First Two Weeks in a French University - Ace the Challenges!
- Shiuology
- Feb 10, 2019
- 4 min read
Updated: Jul 4, 2019
Orientation week, choosing courses, enrolment... for an Erasmus student, studying a French university, the first two weeks could be *ahem* chaotic! As I reckon many French-major students are preparing for their study abroad in France, I asked some of friends, who are currently studying across France, to give you all an insight of challenges that you might encounter at the beginning of the semester. After all, the British education differs a lot from the French ones!
Challenges 1: Make your own timetable
'In Toulouse, do not open their online enrolement system for Erasmus students. You have to organise your schedule and sort out any course clashes. There isn't any administrative team on campus to help you.' You have run around campus to find the timetables of the classes you will attend, and make your own timetable!
Best advice: Do it as soon as possible, ideally within the first couple of days during the orientation week!
Also, make good use of your phone and take pictures of the timetables! Then you can refer to them while planning the your timetable at home. Usually the university will give you three weeks to sort out, but save the last two weeks to run through the finalised timetable and see whether you might need to change any courses.
Challenge 2: Get rejected by classes or Classes got cancelled
'I am doing my exchange in Nice and the classes we originally put down in our learning agreement did not exist anymore, so we struggled a lot with figuring that out.'
Before you start university, French public universities are well-known to be over-subscribed! This problem does affect exchange students very often as professors will say 'non' because the class is 'complète'. Apart from that, I reckon that French universities are not very tech-savvy :) They course options online are not up-to-date. Therefore, courses that you put in your learning agreement might no longer exist! Yet, no worries, the learning agreement you filled in before leaving for your exchange is TENTATIVE only! You can change it when you arrive.
Best advice: Make multiple timetables! Just in case one does not work, you still have black up plan B, C and D.
Also, make sure you know your home university requirements inside out! How many ECTS do you need to do? Do you have to choose some specific courses to meet your university requests? For example, University of Glasgow students for language year abroad need to take 60 ECTS (throughout two semesters), in which 50% of the courses have to be subject-related (aka. French) and pass 30 ECTS. You can choose French courses for foreign students. Other universities, such as University of Edinburgh, University of Saint Andrews, University of Manchester... have various requirements.
An extra tip will be write to the coordinator of the course which you want to attend an email, expressing your interest in joining!
Challenge 3: Adapt to a new teaching methods and marking system
French education is very different from the UK's. In France, you have classes starting as early as 8:30 AM, and finishing as late as 8:00PM. The duration of French lectures or seminars is longer than Compared to the UK, you have way more contact hours in France. You will be expecting around 20 hours a week in lectures or seminars. Yet, more work will be done in classes. In terms of the marking systems, in the UK, all assessments are marked out of 100. In France, assessments are graded out of 20, with 10 as the passing mark. Also, don't be frustrated if you get 13/20, which is already a solid 'B' in the UK! It is also worth noting that French professors tend not to give out grades above 15.
In addition, British undergraduates have to attend classes (well, technically). In France, however, you will discover 2 different assessment systems: CC and CT. For those who might not know, CC means Contrôle Continu (continue assessments), while CT means Contrôle Terminal (final assessment). Students who opt for CC has assessments and tests throughout each semester while others choosing CT will only have a final test (partiel) at the end of each semester. For Erasmus students, you will normally be asked to go for CC. Interestingly, CT students normally never show up for classes; many of them only show up for the end-of-semester exam (only)!
Challenge 4: Blend in and meet friends
You might feel a bit disappointed if you are keen to take part in student clubs and associations. French universities do not have the same student union systems as the UK and there are fewer options available. Also, orientation week in France a lot quieter than the UK... But you can still make good use of it!
Advice: The Erasmus community in France is quite coherent. In Toulouse, societies such as Bureau EIMA and ESN organise trips for Erasmus students to visit nearby cities at a reasonable price. They also organise welcoming nights and activities for meet and great at the beginning of the semester!
Besides, there are quite a lot of voluntary societies that you could participate in. I am currently volunteering at RETSER, teaching refugees and asylum-seekers beginners' French. It is very rewarding experience as I can contribute to the local community by offering help to those who are in need. I am also given the opportunity to meet and work collaboratively with the French students, not only from my exchange university, but also from universities across Toulouse! I highly recommend Erasmus students to take part in and help out!
What makes Erasmus so special is that it gives you the opportunity to step outside the comfort zone and face challenges and come up with solutions to deal with it! The process might be tough and uncomfortable at first, but you will profit from it at the end! I have also written another article Let's Talk About Erasmus Myths and Realities for UofGAbroad 18-19, discussing challenging within and beyond the uni or 'la fac'! Please check it out!
That's all for today and hope you find the information helpful! If you have any enquiries, tips or even experience on travelling abroad for studying, please comment below!
Bonne Continuation!
Shiuology
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