Student/Alumni Testimonials
Colleen Hart
Ohio University – Communications
Culture Shock
I found my mind wandering to thoughts of London as I tried to pay attention in my 8am Economics class last spring quarter. As the summer approached, my excitement started growing as well as my curiosity. I wanted to know everything. I started to wonder how big the classes were, if my teachers were going to be hard, and how much work would be expected of me. It was as if I had become a freshman again. I had no idea what to expect, but I was ready.
The transition between Ohio University and AIU went fairly smoothly. The hardest aspect to get used to was trying to manage my fun time and school time. As the second week approached and I realized I had two papers due on Friday, I knew that I needed to figure some work system out so that I could complete all my assignments. Marketing Principles and Psychology of Advertising and the Mass Media were the two classes that I attended while in London. From 8:30am until 1:45pm, Monday through Friday, I participated in many classroom discussions and listened to many interesting stories of work experience, travel, and lifestyles of not only my professors but the other students in the classroom.
Coming from a larger school, I found the small classroom setting to be an ideal learning setting. Classes are hard to get into at Ohio University, so as a result there are at least 30 people in every class. My core classes contained hundreds of students. At AIU I always felt comfortable in my classes. The people that I was in class with everyday were usually the people that I went out with at night. Because each of my classes had about ten people, all of us became really close by the end of the term.
The classroom discussions were always the most interesting part of class because everyone sitting in the room was from a different part of the United States, or the world and everyone had a different viewpoint. In one example, my Marketing Principles professor, Lieselotte Badenhorst, gave us an assignment before our tea break at 9:30am to come up with a strategy to market the SMART car in the United States. Instead of working on it individually, all ten of us talked together and came up with an impressive strategy listening to everyone's input.
Overall, it was a different experience than at Ohio University, because the learning did not stop in the classroom. Whether Tony was talking about different types of French wine, or I was listening to a guided tour of Jack the Ripper's conquests, there was always something to discover or learn. Throughout college, I have and will take lots of classes. I get the A and forget the majority of the information. Ironically, while studying abroad some of the best lessons I learned did not receive a grade, and yet those are the lessons I know I will never forget.
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