The Land of OZ, worth the 16 hour flight. Past Review

Academic rigor, intensity, resources, etc.

they do everything on a bell curve, you need a 50 to pass. only 5% get A's and 5% Fail the class to keep things competitive. I recommend the history and wine studies course. The major courses aren't easy but as long as you do mostly if not all electives your work load shouldn't be too hard. they do classes differently at Bond, you have one 2-3 hour lecture class with the professor and then a 2 hour tutorial with the teachers assistant or the professor with no more then ten other students. its very possible to get classes to two days a week, i got mine down to a Monday Tuesday schedule. you also have a two week final exam schedule which can allow ample time for travel, but do not make travel plans for those two weeks until you get your final schedule about 6 weeks in. they do have tests on Saturdays. also 18 is the drinking age in OZ so there is a bar on campus and the UNI schedules Thursday night drinking events and other stuff for the students every week. expect 2 tests, a midterm and final and very little other work, or a paper and a test. sometimes you will have no work until the final which could count for up to 80% of your grade. you can only miss 20% of your classes or you automatically fail, so go hungover and save those 20% for traveling.

On-site administration of your program

Australearn sets everything up which is nice, but they misslead you. when they say you will be staying at the bohemia resort in cairns look it up, its actually a hostel, which you will get used to form traveling but is depressing when other programs are staying in nice hotel for their bonding week before school starts. also bring shampoo, conditioner, and soap because they do not offer it at the hostel and it is so expensive to buy once in cairns. the volunteer day sucks, they make you clean a beach but that they say you can't swim in...which is really depressing cause it was hot and the water looked refreshing. The hostel was also far from the bars and main part of cairns. you have to walk past a park and a grave yard (where all the homeless people slept at night)to get to the bars which i personally thought was dangerous especially if a girl got separated late at night and had to drunkenly pass these very sketchy areas of cairns. I would have preferred living arrangements closer to the hub of cairns, and less structured time allowing us to explore the tropical city.

How satisfied were you with your living arrangements?

I lived in Varsity Shores in the villa complex down the road from the school, it was expensive but it was awesome. i shared a bathroom but had my own room and deck overlooking one of the two pools, i ate breakfest out there almost every morning! it sucked cooking, and it was an expensive cab ride to surfers which is where you will be doing most of your partying but i loved it. i lucked out with really international roommates, US, Tanzania, P&G, Germany, it was awesome! the only issue i had was that the pool areas closed at 9 which sucks when you want to use the hot tub at 11, and its in a gated community and although most houses hold college students there are some family units which is a little weird. It sucked having to take the bus everywhere especially to get groceries but for 2 bucks you can have them delivered which is what i recommend!

There's a good Mexican, Indian,sushi, and Chinese place in the market about a mile walk from the villas at varsity shore, even less then that from campus. The food is very expensive, and i didn't like a lot of the food in Australia, i thought the pizza taste weird and the chips and their lack of pretzel variety was bothersome but i did my best to try new things. Also they don't process things the same we do so their bread and dairy products go bad very fast. You will notice there are kebab stands everywhere, get on, or two they are amazing. i recommend the gellato as well. Food is very expensive so is beer, and liqueur but wine is cheep and comes in box's, they call cheap wine goon, and you will prob be drinking out of goon sacks a lot!

How integrated did you feel with the local culture?

The scuba diving in the great barrier reef was awesome a well as the cultural center in cairns where you get your picture taken with a koala.

How well were health issues addressed during the program?

i saw no health issues/ had no health issues while there.

(1 = not very easy/$200+ on food & personal expenses/week, 2.5 = $100/week, 5 = very easily/minimal cost)

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• Apartment

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• International Students

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• International Students

• helped me enroll in the school and in classes
• were always available to talk to me or my parents
• set up a fun week before we went to bond

• better hostel in cairns/ better food the sausage cookout was gross peanut butter and jelly is alwasy a welcome treat!