UU Report form - Erasmus PREPARATION STUDY ABROAD PERIOD. level bachelor s master s PhD. name study programme. 01 / 07 / 2016 (dd/mm/yyyy)

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1 UU Report form - Erasmus faculty/college Social Sciences level bachelor s master s PhD name study programme destination city & country name university abroad start date end date Erasmus Budapest, Hungary Eötvös Loránd University 01 / 02 / 2016 (dd/mm/yyyy) 01 / 07 / 2016 (dd/mm/yyyy) exchange application process PREPARATION The exchange application process does contained a lot of steps. However, those steps were easy to follow. In the beginning, I was scared if my home university did everything well, because I did not hear anything about it from my receiving university. Because of this, I sent the receiving university an with the question if I am on their list of people who are going to do Erasmus there. And yes, I was, so everything was fine. As I was supposed to do my Erasmus in the second semester, I had to wait a long time before I actually went to Budapest. Budapest was my first choice and it will be my first choice forever! counselling & support at Utrecht University The support of the home university was fine. When you needed help, you could speak with the erasmus coördinator. You are doing University so they expect that when you need help, you go and ask them yourself. They gave a presentation, two times in a year, and gave information by . academic preparation I did not prepare myself for this. I really like to surprise myself. language preparation I did not do any language preperation. My English was good enough and I knew that when I am living there for five months, my English will develop quickly. finances I went to a country where everything is way cheaper than the Netherlands. I receive a montly amount of money from my dad, I receive 380 euros from the government (study funding and public transport allowance) and I borrowed money from the bank. I did not need any books. However, I thought I would save money because it is so cheap, but instead of that, I have spend it all. This is because of the many eastern european trips I made. study programme (content and organisational issues) STUDY ABROAD PERIOD The study programme of all the faculties was available on the website of the university. I looked at the faculty of Psychology, because that is what I am studying back home. However, I signed up for Social Sciences in the Netherlands, because Psychology is a branch of Social Sciences. At my receiving university in Budapest this was really different. They had seperated faculties for Social sciences and Psychology. So, I ended up with people who did Social Sciences and that means that my classmates were all social workers. Normally, I do neuropsychology at my home university, so it was quite different and not what I expected. This is something you really have to look out for. page 1 of 10

2 academic quality of education activities The academic quality of education is so different if you compare it to the Netherlands. I did all master courses, because they only had three bachelor courses of 5 credits each. Those courses were not interested for me at all, so that is why I chose courses of bachelor's degree. Even if it was not my subject, I find it really easy. The work pressure is not that high and because of that I really enjoyed the (night) life in Budapest and I could do so many trips do different eastern countries. counselling & support at receiving university abroad The support at the receiving university was really good. There was one person in particular: Ivett Császár. She answered by really quickly. I also got a mentor (like every erasmus student in Budapest), who was supposed to guide me through the whole semester. But after a few weeks, I already knew almost everything. Now we sometimes have a coffee together. transfer of credits I did not received my credits yet, because I think it takes some time. welcome & orientation programme STUDENT LIFE The welcome and orientation programma was really well organized. There was an organisation called ESN which organized several events like sightseeing tours, parties, trips to other cities, and so on. I took part of those events the first month, but after you know some people, you do not need those ESN activities anymore. Sometimes I go to parties, but that is all. accommodation I rended a place by contacting Sean Da. This is a guy who rents flats for erasmus students in Budapest. By facebook I posted a message in his facebook group and a french girl contacted me to ask if I wanted to live with her. She lived in Budapest for a halfyear already, because she is doing a erasmus for two semesters. We decided to choose four other roommates to live with us. After we found all our roommates by facebook, we contacted Sean that we wanted to live together in one of his appartments (where the french girl already lives). I found my appartment really quickly. leisure & culture Budapest is an amazing city. You cannot get bored in Budapest! It offers everything you need. From nightlife (which is really good, because of the many ruin bars which I like so much), restaurants, biking tours, the history, the beautiful buildings, the visits you can make quite easily to other counties (I did a roadtrip, for example, to Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Serbia). Also I made weekendtrip to Vienna, Bratislava, Prague, Istanbul, Roemenia (Cluj-Napoca and Timisoara) and the Balaton lake which is in Hungary. suggestions/tips The public transport is great and cheap. If you have to wait for 5 minutes, it is long. You pay 11 euros per month and you can catch four subways, two trams, all the busses AND THE BOAT which crosses the Danub. Really nice by sunset. CONCLUSIONS would you recommend this university/destination abroad to others? please explain Yes, I would really recommend this destination abroad to others! It is a developing country. It is cheap (half liter beers for 1eu), really beautiful, great history. Just go there and see it yourself. You will not regret it; I am sure of that! do you have any additional advice or comments? - page 2 of 10

3 UU Report form - Erasmus faculty/college Social Sciences level bachelor s master s PhD name study programme Psychology destination city & country name university abroad start date end date Budapest, Hungary Eötvös loránd university 01 / 09 / 2015 (dd/mm/yyyy) 31 / 01 / 2016 (dd/mm/yyyy) exchange application process PREPARATION It is really important you start making a list of things to do as soon as possible. I was a bit too relaxed so i needed to do everything last minute. It takes more time than you think. Check to websites of the universities you're interested in and ask other people for advice. counselling & support at Utrecht University The university helped me really wel and always responded as quickly as possible.it is okay to have questions, so don't hesitate to sent them an . academic preparation I didn't need to do any acedemic preparation. language preparation I didn't need any language preparation. If you don't know wether your english is good enough you can check your skills with the language assessment finances. The teachers at the university where understandable, but there pronunciation wasn't that good. study programme (content and organisational issues) STUDY ABROAD PERIOD At my university everything was quite chaotic. We got a course list but they told us we couldn't do any master courses. Afterwarts I got told that i could do them. I really needed to improvise with my courselist to find 6 courses. It is important to start as quickly as possible. academic quality of education activities 5 out of 6 courses were really easy. For some courses i just needed to a presentation or write a paper. You can expect that the standard is a bit lower than at your home university. counselling & support at receiving university abroad Right away we got an from our mentors if we already arrived in budapest.the mentors were really nice and if we had any questions we could reach them. Also, the international coordinator l.elped us. She ed us all the important data and we could always visit her at her office. We had a student website for our schedule and one for our homework and assignments. It was arranged quite well. page 3 of 10

4 transfer of credits This went very smoothly. No further problems. welcome & orientation programme STUDENT LIFE The welcome programme was okay. The mentors tried really hard but i think they tried too hard. Everything was kind of childish and there was not much money available so sometimes they needed to improvise. We didn't get any free time and i think they had the feeling that they needed to entertain us. I prefered to go hang out with my erasmus friends. accommodation I went to budapest without looking for a room. I had a great apartment with 2 friends wiithin 3 days but i recommend to get a room before you go there. leisure & culture The people are a bit closed, probably because there english is just bad. You spent a lot of time with students and all of them are nice. suggestions/tips Make this time a time you will never forget;) CONCLUSIONS would you recommend this university/destination abroad to others? please explain Yes, it is a good international university. What is even better is the city itself. There are lots of pubs and restaurants and the bath houses are superb do you have any additional advice or comments? page 4 of 10

5 UU Report form - Erasmus Faculty/college: Social Science Level: X bachelor master PhD other Name degree programme: Psychology Destination city & country Budapest, Hungary Name host institution and/or company/organisation ELTE Purpose of exchange X study/courses work placement field work other Departure date (dd/mm/yyyy) Return date (dd/mm/yyyy) Preparation Exchange/placement application process: I needed to complete all the required documents the University of Utrecht asks you to fill in to go abroad, like a motivational letter and study- and financial plan. I got placed by my first choice, Budapest at ELTE University. I didn t need to complete anything for ELTE. They placed me at the Faculty of Social Science, which was not the right one in the end because I study Psychology. But that didn t matter much to me, I really wanted to go abroad. Counselling/support at home university: The international office at home settled everything with ELTE, which was very nice. The only thing, like mentioned before, was that they made an agreement with the wrong faculty. For me that didn t matter because I was also interested in Social Sciences, and when I arrived it turned out I could also follow a few courses at the Faculty of Psychology if I would really want that. Correspondence by went very quickly and good. Academic preparation: I didn t do any academic preparations before going abroad. Just filled in the study plan, but ELTE contacted us that the right courses would be announced at the beginning of the semester. So when we arrived we could choose which courses we wanted to follow. Very Hungarian Language preparation: None. Finances: page 5 of 10

6 I filled in my financial plan to see if I had enough money to make it to the end of my stay. You cannot get a job in Budapest so I had some savings, money from the government and OVvergoeding. Budapest is quite cheap so that saved me. Study/placement abroad period Study programme/work plan (concerning content and organisational issues): We had to fill in a study plan based on the courses at ELTE from the year before. When the semester started we got a list at the university with all the courses of that semester where we could choose from. You could follow the classes and then decide if you wanted to get a signature from the teacher. Very old school and not a very good system, but in the end I had enough point to get my 30 ECTs. But I needed to re-upload my study plan to get my Erasmus Grant. Academic quality of education/placement activities: The Erasmus courses at the Faculty of Social Science where very easy. Papers had to be only 3 or 5 pages or you had to do one presentation and you were done. Teachers didn t seem to care that much about the quality of Erasmus classes, but it depends per teacher and definitely per faculty. I heard some people had a really hard time getting all they points. Counselling/support at host institution/organisation: The international office replied fast and had good contacts with the international office in Budapest at ELTE. Transfer of credits: Didn t happen yet, but I think it will be fine. Student life Welcome/orientation programme: One introduction day at ELTE, then a week of trying classes and sports. ESN did some parties and pub-crawls, which was nice to meet new people. Once I met people I didn t go there anymore because the parties where not that nice, but it was good to make some first contacts. Accommodation: I found my flat on Facebook. Search for a flat before going, because it is not that cheap and easy any more like a few years before! A lot of people got stuck in a hostel for the first days/weeks because they had trouble finding something. Start in time, there are a lot of Facebook groups where you can get in contact with people. Leisure/culture: Hungarians are pretty grumpy and not that nice to tourist/international students. But I didn t meet a lot of Hungarian people. I mostly hang out with Erasmus people. The food and drinks are cheap so that was very nice, I went out for dinner a lot and going out was so much cheaper than at home. The politics in Hungary are very bad at the moments, the government is super corrupt. Maybe that s why Hungarians didn t leave a very good impression on me. But younger people at bars are page 6 of 10

7 nicer most of the times, especially in the Jewish Quarter, which is very western with a lot of coffee shops and hip places to go out. Suggestions/tips: Because we had a lot of free time we went on a lot of trips. The surrounding countries like Slovenia are really worth visiting and also not expansive. I also went to Istanbul because flying back and forth was only 45,-. Fly with Wizz air! Conclusions Would you recommend this host organisation/destination to others? Please explain: I had an amazing time, and in the end I only wished I would stay for the whole year instead of half a year. Go for it, it is so incredibly nice! But don t go for the quality of education, do it for all the other experiences. Do you have any additional advice or comments?: Go to Budapest! page 7 of 10

8 UU Report form - Erasmus faculty/college Sociale wetenschappen level bachelor s master s PhD name study programme Psychologie destination city & country name university abroad start date end date Hongarije, Budapest Eotvos Lorand University (ELTE) 02 / 09 / 2015 (dd/mm/yyyy) 29 / 01 / 2016 (dd/mm/yyyy) exchange application process PREPARATION Voordat ik aan dit avontuur begon hoorde ik van veel mensen dat de aanmeldingsprocedure veel werk was. Voor mij viel dit wel mee. Het belangrijkste is het schrijven van een goede motivatiebrief en het kiezen van de vakken op de universiteit waar je heen wil. Het kiezen van vakken is best lastig, omdat je vaak alleen inzicht hebt in de vakken van het huidige studiejaar (en je weet niet of deze het volgende jaar ook gegeven zullen worden). Al snel bleek dat je gewoon vakken kunt kiezen uit het huidige studiejaar (dat is tenslotte het enige waar je inzicht in hebt) en deze kun je later (wanneer de defintieve courses online komen) altijd nog veranderen. counselling & support at Utrecht University Wanneer er vragen waren kon ik altijd terecht bij de International Office (die zijn een paar uur per week in het Sjoerd Groenman gebouw te vinden). Ondanks dat ik mijn Bachelor psychologie voor de zomervakantie al binnen had, mocht ik alsnog een half jaar op Erasmus-exchange. Zelf wist ik van te voren niet dat deze mogelijkheid er was. Door naar de bijeenkomsten te gaan waarin voorlichting werd gegeven over studeren in het buitenland heb ik o.a. deze informatie gekregen. academic preparation Eerlijk gezegd heb ik niet veel academische voorbereidingen getroffen (naast 3 jaar studie aan de Universiteit Utrecht). language preparation Ik studeerde al 3 jaar aan de Universiteit Utrecht, waardoor ik voldoende Engelse boeken heb gelezen. Voordat je naar het buitenland vertrekt doe je (en iedereen die op Erasmus gaat) een Engelse taaltest om te kijken welk niveau je hebt. Deze geeft aan of je je nog meer moet verdiepen in de Engelse taal. finances Ik heb in de afgelopen jaren wel wat gespaard, maar niet zo veel. Ik wist dat Budapest niet het meest dure land is om te gaan studeren, dus dat speelde hierin wel een rol. Waar ik naast mijn gespaarde geld van leefde is het geld van de Erasmusbeurs, de OV-vergoeding en mijn ouders die me maandelijks een financiele bijdrage gaven. study programme (content and organisational issues) STUDY ABROAD PERIOD Vrijwel direct kreeg ik een Erasmus-mentor (een student) en een coordinator aangesteld gekregen. Voor alle vragen konden we bij de coordinator terecht, die binnen 5 minuten op je s reageerde (zowel voor als page 8 of 10

9 tijdens de uitwisseling). Daarnaast kon ik voor alle vragen terecht bij mijn Erasmus-mentor. academic quality of education activities De kwaliteit van het onderwijs was erg laag, al moet ik wel zeggen dat er grote verschillen waren. Voor veel vakken was enkel het schrijven van een paper en het geven van een presentatie voldoende om een 5 (dat is omgerekend een 10) te halen. Hiervoor hoefde je bij sommige vakken verder nieteens aanwezig te zijn tijdens de colleges. Ik had zelf in totaal 5 uur les per week, waarbij de docenten vaak gebrekkig Engels spraken, waardoor het vaak niet helemaal duidelijk was waar de les precies over ging. Sommige docenten waren daarentegen wel erg kritisch en verwachtten veel van je. counselling & support at receiving university abroad De begeleiding verliep een beetje hetzelfde als op de universiteit Utrecht. Voor vragen waren ze altijd bereikbaar, maar verder moet je toch zelf dingen uitzoeken. Omdat je al snel veel nieuwe mensen leert kennen op je universiteit kun je gelukkig altijd met hen overleggen en kom je er vrijwel altijd uit. transfer of credits Ik heb mijn transcript of records nog niet ontvangen, maar al mijn punten zijn wel ingevoerd in NEPTUN (dat is de Osiris van ELTE). Vanuit hier wordt een transcript of records gemaakt, dus ik denk dat dat goed moet komen. welcome & orientation programme STUDENT LIFE Het welkomsprogramma stelt vrijwel niets voor. Ik moest 2 uur aanwezig zijn waarin presentaties werden gegeven en de belangrijkste informatie werd verteld. Verder werden er wat dingen verteld over de stad zelf en vertelde ESN over hun organisatie. ESN is een organisatie die feestjes organiseerd en kortingen biedt als je hiervoor een pas aanschaft. Ik zelf zou niet aanraden om veel te ondernemen bij ESN. In het begin is het makkelijk om mensen te leren kennen, maar Budapest zelf biedt zo veel mogelijkheden om leuke dingen te ondernemen dat dit naar mijn mening niet via ESN nodig is. accommodation Ruim 3 of 4 maanden voor vertrek heb ik mezelf aangemeld voor verschillende Facebookgroepen. Eigenlijk verloopt alle kamer-verhuur via Facebook, want hier posten alle huisbazen hun appartementen. Voorbeelden van zulke Facebookgroepen zijn: ERAsmus/Exchange in Budapest 2015/2016, Erasmus Students in Budapest 2015/2016, Erasmus Budapest , ERASMUS/EXCHANGE BUDAPEST , Erasmus/Exchange Students in Budapest SPRING Semester, ERASMUS BUDAPEST 2015/2016 EVENTS, BUDAPEST FLATS FOR RENT, etc. Als je je hierbij aanmeldt vind je snel een kamer! Ook kan je mijn huisbaas, Sean Da, toevoegen op Facebook (of een berichtje sturen). Hij heeft verschillende appartementen door Budapest die erg mooi zijn (en je weet dat hij betrouwbaar is). leisure & culture Er is ontzettend veel te doen in Budapest. Ik heb me het hele semester vermaakt met alle bezienswaardigheden, barretjes en uitgaansgelegenheden. Ook ligt Budapest zo centraal dat uitstapjes naar Praag en Krakau heel aantrekkelijk zijn (met de bus is het 7 uur en een retourtje heb je al voor 21 euro). Zelf heb ik de laatste 2,5 week een roadtrip gedaan door Oost-Europa. Alles is zo goedkoop en zo mooi! Genoeg te doen dus. suggestions/tips Koop van te voren een boekje over Budapest en maak een lijst met dingen die je sowieso wil doen en zien in het semester. De stad is zo veelzijdig en je leert zoveel nieuwe mensen kennen dat je er vanzelf wordt meegesleurd in alle bezienswaardigheden en activiteiten. CONCLUSIONS page 9 of 10

10 would you recommend this university/destination abroad to others? please explain JA! Het is absoluut een aanrader om op Erasmus uitwisseling te gaan. Je leert er veel van om helemaal in je eentje een half jaar in het buitenland te wonen en zelf daar iets op te bouwen. Daarnaast is het heel goed voor je Engelse taal en voor het leren kennen van veel nieuwe, internationale mensen. Ik zou de stad Budapest iedereen aanraden, omdat ik denk dat je nergens anders een betere, leukere en veelzijdigere uitwisseling kan hebben dan hier. Als je twijfelt: gewoon doen! De 5 maanden vliegen voorbij en het is ontzettend goed voor je ontwikkeling. do you have any additional advice or comments? Mocht je dit lezen en nog vragen hebben, laat het me weten! page 10 of 10