EXPERIENCE REPORT E-mail: m.a.cox@tilburguniversity.edu Study Program: Business Economics Exchange semester: Fall semester Fall Academic year: 2017-2018 Host University: Católica Lisbon Business & Economics (CLSBE) Country: Portugal I GENERAL INFORMATION ABOUT THE SCHOOL Well, it was time for my journey to Lisbon. The first week felt a bit like a holiday. I arrived in the evening at the 30 th of August and my school started directly at the 31 st of August. So, I didn t have any time to explore the city. If I could do this again, I would be there at least one day earlier, so that you have time to find out where you can do your groceries etc. I had never been in Portugal before, so it was all new for me. Lisbon is a nice and warm city and the people are really kind. Most of them speak English very well and they are all willing to help you. The university is located near the metro station cidade universitária (yellow line) or near the metro station Laranjeiras (blue line). It doesn t really matter which line you choose, since it s both about +-10 minutes walking to the university from there. The campus of Católica is not as big as in Tilburg. There are three buildings: one for the business economics students, one for the communication studies and one building for the library, a bookstore and a small cafeteria. In the building for the economic students is also a cafeteria, which is actually bigger than the one in the Library building. Here you can have both warm meals and sandwiches as little snacks etc. I think this cafeteria is a little bit the same as the Mensa in Tilburg. I don t know if the building for Communication studies also has a cafeteria, since I ve never been in that building. There is also a big supermarket close to the university (I think about 5 minutes walking) and a Lidl next to the metro station Laranjeiras. One thing which was different from Tilburg, was that it was a Private school, which I actually didn t knew before I left. The main difference is that the classes are much smaller (20-30 students) and the teachers have a lot more attention for everyone. Attendance was mandatory in almost all the courses, and they really checked it in every class. I had missed only one lecture (since we were going on a trip), and they decreased my final grade with 10%, despite that I had informed the professor in advance and she said it was not a problem. So, the thing with this private school is that you really need to be present in (almost) every class, which was not the case at the other universities in Lisbon. Sometimes, it felt a bit unfair that other people didn t have to go to the university every day and that they had more time to do other things. But on the other hand, I had all the time in the weekends to have fun, this university was much better and the teachers were really inspiring, so I learned a lot more (I think) than they did. II PRACTICAL INFORMATION Information before you left Before I left, I did receive a lot of information by the host university. I don t remember exactly when, but it was a few weeks before the start of the semester. It was all quite clear,
you just have to follow the steps and the rest will be clear at the introduction day. If you don t understand something you can just mail them. Católica does have a really excellent and kind supervisor (called Mariana), who answers your questions really quick. The only thing I had a problem with, was the course enrollment. The rule at this school is that you cannot have overlap in your schedule, since participation is mandatory. The schedules of the courses were only a few days in advance, of this course enrollment, published. The other thing is that this course enrollment goes very fast and many courses are already full after 2 or 3 minutes. So, my advice would be that you have to be exactly on time when enrolling for the courses. In addition to that, I would advise you to have a backup plan. What if the group you wanted to choose is already full? Which other courses do you like and would that also fit in your schedule? Be prepared! The arrival The arrival was all well-organized. My buddy picked me up at the airport and brought me to the hostel. I remember that there was a really long queue for the taxi s, so I definitely don t regret subscribing for this buddy-program. Personally, I didn t need my buddy that much after the arrival, since I had made some Portuguese friends, who I could ask everything. Housing I searched for accommodation on the internet. There are a lot of websites, such as, www.uniplaces.com. I booked my room via www.ondacity.com, but almost everyone booked it via Uniplaces. I think all of them are fine, as long as you book it on time and read the reviews. I did wait until July, but a lot of nice rooms where already booked by then. I still did find a nice big room in an apartment with 5 other flat mates, near Marques de Pombal. It was a bit more expensive than usual, since I was late. There were a lot of people who thought it was a good idea to just go there and find a room after the arrival. But most of the time (as far as I know), all these people couldn t find anything, since everything was already fully booked. So, they didn t end up in a nice or cheap apartment, like they thought in advance, but they just had to say yes to a crappy apartment, since there wasn t anything else. I m not saying it is impossible to find a good accommodation this way, but I m just saying that (at least last year) it was harder than people expected. Before I went on exchange they all said I had to live close to Marques de Pombal, since you can both take the blue and yellow line from there. This is true, and it is definitely a good location. Yet, I would choose for a place a bit more near Baixa / Bairro Alto. In this area, there is a lot to do. You can go shopping here, but there are also a lot of bars and restaurants, etc. It feels like the center of the city. Most of the time when you re using the subway, you need to go to the university, which only differs a few minutes between these two subway stations (Marques & Baixa). From Marques, it was only +- 25 minutes of walking to go to Bairro Alto, so that is not that far during the day. But I didn t like to walk home alone in the middle of the night, so I still needed to call an Uber then. Not necessary because it was dangerous in the streets (actually, I always felt quite safe), but you just never know for sure if something would happen. Sometimes I shared an Uber with friends to split the cost, but this was only possible when you both wanted to go home. So, this was always a (big) spending for me and you can avoid this by living a little bit closer to Bairro Alto. Besides Marques de Pombal and Bairro Alto,
there are many other nice locations to live, so if you can t find a place there, it is not that big of a deal. Living costs We did receive an Erasmus Grand from Tilburg University. This was around 600 in total for 5 months. Besides this, I had saved some money for my Erasmus. Like I said earlier, I lived in a good area called Marques de Pombal. Actually, this is a more business area, so it was also a bit more expensive to live. I paid 420 each month, so I did spend most of my money on my accommodation. For the transportation card, I got the wrong information about the student discount from the university, so I paid 36 each month. Apparently, you can also get this card as a student for 28 each month, but you need an official paper for that. The smartest thing you can do is to ask the volunteers at the Erasmus organizations to fill in this form for you. Besides this, there are also so many trips and activities, so you need to save money for that as well. The price of the food is more or less the same as in the Netherlands. The (alcoholic) drink on the other hand, were really cheap. I think you could buy 0.5L Beer or Somersby for only 1,20 at the Erasmus Corner. Academic Calendar Social Activities There are a lot of activities organized by the university, but there are also some student organizations, such as Erasmus Life Lisboa (ELL) or Erasmus Student Network (ESN), who
organize a lot of activities and trips. In other words, there are so many activities where you can meet a lot of new people and Erasmus students. Besides that, with an ESN card you can get 10% discount on your flight with Ryanair and extra 20KG for free, so I would definitely recommend this. I joined a lot of trips and activities, such as: - Welcome Dinner - Weekend trip to Porto - Trip to Sintra - Pool party - Algarve Paradise weekend trip - Buddha Garden + Obidos Christmas Market But I also went on a few road trips. For example, to Serra da Estrella (which is the highest mountain in Portugal), Aveiro and to the Azores! Culture and Language I did not experience a culture shock. The people in Portugal are all so kind and lovely, so it felt like I was a part of them. The main difference is that the Portuguese people are having dinner really late. This was quite unusual for me. Most of the restaurants are not even open before 8pm. Sometimes we had dinner at 10pm, which was really different from what I was used to. Most of the Portuguese people do have a good English level, so it was easy to talk to them. Only a few people from the older generations were not able to speak English. But I ve never been in a situation when there was nobody who could understand me. Personal Development I don t think exchange really changed me, but I have learned a lot of things. For example, working with totally different people, and how to deal with them. There are many differences in cultures between all the (Erasmus) students, so you learn how to deal with each of them. Besides that, you also learn how to manage everything on your own. Living in a total new city and being more open to other cultures. I had been living on my own in Tilburg for two years, so I was already a bit used to that. But still, it is a really nice experience and I would love to do it again! III ACADEMIC INFORMATION Academic level at Host University CLSBE has courses in English and Portuguese. I only took English courses. I needed to get 30ECTs so I took 6 courses. Five of them, because I thought they were really interesting, and the other one, since this was the only course that fitted my schedule. After all, I would recommend all of them, even the one I thought that would be really hard and not so interesting (Economic Analyses of Social Policies). I think the workload was different than from Tilburg university. Not especially that it was harder or easier, but since the classes were all mandatory, the workload was higher during the normal weeks and a little bit lower during the exams. For almost all the courses, you needed to deliver a few assignments and for some of them you needed to deliver a group work each week. These assignments were not especially that hard, but it just took a lot of time. Especially when you need to deliver assignments for every course at the same time. But after all, I was able to manage it all while
still having a social life. I think the teachers at this university were really inspiring. The relationship between the teachers and the students was really different compared to Tilburg. It was common to send them a message via WhatsApp, if you had a question about the course. Other teachers did prefer to skype with you. This was really uncommon for me, so I have never tried this. But I knew a lot of people who actually skyped or texted with them. After passing all my courses, I am really happy with my achievements, and I think I have learned a lot. Exams I only had written exams. Together with the participation grade and the assignments was this formed into a final grade. Other The library was nice and easy to access, but it was not as modern as the Library in Tilburg. Description of the Courses Courses Exam ECTs Comment Organizational Written 6 Really good and Behavior (154090) funny teacher, really Behavioral Decision Making (154136) Product and Customer Management (154044) Marketing in the New Era (154071) Topics in Marketing (154045) Economic Analyses of Social Policies (158213810) interesting course. Written 3.5 Good teacher, nice course and very useful in real life. Written 5 Interesting course, teacher was not the best and it was vague sometimes, but still nice. Written 5 Inspiring teacher. Really up to date with real life and a lot of guest speakers. Written 5 Interesting course, but a lot of assignments Written 6 seemed hard in the beginning, but actually quite interesting. I m happy I took these courses, since I think it was all interesting. But If I had to choose, the courses I would definitely recommend are Organizational Behavior, Marketing in the New Era, and Behavioral Decision Making. These are also all easy to pass if you re interested in this area.
Tips for future Exchange Students: So, after all, I would definitely recommend all of you to go on Exchange if you have the opportunity! It is a really nice experience and you won t regret it. I can imagine that it sounds so crazy to go away for a few months, but I can promise, it is really nice and the time will fly! A Picture is worth a thousand words Image 1: The building of CLSBE
Image 2: ELL Algarve Paradise Weekend Image 3: Boatparty Algarve
Image 4: Azores Image 5: Azores (hot springs in the WINTER)
Image 6: Aveiro Image 7: Serra da Estrella
Image 8: Soccer match Image 9: Surfclasses Image 10: typical cute street