okay good afternoon hello everyone and welcome to this webinar for students who are interested in studying business economics and management at Lund University today we have something very special for you guys because we have invited current students representing many different programs but also who come from different backgrounds to speak about their experiences as students at Lund and I I just talked with them and they told me that they were pretty new most of them they they started this Autumn semester of 2022 but they have been here for a couple of months now so they've had some experience from studying at Lund and today we have a bunch of them to share their experience from you know preparing and planning their application and what happened in the throughout the application procedure when they got their offer last spring I suppose and how they plan to finally join us here physically in Lund because we know that many students are maybe in this similar situation this Autumn planning their application or they have made their application to Lund and there's a lot of things to think about and we're going to ask the students here to to give some expert advice and tips on how to plan before you make your application or during your application procedure all participants are welcome to ask questions to our panelists of course that's the point really to listen to your questions or to read your questions and have the current students answer to their best of their ability you don't have to raise your hand we'd rather that you actually write your question in the zoom Q&A so the zoom Q&A that is where you type your questions and you can ask about anything related to being an international student at Lund University so please go ahead and do so at any point we have one hour today so let's make the best of your time there's already a question coming in here I'm gonna We're Not Gonna Take the question just yet because I would like to introduce our panelists current students at Lund University School of Economics and Management and first I'm going to ask Hasmik to introduce herself. hi I'm hasmik I'm from Armenia, and I’m taking the Information Systems Master’s Program at Lund University. Thank you Hasmik and then we have Domenica. hey everyone I'm Dominica I'm from Ecuador and now I'm studying International Marketing and Brand Management. all right and then we have Donna. hello everyone I am from Taiwan and currently I'm taking the master program in Managing People Knowledge and Change. thanks Donna next we have Bettina-Sophie hi I'm from Germany and I'm taking the master's program at Economic Growth Population and Development thank you Bettina we have noticed you noticed that there is kind of an error in the program name there so please disregard that but okay Tedo hello everyone I'm Tedo I'm from Georgia and currently I'm studying my master's program in Management and at Lund University School of Economics and Management thank you Tedo so yes those are our master's degree program but we also have a representative from one of our bachelor degree program namely Adriana yes hi everyone I'm studying Bachelor International Business and I come from Poland very nice so correct me if I'm wrong but you told me you all started your studies here this Autumn right so you have been here for three months so far some of you are staying just one year with one year program some are staying two years perhaps and Adriana you will most likely stay for at least three years right in the bachelor program so the first question that came in as soon as we opened the session was how did you cope with the stress during the application process it's a very stressful experience because you need to find a program and make your application and collect all your supporting documents and make sure that everything is right how did you deal with that Donna would you like to share your experience sure for me it was a very stressful time especially I had a full-time job and two side projects and my own business to handle as well so yeah I was very stressed at the time but I like to do workout as a way to help me release the stress and help me focus on the right things yeah so that's how I usually do it do more workout yeah all right Bettina how did you feel in the application process I think for me it was quite a ride because I studied in Netherlands so I think it's easier for Europeans than for non-eu students but I think the university is quite supportive with it if something is missing they would still let you know or like there is the hard deadline in January but then you can still have a bit more time if something is missing to still upload it so I think you should not stress too much about something when it's not there yet or something so because you left some time alright Hasmik how did you feel in the application process when you selected your program what happened then well after selecting comes all the questions okay where I'm gonna live what I'm gonna do if I get admitted and so on and so forth my advice is just to try to organize make a to do lists and maybe also to understand which program to choose it is also very helpful just try to make it simple keep it simple and structured Domenica would you like to share your experience because I mean when you apply to a program at Lund you have to yes you make your application but then you have to also send a bunch of documents in was it difficult to understand what documents to provide and how to provide them in your opinion Sorry for the noise my earphones are just - but okay so yeah I was working a full-time job when I was in – back in Ecuador so when this application processes start so it was well so I distribute my time so I was working maybe 40 to 45 hours in that time but then I took on my weekend I took for maybe around 8 to 10 hours just focus in my application and I knew well I had the experience for two years ago I started applying for Masters so I knew that this year at least I wanted to apply for some different options so in this case I focus for example one weekend in this application one weekend on the other so I think that it wasn't that difficult I had all the instructions it was really clear so then it wasn't like an issue of I don't know what documents to fill in or I don't know how to proceed so maybe it's just about organization to be focused even though like you don't have that much time but at least take from five to eight hours per week like just applying for the master that you want to apply and if you really like if it's your dream then you will have that time like you will find that time during your week so yeah it wasn't difficult for me I managed my time somehow I don't know how but then yeah it was like it was tough but then I'm here you can see yeah Tedo what what do you feel I mean in the application procedure was it stressful for you I would say I have the quite similar experiences Domenica has just said because I had a full-time job at the time but as a information almost everything is so much easily available on the University website you just you know you just have to invest some time to organize everything for me it was easier to just visualize just write my tasks what should I do and how should I do and when should I do this and I would not say it is something difficult to do it is just about more about organizing and making sure that you tick the box and afterwards you have kicked all the boxes stress level of course goes down because you see that you did most of the job of course for me stress was till the end of the application procedure and also for the whole process I was waiting for the results for me it was always there and I think it's quite natural so I would suggest that just visualize picture boxes do your job and make sure that not to worry much about this because after you apply there is not too much you can do about the application so just use the time to enjoy your time and wait for the results right thank you very much we also have a Dian is that the correct pronunciation of your name okay welcome from Entrepreneurship and Innovation we're talking about the kind of stress that people might feel in the application process because there's quite a lot of pressure to find information and to gather documents and to make sure that you have submitted everything in the correct way and and what we've heard so far from the panelists is that you have to be organized that helps a lot when you make your application Adriana you applied to a bachelor's degree program and then I know that there are not so many documents that you need to provide right it's basically just High School grades and proof of English isn't it yeah exactly I mean everything was listed on the university website and there were also videos with instructions with how and when to submit everything. So I just did
a to-do list with a list of deadlines as well to keep everything in track right so Dian did you find it difficult to cope in the application process because you were worried about maybe making mistakes with your application or something like that yeah I think the first time I applied I was kind of worried I think what also helped me a lot is to basically before I apply I always copy everything from the admission site and making sure when I apply I have this two windows I'm looking into like this is a document required and this is the ones that I already have right now so I'm kind of comparing those things whether everything's already there I think that's what helps me making sure that I already did it right that's basically what I did yeah and I think what is maybe a little bit confusing for applicants is that the feedback you can get from University admissions in Sweden or the lack of feedback maybe even I should say because they they won't necessarily provide much information if everything goes okay they will just notify you in case they find a mistake so students maybe they don't hear anything they think what's happening with my application I don't know so that can be a bit confusing but I usually say no news is good news in that way because you will only hear from them if there is an issue or a problem with your application but that was like the first question the stress of the application process there is actually a question here I think Domenica you as a student of international marketing and brand management a person is asking about the two different specializations within the program can you share some information about that. For sure yeah for sure well so when I applied for international marketing and brand management there are these two tracks so I'm in track two the one that is more consumer oriented but there's also the one that some of my friends took that is track one that is more like a corporate than retail oriented focus so what I've noticed for example at least from my track I can talk more about my track because I feel more confident in it so for example we have like the semester it's about like in two cycles let's say like that so then in my first cycle then I got two classes the first one was consumer culture theory and consumer insight and the other one was Innovation so then those two classes I got from the start but then in the second cycle you have the option like the track one and the track two join together and then you can decide to take for example ethical marketing or digital marketing as I really wanted to go into and go deep in digital marketing that I took this like elective but there's also other people that were more interested in ethical marketing that went through that option so then you can see that track one and track two it's like combined these two classes but also we have other class that is called the value of brands in consumption society that is just for the track two so you see like for me like I'm really passionate and really into market research consumer Behavior all about consumption and market research that's also a big thing in my track so then that's why I decide for track two so if you are more interested for example in retail or getting a more knowledge like an overall knowledge of what's a marketing then you can take the track two so I've seen like well so that's maybe just a pattern but I've seen that people that for example went like in their bachelor's to a business international business and all that and they don't have like a really detailed let's say background in marketing then they took that one because it's more General and you get more like insights from marketing but then me that I took as marketing as my bachelor then for me it was way more interested in the track two so that like yeah thats talking about the track one and track two so they depending on your own interest and your own kind of background but then in the like in the second semester like the one that starts in January then you had two classes that is the what's it's called the quantitative and qualitative then you join like the two track right like you are combined in those two classes so then you can choose either like quantitative methods or qualitative methods that will help you for your thesis and there is also other options where you can for example if you take track two that is a more focused in consumption then you can take corporate brands that is more frequencing track one but there's also yeah other subjects other optional subjects that you can take as Market intelligence but also other class that is more into consumption so then yeah it's more about your preference all right thank you very much so I wanted to talk about you mentioned that you can take different classes Etc is there anyone who would like to say a few words about you know a mandatory courses versus elective courses or optional courses what's your program structure like do you have the opportunity to select courses or is it are the you know course selections fixed before you start the program what's it like Hasmik in your program Information Systems the first two months we had two mandatory courses it is all stated on the website of Information Systems on the second period during the second period right now we had one mandatory course and one elective course the information about the elective courses the structures also the examinations what what are they going to teach us has been provided a way earlier and also in during the third period also they're going to be two elective courses and the four period is all about master thesis but you get all the information you want from a teacher himself there is a presentation day when they come and talk about the courses and you have time to decide and choose so this but this is you don't have to choose your elective courses before you come to Lund you do that when you have no yes you do that when you have arrived and you have a meeting with the lecturer to have all your questions answered and then you have time after the meeting to decide a week or 10 days and then you choose okay thank you Bettina can I ask you how many courses do you have at the same time I mean you're taking a full program there are many different courses but do you have many courses at the same time as well or is it just one no for us it's we always have two courses at the same time for I think eight weeks and in my program it's we have three tracks so it's quite a bit more complicated I think than another masters because we always have a specific one for our track and then we can choose another one most of the time and in our second year we can choose even courses from different departments faculties so we have a lot of choice we can make which is quite nice but we also have mandatory courses of course specific to our track is there anyone here a panelist who is in a program where there are no mandatory courses or sorry no elective courses just mandatory courses Tedo? well as a management program it's quite unique in this way and it's not as much standardized and there are many parallel processes it's a time there is more balance between practice and the theory so we do have only mandatory courses during this program and it is also one course at a time and for example in our program we have already finished three courses and we are just working for the four course so it is quite different program to program what courses and what choices do you get for this Dian? yeah my course is also only mandatory courses so we don't have any optional track that we need to choose and every course usually like that like Tedo basically in the beginning it's only one course and then when it ends there's open another course but I think for some time we do have multiple courses run in one place so for example like this days now I'm working on entrepreneurial leadership and the entrepreneurial project at the same time but I think it's usually just two or maxim three courses that happen at the same time and basically the one that happened at the same time which is like the short course and the one that is like long term until at the end of the year because we have entrepreneurial projects that lasts until we graduate and then the other course is the short-term courses that will end and then there will open another course so a few different experiences here but one or two courses at least at the same time students can expect in most programs Donna I would like to ask you because you said when you made your application you had a you had a job you had your own company you seemed very like super busy how useful did you find I mean your professional work experience how useful was that for you in your application do you think I think it gives me a lot of like Reflections and to help me think through what I really want to study on and so I look into every courses from each programs and really being consider what I really want to focus on that's how I chose this program so for my program we only have mandatory courses but you get to choose two out of three tracks so yeah so our program only provide only two courses at the same time and it was very heavy but you get to learn very deep into each theories and each topics so I will say my professional experience really helped me to be more clear and aware of what I want to focus on so I think it would be really helpful for me to position myself in the future after graduating like what kind of job I want what kind of industry I want and also I think it gave me more in-depth ideas of what exactly this experience gonna bring me bring to me so I think professional experience is really important for me to choose yeah yeah because we had this question someone in the audience who wanted to know how useful or impactful the work experience was when you applied to a certain program or even in the program of course no program that we have would require work experience but it can be helpful in for some applicants so there is another question here about learning Swedish because of course we know the programs are taught in English your classmates and you communicate in English but we live in Sweden where Swedish is the native language but people usually speak English but what is your impression of life in Sweden living in Sweden as a non-swedish speaker Adriana would you like to share some of your experience from if I don't know if you speak Swedish maybe you do I I'm just going to asse that no panelists speak Swedish but what's your experience Adriana oh honestly in my case it was a bit different because I was studying in Denmark before so I can speak a bit of Danish which kind of helps me in daily life okay yeah I mean the Danish and Swedish can be quite similar but what about you, you other guys who do not know or understand any Swedish at all at least not before coming here what is your kind of feeling of living in Sweden as a non-Swedish speaker Hasmik do you speak Swedish no I don't and English is okay everywhere I during this three and a half month I didn't have any problem any issue with the with the non-english speaking Swedish or other nations so it's okay all right so everything is with if you are if you are good in English so you will not have any extra stress with Swedish right because there is a question here from someone who wanted to know wait if there is a way to learn Swedish at the University while you are doing studies here so to my I know that we have some kind of short course in the beginning of the semester just like an introduction Swedish but after that you have to get a so called Swedish personal number to be eligible for Swedish language classes and you one-year students maybe you don't have that but Bettina perhaps and also Adriana maybe you would get Swedish personal number so you qualified for free Swedish language classes right yeah so to the Swedish person number you can't get it if you only stay for a year so for a lot of Master's students it was not possible to get one but for me it was and it was I could get it without speaking Swedish that's no issue but sometimes you get mail which is in Swedish so it's always good to know a Swedish person who can possibly translate it or Google Translate is your best friend at that point and if you have a Swedish number you can apply for SFI I think it's called like Swedish for foreigners I did not apply for it yet but I want to I think it's totally fine if you don't speak Swedish but I think just it's nicer sometimes if you could speak Swedish and if for example I would like to stay in Sweden possibly after my masters and then it's just good to know the language already and it's like classes in the evenings so you could still do it next to your studies if you would like to yeah anyone else Tedo Dian Donna yeah I actually like to share as a non-English native speaker living in Sweden I think it's super nice that everyone can speak full English here so it's there's no problem to navigate the life here the only thing is that when I went go to a supermarket to do like grocery shopping it's really hard for me because there's no English explanation on everything so you kind of have to use a Google translate all the time and I've been learning Swedish more about learning the culture here especially in the especially in the workplace you don't really need the Swedish as well like you don't really need to learn Swedish but on the social social perspective like if you want to make friends with the Swedish people here then I think it would be great to learn some Swedish and also I'm right now I'm teaching kids climbing here in Sweden so the kids actually don't really speak English and they might find me really intimidating if I don't speak Swedish with them so I think if you want to get to know the locals more then I think it'd be really helpful to learn the language but otherwise it's totally fine if you don't know anything about it. Dian, Tedo, Domenica yeah I would say that yeah I took the Swedish classes as well I mean the a short courses it's the beginning of the semester from Lund University and it was quite helpful for the basic words to study but I was just thinking I cannot remember the case when someone did not spoke in English here in Sweden at least in Lund so I had never had any problems with communicating with English and also I would like to mention that people themselves are quite open to speak in English without any intimidation or problems so it depends of course what objectives do you have if you want to more integrate with locals of course it's always nice to be able to communicate in the local language but I would certainly say that it's not must in order to be her and communicated all right so basically what we can tell people is that if you are a one-year student one year Masters there is just a kind of a short intensive course in Swedish that the university provides but if you stay for two or more years you can get free Swedish language classes from the it's organized by the city or municipality where you live actually so you can just apply for that but I want to we kind of I think it was Donna who mentioned the social more social aspects of like meeting local people have you had the chance to meet any Swedish people outside of the classroom as they were I mean socially and are they people say Swedish people are shy Swedish people are shy and may not approach you if you if you're not friends already you know what I mean yeah is that correct we have to be proactive in approaching people here because Swedish people they usually won't be the person who approach you but they will be really polite and nice to reply you back there's so that's a really great positive experience that I have here that they won't reject you or say anything else they will just really be happy that you reach out to them when you approach them so I think that's a very positive experience for me and so I also joined some climbing because I love climbing like bouldering so I joined the local community here and they are all very welcoming and also because they know probably know I'm in the meetings they will always switch to English so I can understand so I think that's a very nice gesture they they include someone else here and switch to different language just for me so yeah all right Domenica what's your impression I assume you you're a Spanish speaker right and an English speaker yes speaker yeah not a Swedish speaker maybe yes I know the basics but like I haven't used them those things now yeah I'm kind of shy like because I know like I understand some things but for me at the started it was kind of difficult like to get used to it was like a quite a shock that I had from coming from Ecuador like Latin American then coming to Sweden but now after three months I can say that like I'm more used to live here in Sweden I'm happy like talking about like getting involved or getting friendships and all that stuff for like Swedish people I have some friends like maybe not 100 friends but they're like five friends that are from Sweden and the other ones are more from South America Poland and international students also I'd say that maybe like if you want to if you know the language maybe like in intermediate or advanced level then you make more easy friends here in Sweden for like talking about the locals but then you will also have like the advantage that as it is the international City then you won't have that problem you will find people from South America in my case it was like an advantage because then those are my closest friends now and then you can find people also from different other countries like around the world and it makes you like see this overview in different cultures perspectives on having friendships from all around the world so yeah I'm pretty happy now thank you but I I think that's kind of interesting can you speak a bit about the makeup of your class because we always like to say oh we're very International University but are we is that also your impression after taking a class here in Lund Adriana would you like to share information about your now you're a bachelor degree student so we should perhaps keep that in mind because I think those programs tend to have more Swedish students perhaps than the master's degrees but can you still share your experience from yeah exactly I think in my class it's 50/50. 50% of Swedish students and 50% of international ones but I think in the beginning it was quite easy to make friends because of many University events organized around so I got to meet many people from my class and from the second Bachelor taught in English okay Dian what about your class how many are non-Swedish I mean how many approximately we have 60 around 60 students in my class and then only four of them are Swedish okay so it's a tiny kind of minority yeah where do the rest come from where are they from we have about I I think around 20 nationalities in our class so one from, two from USA and then mostly from Europe but we also have southeast Asia we have East Asia we have South Asia we have South Africa we have South America so I think everywhere yeah is that also the case for you other guy I mean Donna, Tedo yeah Tedo would you like to say something to that yeah my group is also quite International there are students from 25 different nationalities in my class almost all from all the parts of the world we they're almost I would say 20 to 30 percent from Sweden and all of us are from many different places quite balanced quite balanced team it means it means it's regard because we cover almost all continents Australia we have two guys from Australia as well so it helps a lot as well for the learning process because when you're such an international environment you get completely different viewpoints from the others and completely or quite different understanding so the same subject or topic so it helps a lot for the understanding as well together with studying and learning about different cultures and languages and people so I would say it's quite quite International I just want to say because we had a session with the teachers previously today or program representatives and they say it's very common that classmates learn from each other I mean you learn as much from each other as you do from the teachers or professors is that correct Hasmik would you say that's true because these people you meet in your class are from all over the world and with their perspectives and their knowledge that they bring in so that's very useful for you as well yes I totally agree because the group projects are very common in the process of learning and groups switch from one course to another and you know working with International students International people in one group is very interesting it can be it can be sometimes worrying because at the beginning you have issues with understanding each other but at the end it works great I mean exchanging knowledge experience and the point of view is always a good thing to do thank you so we have a question here and I think it's a question that a lot of prospective students are interested in it's not really about learning or the programs it more it's about working part-time is there anyone here in this group of students who has an experience part-time job in Sweden Domenica well so I don't have yet my experience but I've been through different recruitment process so maybe I can help you somehow like showing you how's the recruitment process I think that if you put like one for example maybe like now that I really want to get a job I’m giving maybe two hours of my day by applying to jobs and then from those jobs imagine if I've applied for 30 jobs they have called me from three to four companies so in this case Swedish like yeah you can find like easier at work you know in Swedish but then it's not mandatory like I don't know Swedish but I have had like these opportunities and interviews and all that where you don't need Swedish at all so now I'm in the final steps of recruitment process into companies so then I think that it's not that difficult I don't know how is from the other Masters but Lund universities that really recognized university so then nothing that you won't have that much problem if your purpose is also finding a part-time job obviously it's better and easier to find a full-time job but then there's also these options of part-time then I'll suggest you like for example in my case they'll leave here in Lund then you can find in Malmö a lot of options like I've seen that there's a lot of options for my masters also here in Lund there's some times that you can find like some other vacancies open positions and if not then you can also see maybe an option in Copenhagen that is also super close from here all right thank you Bettina you had your you raised your hand and then you took it back but maybe you had something to share about part-time jobs yeah I think it really depends on what you study because for me it's really hard to find one I am because I'm doing demography which is not the most common thing and a lot of jobs would be in Denmark so in Copenhagen and I know it's not far but traveling there back and forth is quite time consing and also what you need to know is if you have a Swedish personal number you can apply for subsidy or like money from the government from Sweden if you work 10 hours per week but you can only do that if you have a job in Sweden and only if you use a citizen and so for me it doesn't really make sense to yeah work in Denmark because then I would not get the money from the government and I think it's also a lot I don't know Domenica if it was for you the same but I think some companies want you to have the Swedish person number and a Swedish bank account so I think it can be quite hard for one year's Master student to find a part-time position to be honest so don't come here and expect to find one when you like financially you should be able to afford this life here without depending on it yeah I mean that's absolutely correct and especially for students who need to get a residence permit in order to join us here they must have savings in their bank accounts so because a student might find a part-time job but they also might not find a part-time job or even have time for it you know because many of these programs are very intense and require a lot of work so that is the main priority of course a question came in here is it compulsory to learn Swedish while studying Hasmik is do you need Swedish language proficiency no I don't need because everything is in English and professors they have a great English and all the exams and works are being done in English so I'm not thinking about learning Swedish for studying at least yeah exactly I mean no the answer is no you don't need Swedish to join an international degree program Adriana can I ask you what what is your schedule like a typical week or I mean you've only been here since August so but you maybe but at this point you have kind of an idea about how to structure your studies and how much how much time you need to spend every week studying and in class and Etc can you tell us a bit about that in your experience yeah from the beginning from the beginning of the semester I had three courses at the same time and now I have two so the amount of lectures seminars and they compulsory things varies between 10 to 15 hours per week and then of course the rest of the time is just for us to study on our own do the assignments write essays or maybe do some group works as well so I would say also there is one day in the week that's totally free without any lectures at University that we can just divide to the group work or just study on our own because there are also a lot of readings that we need to prepare for the classes so the time is very useful. right how to manage your time Tedo what's your take I mean how much time
per week do you spend like in lectures or group work or seminars or well I would say that it's I ass it depends on the program because all of them are different for example my program is quite intensive and even though I we have one classes per time at one time it is quite it demands quite a lot of time from us even though there is only one two or three hours of lecture in each day the whole other time you need to prepare to work in teams and other other projects to be prepared for everything so I would say that at least eight hours a day is something you should have in mind if you're going to study Masters in management here in Lund and of course it depends on the person as well Dian what's your experience there is a questionnaire what's the teaching style is it more lectures more seminars or group works or everything and can you also tell me a bit about your kind of the relationship between program staff academic staff and students do you have an opinion on that Dian Oh okay so in terms of the interaction will be first I would say it's very casual here in Sweden like you can call the professor teachers by their names I think it's something new for me because it's I usually always call someone older people who like Mr like Sir like that back home but if you do that here it's going to be weird on their side so yeah that's also something that I try to adjust and then in terms of the lecture style I think it's quite varied we do have a lot of group work mostly group work but then when you come to the class the way the teacher teach you could be different depending on the subjects for example like the first introduction is usually one-way kind of thing but once you already enroll to the class there will be a lot of readings going on before you come to the class and in the class it focused more on the discussion instead of the teacher telling you what's new in class so it's about the discussion that you already read beforehand so the class is quite productive in that sense another way is also we do a lot of case study we do a lot of roleplaying as well sometimes where basically we learn by doing things well I have a question and anyone here in the panel can join in what's the kind of division between in your opinion between more theoretical and practical component of the program is it very theoretical you just read books and or and write or is it that you learn some theories and then you they encourage you to apply the knowledge in a more practical way can you speak to that anyone here maybe Donna would you like to share your experience is it your program more theoretical more practical or 50/50? I will say my program is very theoretical oriented however in the class the professor will actually encourage you to apply the theory that we have learned to the case study so we will discuss have seminar so it's like a lot of discussion you will have to apply to the case study that the professor assigned and discussed with other classmates in the classroom so I think in a way it's very theoretical oriented but on the other hand it's also very discussion dialogue based to help you apply those theories we learned and also the exam are mostly take home it’s also to help you to encourage you to think critically and also to apply for the theories yeah is there anyone else that would like to say something about this is are your programs mostly theoretical and then or is it more yeah Dian yeah I think for my programs 70% practical and 30% theoretical probably because a lot of things that we need to accomplish in the program is to actually by doing something but in terms of the assessment for the tasks for instance we do need to align what we practice into the theory so that's where the theory can say that's why you still need to understand the theory and how that would help you in practice but they are mostly the program requires you to do a lot of things by yourself and within the group okay so there's a mix but different programs have different kind of Domenica what's it in your program is there a practical component or is it mostly theory yeah there’s practical but there's a lot of readings like I've been reading I've been reading my three months like 24 7 but I like to read so then it's not an issue for me but it like at least in my masters I don't know how it's in track one so I'll talk more about my track that is more like psychological and all that it's tons of reading maybe I read three or four articles from like 20-25 pages each like each day so yeah like if you go to the track two in my masters then you are expecting to read a lot but also like for example in my digital marketing class like what I like the most of that class is that it's super practical so you learn the theoretical part but also you have like a simulation where you can apply all the concepts and all the definitions that you're learning in class and in my like in this part of the theoretical in the other courses then it's fun because then you have the seminars where you can see your perspective and tell the others your perspective and some of the readings that I'm going through like they're the authors are my professors so that's like quite interesting to see how like my professors gets to that idea or to that perspective and they can explain to you like further there's a lot of seminars also and project groups so yeah basically my masters is like the main components are a reading seminars this part of practical but also like working in groups all right thank you very much time flies we just have 10 more minutes left I have a question that came in here that is not about studying or research but it's about the nightlife in Lund now Bettina you're smiling is there a nightlife in Lund what happens yeah there is definitely a nightlife in Lund even though it's small there are a lot of Nations I don't know how many nations are there 12 or 12 13 I think yeah so when I came here I was like what are nations Nations is oh it's really hard to explain but they're kind of you can you have to join a nation and that's like your home nation but you never have to show up again if like if you don't like it but every nation has their own club or bar and they have their specific days where you can go to the Nations and meet up friends and yeah go to the club if you want and you can even live with the nation so if you yeah search for yeah for housing you can also look into Nations and apply for them I think that a lot of people don't know about that so I mention it here because it might be an option for you and then there is also the t-bar in Lund which is the club without Nations or you go to Malmö or Copenhagen if you really want to go to a bigger cities so you have a lot of options and even though Lund is small you're definitely gonna have a night like you can enjoy Lund is a pretty small town but it's a big university on the other hand so lots of young people in the city anyone else do you have time for night do maybe you need to go to bed early to cope with your studies and your program or maybe sometimes you can go out and enjoy your evenings Hasmik oh sorry yeah Tedo please chime in Its well there’s around good places to go the night life in Lund certainly and it's always to have some time for yourself and enjoy the life outside the university so Lund has all in one so I would say that there is definitely that life in Lund it is just up to you how you manage your time and your needs and wants during in here in Lund great what about I mean nightlife is one thing to go out and have fun in you know Friday Saturday night maybe but what about other social activities I know Donna talked about for example like a climbing club or hiking stuff like that is there is anyone enjoying hiking in this group yeah I do I also joined so there are many different kinds of like outdoor student club that they will host many different events and also on Facebook there are also some class or groups that's mostly organized by non-students here in Lund so it's a really nice way to meet people and there are also some extreme sports groups that you can join and you can you can go diving or even surfing in Sweden so I think it's super nice that there are many Natures and outdoor activities that you can explore so for me I also went canoeing with my friend here in the middle of the Sweden and it was such a great experience so I think it's mainly based on what you want to do and you always find something here yeah can I ask more kind of general question and maybe it's different from person to person but do you in your social life do you hang out mostly with your like classmates or with the people you happen to live with I mean in like a student dorm or do you have friends based on your kind of from your home country or from all kinds of countries what's it like Adriana what about you do you have mostly hang out with your classmates or it's a mix of people. I would say mostly with classmates, but the I also know a few people from the novice weeks that’s actually a fun social activity that you do when you’re a new student in Lund that's also how I met a lot of people that we still hang out despite we met in August so there are a lot of ways to meet people outside of the class that's also a good way about Lund all right can I because you all come from different countries and I would like to know how important is it for you to be able to meet people coming from your kind of own cultural background or linguistic for that matter is that something you feel that you're able to do if you want to meet like Donna you're from Taiwan if you want to meet someone from Taiwan or a chinese-speaking person or Domenica from South America you mentioned you have friends from South America how important is that and how easy is it to find those people In Lund I would say it's not for me because I've been working for a while and I and Lund is a student town so I found it, it’ll be maybe I should say my program doesn't it's not very diverse like 80% or 90%. Oh 4 out of 60 students are Asians and the others are all Europeans and mostly people from Germany and Netherlands so for me as a minority here I would say I think people tend to get connected with the people from the similar cultural background and also in Sweden it's it really depends on how you what you like but because I like outdoor activity so I get to meet locals and also foreign westerners here to make friends easier with them but I usually hang out with friends out of my like with us who share the same interests as me but I also know a lot of people who prefer hang out with their roommates or corridor mates rather than their classmates but I think it's really verified depends on each person's experience yeah right if you're comfortable hanging out with anyone regardless where they happen to come from Hasmik you’re from I believe you said Armenia if I'm not mistaken have you found any Armenian friends in Lund if you feel like a bit homesick maybe or whatever yes in Lund in Malmö and in other towns also and I believe it happens naturally like you know person you know of your nation then you know another person then another and then you have you know a group but still it is always good experience to hang out with your classmates apart from classes to go somewhere I don't know I went to traveling to Helsingborg and to Helsingør with them and also with the student Nations you get to travel or I don't know go to hiking or other social activities it's always good to communicate with as much people as you can meet well at least for me all right thank you Bettina we heard with a lot of Germans and and people from the Netherlands is that correct yeah it's correct there are lots so you can as a German or a Dutch person you can definitely find people who speak your own language but in my masters we are really International we only have three Germans and only four Swedish people and the rest is somewhere else so that's quite nice and I'm also part of Lunda Economerna which is the Student Union of the Lund our faculty the Economics Faculty and there is also to get Swedes to get to know them it's very nice to join that and also they have a lot of events also for corporate events you can join as an international and get to know corporations and that's quite nice I think so you get to know a lot of people Tedo would you like to join you were from Georgia right we have some Georgian students in Lund have you met them yeah I've met I think about 15 Georgians here so far I believe there are much more so whenever I feel that I just need to speak in Gorgian I know where to go so it's quite good it's quite always good to have an option to go there because it was a cultural closeness and everything so the fact that Lund University is so International helps you in this regard to find someone from closer from your culture and language right Dian I didn't catch where are you from. I’m from Indonesia Indonesia yes yeah so I know for a fact that we have quite a lot of Indonesian students in Lund or have you managed to find friends from Indonesia or from maybe southeast Asia I don't know if you like to hang out with people who have a similar kind of cultural background as yourself yeah I think I know a lot of Indonesian students because we have like an Indonesian Association here so we do hang out a lot as well but I think I spend most of my time more in the class because basically it's a 40 hours per week and you need to kind of make friends with people in class in order to do like entrepreneurial projects together it's a whole year program so I think it's important to make friends in class but I do also have my corridor mates if I miss Indonesian food I know where to go I'll just go to with my Indonesian students I usually go there when we want to eat together eat local Indonesian food okay that's a good note I want to ask my final question for you to here today because it's five o'clock already what do you do when you feel homesick Domenica what do I do when I feel homesick call my family you call your family you eat some maybe Ecuadorian food yeah well no there are not ingredients for Ecuadorian food but at least I try to call my family my friends back in home also spend time with if there are not that much Ecuadorians here maybe I found five or six people from Ecuador so but you can find people from other countries in Central and South America so then you can feel somehow calm talking to them and yeah but yeah at least the first month second month I was feeling super homesick so I tried to call my mom every day but then like then you get to know people they get you through the months they are coming closer to you and all that so then like you have this support from all the people you start getting to know and all that and then that thing is crucial like when you're feeling like that coming with people from your culture talking a little of Spanish now we're mixing some English and Spanish because we're mixed in like 24/7 English and Spanish to talk with people that doesn't know Spanish so then that's good I think that those are my two tips when we're feeling homesick here in Lund all right I think that's all the time we have thank you Domenica Bettina Hasmik Donna Adriana Dian and Tedo for joining us here today current Lund University students I'm sorry we couldn't speak more or let you say more things about more you know topics it's a Limited Format here but I want to thank you for taking the time to join us here today and share some of your experiences of being an international student at Lund University School of Economics and Management and for those of you who tuned in I wish you the best of luck with your application maybe next year you will be a panelist like these guys here are today but anyway I want to wish you a happy rest of the week and have a nice weekend all of you and thanks for joining take care
2022-12-08