I love my home university – University of Worcester (UOW) placed in the heart of beautiful England. Because people do a lot of comparison, I promised, I would stay a human and have a similar contribution. Currently, I study Marketing Major in Paris and it happened to me for the first time in my life that I had a class with at least 15 different nationalities. That is the magic of business schools, generally, I suppose; however, in the case of Paris School of Business (PSB) it is the one of the unique selling proposition (my point of view). Nevertheless, I believe, my universities have common elements such as:
Campus Cluster at Paris School of Business.
City campus at University of Worcester.
- A great location - the heart of England and the heart of Paris.
- 3 hours duration of classes (pretty exhausting but when you consider it, the teacher can be glad he/she had a chance to tell all important + use the tool of groups’ discussions and do a seminar activity).
- Wonderful lecturers – nothing can be more precious than the people with so much marketing/management/business experience and nothing can be better when you realize these incredibly motivating people are your teachers and tutors and are here for you in the terms of developing your knowledge.
>>> Paradoxically, they usually perceive it in the same way. It wasn’t for the first time I’ve heard: ”Look at you, I feel blessed I can have so many international students from various cultures, it is the best thing about teaching.”
- Sources like books and recommended case studies (Harvard Business review etc.) from professors and from library resources for free! It is your learning material; so practical, you’ll love it! (yes, we know what happened with our tuition fees now). In addition, UOW has the Hive library, whoooo hooo.
- Students unions = a bunch of creative and funny people who love the organizing and having fun together!
- Lectures in English; 100% prove it with the great advantage to enhance your French as well (I work on it O:]).
- The atmosphere that makes you feel to be a part of the community. Let’s be honest, how many Universities are as cold as a stone when comes to the socialisation? Generally, the huge ones do not care, so be clever, the smaller in the business education means the better in the communication, unless you hate people.
- Equality for everybody! Sounds like crazy hippies but does not matter if you were born in Egypt, US, Brazil or Poland and you study at French or British uni, there are no ethical differences between students and we generally help each other a lot. Nobody ever judged me I’m Czech and why somebody would do that, right? Prague was the most inflected word I heard for the past 2 years and also a beer. It makes me feel a little bit more national but in general, the home is where they understand you and you understand them. Just remember, never deny your nationality but be ready to respect the others!
- Both unis provide a perfect level of the communication between a student and a lecturer.
I consider the way of teaching as the biggest difference. Let’s face it; European attitude is different than the British and vice versa. By the way, do not say to Britons that England is the Europe. From my personal experience, they don’t like it. So the teaching:
- When they say 3 hours, it is really 3 hours (Paris).
- More subjects, one for 3-5 credits (Paris).
- More testing. Here in Paris, we have the mid-term tests; there are different requirements for each module. It can be a test, a presentation or case study with the open questions.
- The final testing is at the end of April. Yes, they start earlier in September and finish in April.
- PSB is not a big school also is private. The lecturers call you by your name. It is amazing. They really try to. There are more questions during the class and my brain works on 100%. It is more based on the class discussion when the teacher is some kind of moderator of the show.
- I enjoy the attitude to the management lecture: imagine you are the CEO of the company and this and this happened, what would you do? Imagine you are a manager and there is this and that problem at your department…
- Seminar activity is partly based on business case studies or the class discussion of various topics and everyone is so active and tries to contribute.
- On the other hand, at UOW I like the diversity of set texts. In Paris, there is just one book (not for each subject) we should use for learning for our exams, for example in international marketing. The truth is, there are various case studies inside the book. So it keeps the balance.
- Approximately 3 absences for a semester, if more = no credits, didn’t pass the module. But I think it works similarly in UK.
- Sometimes, extra credits for the creativity (recently, in the class of international marketing, there was a competition in creating a new promotional ad for uni for 1 credit into the module).
- Definitely a bigger diversity of the students, you sit and there is a friend from Rwanda in front of you, a girl from Serbia next to, the boy from Afghanistan on the left and Canadian girl on the right. Two Americans in the front, two Chinese at the back and Japanese among them.
- You can have a teacher from Lebanon, US, UK, France or Mexico like me!
Don't waste your time and if you feel, go for it!