With Love; From France Past Review
By briana a (PSYCHOLOGY., Colby-Sawyer College) for
CEPA Foundation: Strasbourg - EU Studies Semester Abroad Program
Yes it was, but in many ways I wish that I had gone to Italy instead because I didn't really enjoy france. The Italy group was much more involved in the country. They had to go into the city to go to class. We had to walk down a flight of stairs. I rated it a 4 because I did love it and I would definitely study abroad again, but I would not choose France.
Personal Information
| How much international exposure did you have prior to this program? | 0-2 weeks |
Review Your Program
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* Overall educational experience
Academic rigor, intensity, resources, etc. |
I loved the program but while we were studying at the Chateau in Strasbourg, the internet access was very low sometimes so it was hard to know when we would have internet access for homework and other such things. |
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* Host Country Program Administration
On-site administration of your program |
The strengths of the program were that they were able to study abroad our first semester of college which is very unique to any college, and we also had "house parents" and a coordinator that were very helpful in getting anything that we needed or desired. The weaknesses of the program were the internet access and though we were living in France, all of the workers were from Germany so we weren't really immersed in the french culture unless we left the chateau, but anywhere we had to go, we needed to walk 15 minutes to and also sometimes take a bus that was an extra 45 minutes depending on traffic on the given day. |
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* Housing:
How satisfied were you with your living arrangements? |
we lived in a chateau that had dorm rooms, but it was also a hotel so other people came and went such as parlimentary units and government figures. |
| * Food: |
It was very nice that that the CEPA group provided us with dinner monday through thursday but eating at the chateau restaurant every week got old, and the food wasn't always that great. The cadering service that hosted us wasn't very good either. A lot of people did not like the food, and thought it was not traditional french food. |
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* Social & Cultural Integration:
How integrated did you feel with the local culture? |
Traveling was much easier while we were abroad. It was so much easier to get from place to place. In the last year I was able to travel to 5 different countries in Europe and it was a truly memorable experience. |
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* Health Care:
How well were health issues addressed during the program? |
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| * Safety: |
Most of the time the safety of the trip was pretty good, but while we were visiting other countries the cellphones that they gave us did not work in the other countries, they only worked in France, and the point of the cellphones were to be able to keep in contact with people back at the chateau incase anything went wrong. Also, while we were there we received an email from Colby-Sawyer telling us that one of the students had been sexually assaulted and there were only 10 people in our group. I don't think they handled that very well because everyone was very much shaken up about the idea. We trusted everyone in our group, and suddenly there was this weight on us, because it happened to someone in group from someone in OUR group. |
| If you could do it all over again would you choose the same program? |
No
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Finances
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* Money: How easily were you able to live on a student's budget?
(1 = not very easy/$200+ on food & personal expenses/week, 2.5 = $100/week, 5 = very easily/minimal cost) |
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| Do you have any general money-saving tips for future study abroad participants? | Definitely have enough money with you, because though you have $40 of extra spending cash given to you, it isn't really enough to get by unless you don't plan on traveling, because when you are abroad, you SHOULD try to travel. |
Language
| * Did your program have a foreign language component? | Yes |
| Language acquisition improvement? |
We practiced our French with a German professor and no we did not need to use our host language everyday because we were very isolated and most of the people living at the chateau with us were from the United States and those who were not, were working at the chateau but were from Germany but they spoke German, French and English very well. |
| If applicable, to what degree did your living situation aid your language acquisition? |
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Other Program Information
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* Where did you live?
Select all that apply |
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* Who did you live with?
Select all that apply |
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A Look Back
| * What do you know now that you wish you knew before going on this program? | If you are considering studying abroad, I would definitely advise you to do so, it was a great experience even though we lived on the outskirts of Strasbourg. I probably wouldn't study at the chateau though, the internet access wasn't great and the area in which we lived was too far out of the way to do much unless you wanted to spend an hour getting into town and an hour getting back. I also suggest that you speak the language wherever you go. It makes it much easier to communiated and french people don't really like americans who don't speak their language. They think we are lazy. |
