Category: Academics

Preparing for Florence

Published on by Claudia CutlerLeave a comment

Hi I’m Claudia, I’m a third-year film and marketing student and I arrived to Florence a week ago! I am attending the Lorenzo De Medici institute which I chose because of the creative arts program. Preparing for Florence was exciting yet definitely stressful, and I’m not exactly the anxious type. The biggest accomplishment was figuring out how to apply for a visa, gathering the materials, and hoping the Chicago consulate of Italy deemed me a valid and unsuspicious citizen (they did eventually). I do want to give a shoutout to my mom for helping me out, and also apologize if she’s reading this. A visa application is a daunting task! Within a month I received my visa, and the next prep step was packing. I looked through my closet with disgust as I compared everything to a local Italian fit — whatever my perception of that is. Jean shorts are basically scum cloth, right? How often are you supposed to wear authentic Italian leather? Should I bring my prom dress just in case a Duke courts me to a ball? Luckily I have three friends who I’m living in an apartment with in Florence, and they gave realistic advice and are more importantly willing to share their closet. I ended up packing a large shippable duffel, a small suitcase, and a backpack.

I hopped on my plane on August 24th, alone and equipped with the necessities (Tangled downloaded on my iPad). I’ve never flown out of the country alone, so I was frazzled for sure. In fact, as I was getting off the bus to my gate, I remembered I left my suitcase in security. With my ADHD medication inside of it, of course. Don’t worry, I got to the airport three hours early because I knew something like that would happen. Although I’m from Virginia, I was visiting my friends in New York, so I flew out of the Newark airport and arrived in Milan 8 hours later. My experience arriving to my destination was a little different because my parents and sisters were kind enough to vacation around Italy with me first, all so they could be there for me during this time of transition I’m sure.

After an incredible introduction to Lake Garda, Verona, and the vineyards of Serralunga d’Alba, my family dropped me off at the apartment that Lorenzo De Medici assigned me and my friends.

High off of privilege and seeing my friends for the first time in months, I was feeling genuinely excited. Our apartment is spacious with a kitchen and only two minutes from the Duomo! Down every block there are endless options of pizza, gelato, art and clothing shops, too. Despite these realizations, the second I began unpacking, the excitement faded and anxiety set in. I’ve looked forward to studying abroad in Florence since I applied last December, and now that I’ve actually shown up, I have no clue what’s going to go down. I romanticized Florence for so long because of tiktok and everyone telling me it’s going to be the best months of my life, but I didn’t give any thought to missing home or almost getting run over by motorcycles and tourists the second I step outside. Not to mention the stress of applying for a permit of stay (somehow a different concept from a visa), remembering how to make friends, ignoring the friends I live with because I want alone time, and finding a plug converter. As I said before I’m not a typically anxious person, but the culture shock and exhaustion that comes with settling into an entirely new life got me a little down my first few days. Along with the pressure that it’s up to me to make the most of my semester abroad in Florence. And the fact that I got a cold on day 2.

Despite all the things to complain about, I still knew I was exactly where I was supposed to be. It just takes time to settle. A big part of adapting to transition is routine, so ever since orientation ended and my classes started yesterday, I’ve felt there’s a lot to be excited about! Get ready for the classes I’m taking: World Religions, Filmmaking II, Yoga & Spirituality, Digital Sketchbook, and Ancient History of Magic. What’s funny is that compared to other students I’ve talked to at orientation, I’m taking the hardcore route! Most people are taking painting and cooking classes; the general consensus of the students at this university seems to be to relax and enjoy the city. I’ve begun to catch on to la dolce vite – the sweet life, and it’s pretty nice if I do say so myself. I could wander into cute little shops and grab a bite of the most delicious gelato I’ve ever tasted all day if I wanted to, so thats exactly what I’ve been doing. So far I’ve wandered into a library filled with crystals and fountains, craft shops with mini greek god sculptures and chess sets, cheap stores with surprisingly quality clothes, handmade jewelry outlets, and the list goes on. A specific observation that makes me laugh is almost every store plays covers of American songs, even though the covers are still in English. For example, I’ll be sifting through tiny ceramic fairies and bopping my head to a soft female folk voice covering Justin Bieber’s Love Yourself. It’s funny, but I am curious to find more authentic Italian shops that aren’t designed for tourists. One aspect of Italian restaurants that I love is how long it takes to get the check, as long as I’m in good company and not in a rush. Going to restaurants here make me feel like I’m supposed to take it slow and enjoy myself, otherwise I’d be acting rude. Little tip about food on the streets, don’t carry a to-go meal near a separate restaurant or bar — you will get scolded, and must return back to wherever you just came from. It’s offensive to leave a food or drinks establishment until you’ve enjoyed it to the fullest.

One thing that sets my experience apart from other students abroad is that I’m living with three of my close friends, so I’m not completely out of my comfort zone. This has it’s pros and cons, but this first week I’ve been really grateful for them. It’s especially nice to know that we’re looking out for each other on nights out, because a lot of Italian men are not afraid to prey. Anyways, my favorite experience so far was this past weekend when we ventured to Piazzale Michelangelo at sunset. The walk across the Ponte Vecchio (the bridge across the Arno river) was gorgeous and the panoramic view of Florence was stunning!

Another close favorite was visiting the Bargello national museum, which is free on Sundays by the way!

As with any location, my experience here is dependent on my choices and effort. The first few days this concept intimidated me, but I’ve realized that it’s not that hard to enjoy FLORENCE, ITALY. I’m so privileged, are you joking me? Besides, I do it all for the blog. I would never let my fans down. Haha… I’m just kidding I think. I’m looking forward to updating you about my first full week of classes and other experiences soon!

Challenging Courses Abroad

Published on by joslynhaysLeave a comment

Hejhej! Today, I had two scientific reports and a poster design for a poster presentation due in the one course I am currently taking. In honor of celebrating these large projects getting finished, I thought it was time that I dedicated a solid amount of fun writing to the class. This period, I am taking an intense course called Applied Ecotoxicology. It is a full-time 15 credit hour course (out of the total 30 ECTS I take during the semester), which is an equivalent of 12 DU credits. While I took the same level of studying last semester, taking two courses at a time that are each 50% is somehow substantially less work that one 100% class. I think that professors know that they own you during the 100% run courses, so they can take up all of your time knowing you don’t have other coursework that will clash. It may have also felt substantially more time consuming because, as I found out during the second week of the course, the class is designed for masters students. The biology department coordinator had actually recommended that I take this course instead of another course I had signed up for next period (which I am still going to do because I couldn’t find anything else to get into) based on the previous classes I’d taken, and the website made it seem like both bachelors and masters students were welcome to join the class. While this was true, I am the only student out of the 15 in the class who is not currently pursuing my masters. Majority of the students are actually in the environmental engineering program despite the course being offered in the biology department. One of the girls who I have gotten closest to in the class, Eir, is the only student at LU pursuing a masters in Ecotoxicology, and this is one of the required classes in her course sequence. 

I am actually really grateful to this class, even though I complain about the amount of work and higher level of expectations and pressure then I experienced last semester. Not only is the class geared towards a higher knowledge base, which pushes me academically, it is also set up to help the students gain skills for both their masters thesis and future careers within the environmental field. This has included various seminars discussing beneficial academic skills (such as how to design posters for conferences and how to create a great elevator pitch for scientific research), two group projects focused on teaching students both how to think as a real researcher and how to write in a thesis, and multiple study visits around Skåne to companies and groups where ecotoxicology is used in everyday work. I may have felt very inadequate and embarrassed by my lower knowledge/academic level during certain moments in the course, but I know that it has expanded my abilities as a student and prepared me for pursuing my masters degree back home. 

This course was also great beyond the academics. I spent most of the day every day of the week with the 14 other students in the class. I finally broke through the ‘exchange student’ barrier I found while taking other courses because in this class, I am not just an exchange student. I am just as real and as permanent as the rest of the students. And even though the course is taught in English, all but four students in the class are Swedish. Even though the Swedes are still very hard to get to know, I had lunch most days with some of them and even made a genuine friend. I know that sounds silly to read, but it is a big accomplishment to make a friend with a Swede in my class. Almost every other Swede I have befriended has some sort of international connection (whether that is being half-Swedish, first generation, or having spent a substantial amount of time abroad), making them more open to befriending international students. Making a friend in this class was a totally different ballgame.

The class isn’t quite finished, but we are now entering the wrap-up phase. Both of our group projects were due today. One of the projects was conducting an Environmental Risk Assessment for the pharmaceutical fluoxetine entering the effluent of Källby waste water treatment plant (located just south of Lund). My other group project was also dealing with fluoxetine and specifically its impact on Crustaceans. This was just a literature search, but was still very difficult. My partner and I chose to examine the research looking into behavioral endpoints for fluoxetine ecotoxilogical studies, as these endpoints tend to better reflect environmentally relevant concentrations of pharmaceuticals than ones using traditional endpoints (such as mortality or growth). We submitted the report today as well, then have a seminar about presentation techniques tomorrow before spending Monday and Tuesday preparing a 30 minute presentation for our findings. 

I feel as though this course has allowed me to grow a lot as a student in a very different environment than I am used to. It was also a low-stress environment due to both the Swedish belief in work-life balance (I only had to study two weekends this whole period and we had coffee breaks every hour of class) and because I don’t technically need the course to transfer back to DU. I was nervous going into the course, but coming out of it, I have no regrets. It has enabled me to get a real student experience in Sweden and feel like I am still gaining academic skills while I am abroad. On top of this, it has allowed me meet new people and create an actual schedule during my time here. Taking a real student course is definitely going to be one of my top recommendations for students studying abroad. Okej, I am done writing today and am going to go enjoy being done with these stressful projects. Hejdå!