UST - University of Stress and Tension

I survived the first week of classes! After the previous week's exchange activities, I was more than ready to finally begin classes (really nerdy, I know). Monday begins bright and early with a 9 am Operation Management class. Our professor in that class is great. Although she is a local , she speaks very good English and actually received her PhD at the University of Michigan. Right after management, Daniel and I must book it to the next class for our accounting lesson. This professor probably has the hardest English to understand but makes up for it with his Asian antics (spelling out words like "cost" and "cause" because they sound the same when he says them--or jumping up and down when he talks about the CPA exam). He seems really interested in exchange students and likes when we volunteer in class. The last class on Monday is a Thomson Reuters Certification class taught by a local PhD who constantly brags about her students going to work for major investment banks. Apparently she has a 95% pass rate for the certification class so I'm hoping I'm one of them!

Tuesdays are a pretty slow day. Classes don't begin until 12:00pm with a snooze of an economics professor who goes exactly by the book. Our day ends with a finance course and professor who swears by calculus and memorization.

There are definitely some differences in the academic system here as compared with the states. The first is simply the course structure. Here, in most of my classes, the entire course is composed of a midterm and huge final with a few quizzes or assignment mixed in. In the states there are weekly quizzes, multiple groups projects with presentations, nightly assignments and exams worth and third of what they are here. I'm afraid it may be challenging to stay motivated to keep up with reading and reviewing if there is no homework or assignment points attached to the effort.

Another thing that is noticeably different is the classroom environment. Many students here arrive late to class without any reaction from the professor. They also talk consistently, A LOT. I was sitting in the front row of my accounting class struggling to hear the professor because of the chatter in the back of the room. The most surprising part is that the teachers are extremely tolerant. Only one has specifically discouraged classroom discussions while the rest have yet to address it.

The last major difference, somewhat contradictory to the claim above, is that the kids here are extremely smart and motivated and most professors think that exchange students (because they have mostly pass/fail classes) are here to vacation and party. Most locals here take 8-9 classes on average and are very serious about their grades. Here, an individuals grades determine everything from a students ability to take classes to the likelihood he or she will be able to study abroad. I have heard local students rarely go out and never sleep.

I am hoping to reverse the reputation of exchange students here by attending class and actually performing well on exams. Currently, professor faith in us is low but it's only the first week with many more to come. Overall. my courses will be challenging but not any harder than in the states. I think Daniel and I are both fully prepared to work hard while enjoying the time here as well.