Come for the culture and country, not for the classes December 11, 2023

By A student (Chemistry, Wellesley College) - abroad from 08/20/2023 to 12/22/2023 with

The Education Abroad Network (TEAN): Seoul - Korea University

What did you gain/learn from your experience abroad? Was it worthwhile?

I appreciated being able to live in Korea for 4 months as a student. I got to learn what it is like to live here as opposed to just being a tourist. Also, I am Asian American, and it was very valuable to me to be surrounded by people that look like me. For once in my life, I did not feel like a minority or outsider. It helped that I knew a decent amount of Korean.

Personal Information

How much international exposure did you have prior to this program?	None

Review Your Program

* Overall educational experience Academic rigor, intensity, resources, etc.	Overall, especially after speaking to other students, professors did not seem to care much about the success of students. Most of Korea University's curriculum relies heavily on rote memorization rather than developing critical thinking skills. I did have 3 professors who taught their classes well and cared about students, however my 2 other classes has professors who were extremely inept at teaching, and did not provide any resources for students to improve in the course.
* Host Country Program Administration On-site administration of your program
* Housing: How satisfied were you with your living arrangements?	Although I have housing accommodations at Wellesley to have a single room, I was not able to have a single room in Korea. There was not really a clear way to request a single room for medical reasons. I did request a single room, but I didn't get one to lack of availability. As a result, I got matched with a random roommate who was completely incompatible with my living habits, and for most of the semester I had a lot of gripes with living with my roommate. However, the dorm accommodations were modern and clean. I only wish I got to at least choose my own roommate, even if having one is less than ideal for me for medical reasons. I contracted a cold for 3 weeks, and then flu-like symptoms near the end of my program. I believe this was from my roommate, as I do not hang out with many people, and she had also been coughing and sick for a long time. However, due to my health condition, I get more severely sick than other people.
* Food:
* Social & Cultural Integration: How integrated did you feel with the local culture?
* Health Care: How well were health issues addressed during the program?	TEAN was amazing at providing help when I had health issues come up during my program. I developed colitis, and had to go to the emergency room for treatment, and then was transferred to another smaller hospital to be hospitalized for 5 days. My program coordinator helped translate everything since the doctors could not speak English very well, and she helped me navigate the health insurance side of things. However, I think that the Korean healthcare system in general would not be good if you have rare or special health conditions, and have issues related to that. There are health clinics you can go to, but you are only examined for about 2 minutes, and then quickly prescribed medicine. When I had severe flu-like symptoms, they did not take a covid or flu test, and only diagnosed me with bacterial tonsillitis after looking at my tonsils. No bacterial test was taken. I think that the prescription of antibiotics without proof of a bacterial infection is not good medical practice, as it can contribute to increase of antibiotic resistant bacteria.
* Safety:
If you could do it all over again would you choose the same program?	Yes While I have gripes with KU's professors, I loved the TEAN program and all the help that the coordinators provided. TEAN also sponsors many student activities and trips for completely free, which made it easy to do many tourist activities and explore the city with other exchange students.

Finances

* 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)	About 2. It is possible to live very cheaply if you eat only instant foods or student cafeteria foods, but the options will be limited. The food will also not be very healthy or diverse. Being vegetarian is extremely difficult, and being vegan is borderline impossible on a budget. Almost every single meal has animal products, and many restaurants have no vegetarian options. It is also generally hard to find meals with dark green vegetables. Most vegetables will consist of kimchi or sparse amounts of salad greens. In order to stay healthy, I believe spending about $150 a week would be sufficient if you have no food restrictions. Eating out is relatively cheap as well, depending on the area. University areas will have budget restaurants. Personal expenses are all generally cheaper than in the US. But as a study abroad student, you will need to buy a lot of essentials that you will end up throwing away in 4 months. In that way, it is expensive.
Not including program expenses, about how much money did you spend on food and other expenses each week?	$250
Do you have any general money-saving tips for future study abroad participants?	Buy as many things from Daiso as possible, but actually if it is available at OliveYoung, I would buy it there since it might be a similar price but with much better quality.

Language

* Did your program have a foreign language component?	No

Other Program Information

* Where did you live? Select all that apply	Dorm
* Who did you live with? Select all that apply	Americans
* Who did you take classes with? Select all that apply	Local Students Americans International Students
About how many local friends did you make that you will likely keep in touch with?

A Look Back

* What did you like most about the program?	TEAN Program Food in Korea Public Transit System
* What could be improved?	Course selection
* What do you know now that you wish you knew before going on this program?	There is a website similar to RateMyProfessors in Korea that can help students choose classes to take. Most students I know disliked their class because of their professor's teaching style, not due to difficulty.

Reasons For Studying Abroad

To help future students find programs attended by like-minded individuals, please choose the profile that most closely represents you.	The Outright Urbanite A social butterfly, you're happiest in bustling cities with hip people, and took advantage of all it had to offer. You enjoyed the nightlife, and had fun going out dancing, and socializing with friends. Fun-loving and dressed to the nines, you enjoyed discovering new restaurants, shops, cafes, and bars in your host country.

Individual Course Reviews

Course Name/Rating:	CHEM461 Polymer Chemistry (English)
Course Department:	Chemistry
Instructor:	Woo Han Young
Instruction Language:	English
Comments:	I think the professor was knowledgeable about the subject, but the chosen textbook and method of teaching was extremely ill-fitted to the study of chemistry. Many concepts we learned actually were more related to physics or engineering than chemistry. In addition, the lectures mostly consisted of just going through topics in the textbook, and reading excerpts from the textbook. I was not able to develop any critical thinking skills, or understand how the concepts really worked. The exams are extremely long and difficult, and mostly based on rote memorization. The only questions the professor asked in class were to define certain technical terms occasionally. The homework assignments were also long, and many answers simply required rewriting definitions of terms from the textbook or matching the names of polymers to images of them from the textbook. Though we discussed the synthesis methods of some polymers, we were not taught to understand the fundamental mechanisms behind the reactions. The goal was simply to recognize and memorize them to be rewritten on the exam. It was unlike any chemistry class I have had before, and I would not recommend it to anyone.
Credit Transfer Issues:

Course Name/Rating:	LING202 Phonetics
Course Department:	Linguistics
Instructor:	Oh Sei Poong
Instruction Language:	English
Comments:	The professor for this course had extremely poor English, and was unable to explain concepts related to phonetics. In addition, the course content was contained to only a few concepts, omitting many critical ones. At the end of the semester, the professor began to explain concepts in Korean, and he explained the concepts much better and totally differently in Korean than in English. He also kept analyzing voice clips of extremely conservative right wing American political figures speaking about violent concepts such as school shootings. I found this extremely disturbing and inappropriate. In addition, during class, he only cold-called on foreign students to answer questions. He assumed that all of them are Native English speakers, when in fact, the student he called on most only started learning English during high school, and English was most definitely not his main or even strongest language. We had no homework, and our grade is based entirely on exams and participation.
Credit Transfer Issues: