Sweden: A Personally Wasted Quarter Past Review

Academic rigor, intensity, resources, etc.

The teaching method in many of my classes was, quite simply, not good. One of the classes was structured in such a way that the professor seemed completely unnecessary and it was for a course that, from my initial interpretation, was going to be a lecture course but turned out to be a presentation course. Another class just did not go into detail nearly enough on the material and did not provide anywhere near enough practice work to understand the course and it's content. It's the first class I've ever failed in fact, and I've taken things back home that had much more complicated and difficult material. The way they spread out their courses was very different. Rather than have all the courses at once two or three times per week, we would only have one or two courses for a few weeks (which were only once per week each) then we would move onto the next couple of courses once the first ones were complete. I also did not like this because I need to have the courses multiple times per week for the material to really sink into my head.

On-site administration of your program

There wasn't anything remarkable about it that I witnessed. They were competent and I could answer most any questions that I needed answered. I did not have much interaction with the administration beyond what I needed completed

How satisfied were you with your living arrangements?

The ISEP program arranged all my housing, so that was a non-issue. The area where I was living was safe and calm between all the people living in the apartment complex, but it is located close to a prison and, during my time there (and from what I understand), a police officer was shot and killed nearby to there but it was the only incident that I'd heard or seen.

Quite simply, you're on your own here. You will be preparing your own meals in the group kitchens, assuming that you also live in the same area as I did, so the question of quality or quantity of food is entirely up to your own cooking ability. That said, ISEP does provide a decently large budget (I'll be coming back with the equivalent of about $800)so it should be able to last you as long as you're not going out to eat a lot. Because of that, the only reason this is getting a 4/5 is because it gave me the opportunity to learn to cook, which is something I wanted to do anyways.

How integrated did you feel with the local culture?

I only participated in one trip arranged by the school, but it was able to spark my interest in visiting some specific museums and other sites in downtown Stockholm.

How well were health issues addressed during the program?

I had no personal problems with safety and the like, but there is a prison located close to the school and, from what I understand, there was an escapee that had killed a police officer before the convict was dealt with. Besides adjusting to the new area, which meant getting sick once or twice, I've had no real health problems while I've been here so I do not know how good their healthcare system really is.

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

They had a couple specific classes for learning Swedish, but it was largely irrelevant outside of class. I can honestly say that I only ran into 2 or 3 people in my entire 4 months in Sweden that could not speak fluent English. Because of that, I had no need to learn the language, which was very good for me because I am terrible at learning other languages.

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• Apartment

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• International Students

• Meeting other exchange students
• Participating in outside-of-school trips with other exchange students

• The quality of teaching by professors
• A greater variety of class choices in economics