University !

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In this article I am going to talk about the fresher week. This is a week for new students with some activities and meetings. All things that we need to live in the city and do well in student life.

First, the university sent an email in August to download an application. In this application we could find all activities and meetings for each day during the fresher week. We have to choose what we would like to do for each day by clicking on items. It is for us to make our own schedule. Our schedule can be found in the application. You must know that most of meetings and activities is possible all day long, so we can do all things.

Schedule on the application

Schedule on the application

–Introduction to blackboard : it looks like that “Madoc” in the university of Nantes. We can find all material used by professors.

–Library tour : It is to know how we can borrow books, how they are filed and how we can use the scanner and printer.

–Walking tour : During this moment a student made us a brief tour of the city.

–Pre-session math : It is useful because it reminds us of the most mathematics tools that we need on finance.

–Registration for Undergraduate visiting student : It is to register online, check our personal informations, check the modules and pay tuition fees. For example this workshop made me realize that there was a problem with the registration of one course. There were people who help me to find a solution. After this we can have our student card.

–Student Association and Abertay Sport: it is to know which sport there are in the school (step aerobic, football, volleyball…). It was very useful because thanks to this I knew that there was a cheap fitness centre (only £30 fort one term)

In a second time, we received an email for the programme of fresher week.

Fresher week programme

Fresher week programme

We can see on this email some activities organized by the university such as Pub Quiz, battle games, party club night.. It is very enjoyable to feel welcomed ! For the party club night, it is possible to buy a pass at £15 for the four events. It is a good opportunity.

Fresher week flyer

Fresher week flyer

These activities really allowed us to integrate because we met many people, mainly other students who come from Germany, Switzerland, Spain… This fresher week was very nice because we saw the student standard of living and it was the beginning of our life in this country!