Letter home - Diego Villegas Salazar

Hello, my name is Diego Villegas Salazar, I study business management in Centria and I had the opportunity to studied in Excelia University in La Rochelle, France. 

I can tell you that the educational system in France compared to the system we have in Finland is different in many aspects. One of the big differences is the amount of hours that are invested in going to the courses and the projects at home, especially when times of exams are coming. People can also find out that the amount of information each course has is bigger than the ones in Finland. My personal opinion is that their educational system lacks on efficient and effective learning methods but offers in the same way a great amount of data and theory for their students. 

About the educational culture in the host university and country in general, I can tell you that students like to study in groups and might be always in front of their computers.  Many projects are given in the length of a semester and most of the projects are presented in groups. Courses are divided  in individual assignments, group projects and final exam that most of the time covers half of the percentage of the total course. All assignments and projects were focused on theory and students culture is to recreate enterprise conditions to imagine what they might find in the  professional world.

It was common to go to school in the morning, around 8 am and end up our classes around 3 pm to 5 pm. There used to be a gap of half an hour to one hour to eat before classes continued.

My study group was conformed of students mainly from Europe, there were Germans, Finnish, Spanish, Belgians, Italians, Estonians and some other students from Vietnam, USA, China and India.

As for my daily life, I can tell you that La Rochelle is a mix of tourists and students so in general a beautiful place with a present nightlife. There are many cultural attractions and places to visit, stores are close to the town center but they close around 22:00 and on the week ends was really hard to  find them open specially on Sunday where everything was closed. So our days started early going to school with a lunch break. I have to remark here that for French people it is important the lunch hour and therefore most of the services are out from 12 mid day to 2 pm. After hour classes it was common to finish couple of assignments and try to get ready for regular meetings with other students in the restaurants, pubs and clubs. It was a bit difficult to travel around France because of the expensive tickets that the train company manage but inside La Rochelle there were a lot of activities that let us enjoy our time in the country. Food was expensive and as well as the rent of the apartments around the city. 

Some of the best things about La Rochelle is the nightlife and the touristic places that they have. The food is a great thing and if you like wine that is the country of excellence. They have a good taste in fashion and they try to keep things in a classic way. 

In the other side, I don't like the way operations are manage, and I mean in general the way of doing things in France include a huge process of bureaucracy and this make everything complex. People sometimes they were a bit rude even though they say that is their way of being.

The highlight of my experience and time in France as a student was the award my team and I got for an exercise were we simulate companies and were we obtained the first place among the companies in our market for best performance.

The highlight outside the university was the big trip we made from Finland to France and France  to Finland by car.  A lot of adventures and things to see.

Hope some of the things that I put here help someone else to know just a bit more about what can they find in France.   

I attached two pictures of how beautiful was the city and how crazy was the nightlife. :)