British Council-Studying abroad

Transcript of the podcast

Lin

I’m from China and I’ve been studying in Bristol for 4 years. I’ve just finished my MA degree. When I first arrived in the UK I found it very difficult as I didn’t know anybody here, but I soon met other Chinese people studying at the university, and as my English improved I made friends with more people on my course

Studying in the UK has been a very positive experience for me. I’ve met a lot of interesting people and travelled around Europe in the holidays. For me the most difficult aspect was having the confidence to take part in tutorials, and when I was told I would have to give a presentation to the rest of the class, I was very nervous. My tutor helped me a lot, however, and said that for someone using their second language I did very well

Tomas

I came to Leicester on the Erasmus scheme a year ago. I had a choice of universities and I chose this one because it’s in a multicultural area. In the Czech Republic I had never come across foreigners, so I was interested in living in a place with people from many different cultures

The social life here is great, and I will really miss the good friends I’ve made when I go back home next week. There aren’t many other Czech people here so I’ve had to make friends with people from other countries. That’s been very good for my English – some Erasmus students stay mostly with people from the same country and they don’t get the same experience. The worst thing has been that everything is so expensive. I had to get a parttime job and borrow from my parents to afford to live here

Syed

I won a scholarship to do an MSc in Telecommunications at Manchester University. The course was excellent and enabled me to get a good job when I finished. Now I’m thinking of doing a PhD before I return to India

I enjoyed the way the course was taught. We were encouraged to think for ourselves rather than read piles of textbooks. It’s a different approach to the way I’d studied before, and one that I would recommend. I would also recommend living in student accommodation – it’s the cheapest option and although the rooms are small they have everything you need, and you get to know other people very easily. For me, the only problem was that the social life centres around alcohol, and I don’t drink

Answers