faculty of arts
University of Groningen, NL Groning01 Erasmus+ KA1 Mobility 2019-2020
ERASMUS+
Study Report
This form needs to be completed by every student who has completed an Erasmus+ mobility.
Last name*As shown in your passport Günther
First name*As shown in your passport Nicola Charlott
RUG student number S 3011119
Please enclose a 2-page report on your experiences abroad, using the following headings:
1. Your study programme 2. Language
3. Finance and other conditions
4. Preparation and contacts with the faculty before, during and after your stay
5. Housing 6. Culture 7. Free time 8. Travelling
9. Your host and home institution’s response to Covid-19, and the extent to which the virus (countermeasures) affected your mobility
10. Other
I hereby give permission to the International Office to publish my report on the Faculty of Arts
Repository to inform future students
x Yes No Future students may contact me for additional
information x Yes No
Signature Participant
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1. Your study programme
I did the Erasmus at the Roma Tré University because it is a mandatory part of my Research Master Programme Cultural Leadership at the University of Groningen. Therefore, I had the three mandatoty courses ‘Media’, ‘Heritage’, and
‘Sustainibility and Cultural Awareness’. For my electives I chose “Italian Media and Popular Culture’ and ‘Cultural History of Early Modern Europe’. My electives turned out to be really good courses. Especially if one is interested in history, ‘Cultural History of Early Modern Europe’ is a really good course to take. It
focusses a lot on the city of Rome itself and on Italian culture. In that way, it helps to explore and understand the city.
2. Language
As the stay in Italy is a mandatory part of the Research Master Programme Cultural Leadership, which is taught in English, and as therefore the mandatory courses at Rome were in English as well, I did not learn Italian before I arrived. I must admit that not speaking Italian makes it kind of hard to study in Rome. The choice of electives taught in English is very limited, and many of the people working at the Erasmus office of Roma Tré do not speak any English. Also their complete electronic learning platform (our Nestor, Progress, Occasys etc) is in Italian only. This makes registrating for exams, courses, or requesting any documents quite hard. Luckily, a frind of mine who also studies Cultural
Leadership and speaks Italian helped me a lot. Also one of the teachers at Roma Tré who is an English native speaker but also fluent in Italian helped me by explaining to me step by step how I need to register for exams. I really
apprechiated their help. However, for future students who go to Italy, I would advise to take a basic Italian Language course before arrival.
3. Finance and other conditions
I was very satisfied with the financial support of the Erasmus bursary, especially because we received a great part of the money in advance. Like that, we could pay our flight tickets and the security deposit for the appartement, which we had to pay in advance.
4. Preparation and contacts with the faculty before, during and after your stay
The communication with Roma Tré before arrival was a bit complicated. It was hard to get the Learning agreements signed by the Roman Erasmus coordinator on time. We only managed to do so after the Italian speaking friend took over the communication. Also, we did not manage to chose our electives before arrival, mainly because the schedules and the available courses at Roma Tré are published quite late. Once we arrived in Rome, we could luckily manage everything.
5. Housing
Our group arranged the housing via the housing agency of Roma Tré University, and I was really satisfied with that. Massimo Lione, who had contact with us in advance, was really nice an pacient and tried to find appartments which match all our wishes. Togehther with a friend from my studies, I ended up in a two-persons appartement which was really nice. It had a spacious kitchen and a huge terras. The kitchen was very functional, with, amongst others, a washing machiene, big fridge, freezer and a big table, so we could have guests for dinner.
However, I must say that it was expensive, even compared to Dutch student housing prices. Also the wifi did not work in my room, which was a pity. Luckily it did work in the kitchen. Also, the housing office told us that those appartements
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would be the closest to university they could offer. Well, maybe it was, but from our house it was still a 50 minutes walk to university. Right in front of our house there was a bus stop, but its connection to the university was bad, so walking for 50 minutes was just as fast as going by public transport. Going to the city center took about 50 minutes by public transport. However, as the city of Rome is quite big, I guess this is normal for student housing there. For the rest, the area was fine. Supermarkets, farmacies, and Chinese shops which have more or less everything one needs for a household, were on walking distance.
6. Culture
If one is interested in culture, Rome is a great place to go to. There are wonderful museums and heritage sites to explore. In most places, one gets student
discounts, and at some places, one gets even more discount if one studies at an art faculty of a Roman University. I guess that everybody who is interested in art or history, or both, will have a really great time at Rome! It is a pity that our stay was so short due to the Corona Crisis. Nevertheless, I have visited a lot of
museums and churches during the weeks we were in Rome, and I really enjouyed that. Another thing about Italy which is really great is their food and coffie
culture. In the less fancy areas, espresso, pizza and Italian snacks (antipasti) are affordable, even for students. I enjoyed exploring their heritage and food culture.
7. Free time
In Rome, there is really a lot to do during free time. I enjoyed walking through the city, museums, churches, and also some nice parks within the city. However, Italian universities have much more contact hours than Dutch universities have, so freetime is limited. And as the city of Rome is really big, one has to plan free time to make the most out of it.
8. Travelling
The travel to Rome was fine. I found quite affordable flights from Schipol to Rome FCO. We booked a taxi from the airport to the appartements, which was a good idea, as the airport is quite far from the inner city. As Rome is really big, I used public transport for all my free time activities. Public transport schedules are not reliable in Rome at all, yet, public transport is very cheap (35 Euro for a ticket for a whole month), which makes it okay again.
9. Your host and home institution’s response to Covid-19, and the extent to which the virus (countermeasures) affected your mobility
The University of Groningen, or to be more concrete, Annie van Den Oever who is our Cultural Leadership programme coordinator, did a good job. At one point, after the Italian total lockdown had already started, she called us and told us to leave Italy as soon as possible as the borders would close very soon. We followed her advise, and I am glad that we did. After we left Rome, the situation in Italy only worsened, and I personally think that “getting through this crisis” in the Netherlands where people had much more freedom to leave their houses for a walk or a run in the park, was the better choice than staying in Italy (eventhough it was a pity that our Erasmus in Rome was only about six weeks, instead of five month). The Roma Tré Univbersity emailed about urgent matters as well. This was in Italian only, but with Google translate, we understood the messages.
10. Other
