Jordan was great... go to Syria when things calm down though. Past Review
By Matt P (International Relations and Affairs., Tufts University) for
Middlebury Schools Abroad: Middlebury In Amman
Yes, it was. It solidified a lot of my opinions, changed others, and in general answered a lot of big questions that were looming in the back of my mind. Although we ran into a lot of hiccups, the program was new last semester and we were the guinea pigs. Also it was my third choice of a program, I wanted to go to Aleppo in Syria, which got cancelled, then Alexandria, which got cancelled. So honestly, it was this program was my best option at the time and it lived up to my expectations (both bad and good).
Personal Information
| How much international exposure did you have prior to this program? | 1 month - 6 months |
Review Your Program
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* Overall educational experience
Academic rigor, intensity, resources, etc. |
The classes were overall interesting and fairly challenging primarily because they were all conducted in Arabic. Coming from Tufts, you will unfortunately not be in a high enough Arabic level to take the more interesting elective classes (unless you have additional opportunities to study the language outside of Tufts) and so only Translation, Media Arabic, and Gender Issues in the Arab World will be available to you. However, because these classes weren't as challenging as the upper level classes, I had more time to experience the city and travel. |
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* Host Country Program Administration
On-site administration of your program |
Well the administration unknowingly placed the girls on our program in a brothel for their housing option, which was an interesting introduction into Jordan. But to be honest nobody got hurt and nobody was in any real danger, it was just really uncomfortable for the girls. There was a huge divide between the students and the administration though -- we were kind of always at war. But all in all they were pretty hands off, which was great for the most part. We could do our own thing, which taught us more than had we been in a program like CIEE that is a lot more structured. |
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* Housing:
How satisfied were you with your living arrangements? |
I improved with Arabic just because my roommate (American) was better at Arabic than me. Our apartment was populated by mostly Jordanian students but all of the students on the program had American roommates. Had we had Jordanian roommates, we would have definitely improved a lot more, but I honestly didn't mind having an American roommate, especially because sometimes in the Arab world it's nice to be able to create an American bubble for a weekend. |
| * Food: |
Jordanians love bread. It gets old after a while. |
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* Social & Cultural Integration:
How integrated did you feel with the local culture? |
There were some really awesome field trips (Dead Sea, Aqaba, a lot of hiking). But I think the best part of the program was when we were able to travel independently to Lebanon, Egypt, the occupied territories of Palestine, and Israel. |
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* Health Care:
How well were health issues addressed during the program? |
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| * Safety: |
The city is really safe, although some people got things stolen from their apartments. But they also didn't lock their doors, which I suppose is not smart in any major city. I burst my eardrum when we were swimming in the Red Sea, and the program probably could have helped me out (not sure to what extent), but I just went to the emergency room and got it checked out. Health are in Jordan is phenomenal. |
| 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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| Not including program expenses, about how much money did you spend on food and other expenses each week? | 100 dollars? More or less. You can get a falafel sandwich for lunch for 40 cents. A 15 minute cab ride is 3-4 dollars. Most meals are 5 dollars. 12 dollars for phone minutes will last you a bit more than a month. |
| Do you have any general money-saving tips for future study abroad participants? | I sometimes cringed at how much money I spent on traveling... but to be honest that's what I made my money for and it was DEFINITELY worth it. If you want to drink in Jordan, alcohol is EXTREMELY expensive. A beer is at least 6 dollars. |
Language
| * Did your program have a foreign language component? | Yes |
| How would you rate your language skills at the beginning of the program? | Beginner |
| What was the highest level language course you had completed prior to departure? | Arabic 4 |
| If applicable, to what degree did your living situation aid your language acquisition? |
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| Language acquisition improvement? |
To be honest, a lot of people in Amman speak english, especially the younger generation. You have to sign a language pledge saying that you'll only speak Arabic, which is kind of an unrealistic goal in Amman, but was generally followed by the group. I probably could have improved more had I been in a country like Syria or Egypt, but unfortunately Jordan was the only choice available at the time. |
Other Program Information
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* Where did you live?
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* Who did you live with?
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* Who did you take classes with?
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A Look Back
| * What did you like most about the program? |
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| * What could be improved? |
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| * What do you know now that you wish you knew before going on this program? | You can see pretty much everything that's worth seeing in Jordan in about a month, so try to get out as much as possible and travel. It's a very centrally located country and travel is fairly cheap and easy. |
Individual Course Reviews
| Course Name/Rating: |
Gender Issues in the Arab World |
| Course Department: | |
| Instructor: | |
| Instruction Language: | Arabic |
| Comments: | This course. Was. Incredible. The professor was this incredible woman who started the Women's Studies program at the University of Jordan. She knows every famous Arab feminist. Ever. And she is extremely progressive in her thinking. I had never taken a class related to gender and she got me so interested in it. This might have been one of my favorite classes ever, to be honest. |
| Credit Transfer Issues: | No, it counts as a culture requirement for the Arabic major and a social science requirement for the IR major. |
| Course Name/Rating: |
Modern Standard Arabic 1 |
| Course Department: | Arabic 1 |
| Instructor: | Salwa Mubdaeen |
| Instruction Language: | Arabic |
| Comments: | Wherever you choose to study abroad in the Arabic-speaking world, the Modern Standard classes will not be as good as the classes at Tufts. We used Al-Kitaab but only in the sense that we did every single exercise, even though some of them are completely useless. We eventually convinced our professor to bring in some outside materials and we sometimes had outside readings that discussed Islam, the Palestinian/Israeli conflict, the history of Jordan, etc. The class was ridiculously easy in comparison to the ones at Tufts but I haven't heard much different from any other Modern Standard class taken elsewhere in the Arab world. Also our professor was the cutest woman ever and kept calling us her children. |
| Credit Transfer Issues: | No. Middlebury is well-respected by Tufts. |
| Course Name/Rating: |
Advanced Jordanian Colloquial |
| Course Department: | |
| Instructor: | Sharouq and Khitaam |
| Instruction Language: | Jordanian Colloquial Arabic |
| Comments: | This class was also ridiculous easy because we virtually had no work. The class was taught by two different professors, Sharouq who spoke Jordanian colloquial with more Palestinian influence, and Khitaam who spoke it with a Jordanian Bedouin influence. It was great to have exposure to both dialect and both of them are really sweet. We basically sat around and just spoke in colloquial for an hour four days a week, which was fun, but we could have used the time better. They began teaching us a lot of vocab and how to navigate certain scenarios (cab rides, bartering, etc.) but we never really got into the grammar of Colloquial or translating from MSA to Colloquial, which would have been helpful. It was a fun class though. |
| Credit Transfer Issues: | The class doesn't count towards the Arabic major, which is kind of absurd, but you can get a general credit for it. |
| Course Name/Rating: |
Arabic/English Translation |
| Course Department: | |
| Instructor: | Youssef |
| Instruction Language: | Arabic |
| Comments: | I was dreading this class because I did not see how translation could be interesting. It actually surprised me though -- I enjoyed the class a lot, and it was actually really challenging. The first half of the semester is spent translating from Arabic to English and the second half is from English to Arabic. We focused on different types of translations such as literature, periodicals, economics, religious texts, sports, and plays. The professor was really smart and knew English really well, although sometimes there was some tension when he was correcting our English sentences when we were translating from Arabic to English. Overall it was a good course. |
| Credit Transfer Issues: | No, and it counts as a culture class towards the Arabic Major. |
