University: San Diego State University
City: San Diego
Country: United States
Continent: North America
Field of study: business administration
Study type: semester abroad
Even if there are already a lot of experience reports on the SDSU here, I will try to put my experiences on paper as best I can. I will only go into all the things like visa, formalities, etc. very briefly, because in my opinion everything is actually quite easy and MicroEdu is a great help here. See andyeducation for University of California Irvine Study Abroad.
Basically I would say there are 4 really interesting “problems” or “topics” that interested me the most before leaving for San Diego.
1.Preparations:
Personally, I found the preparations up to the outward flight or the first day in SD to be relatively relaxed. But you should take care of the following things as early as possible:
Health insurance: Here I chose the ADAC insurance. This is probably a bit more expensive than the MLP, but it is recognized by the university without any problems and I was very satisfied. But I can’t say much more about it because I never used it in SD.
Credit card: I opted for the Germanwings gold card from Barclay. You can withdraw for free and pay for free. In addition, you do not pay any fees in the first year. After that you can just cancel it. The credit limit is initially €1,700, but if you ask nicely and explain the whole situation with a semester abroad, etc., you can increase this to up to €4,900. This can sometimes be very useful.
Telephone: I chose T-Mobile as my telephone provider. I already ordered the card in Germany via Ebay and then activated it in the USA. That all worked perfectly. The whole thing cost me $30 a month (100 free calls, unlimited SMS and Internet up to 1GB, throttled from then on).
In addition, of course, the visa, but that was actually a relaxed affair.
Ok, I have to say about the university that the first week, especially in the fall semester, will not be easy. The so-called course crashing can be really exhausting. Find as many courses as possible that you can crash, even if you spend the first week hanging around at the university and maybe only get rejected. Sometimes it can also happen that you have to crash courses in the second week. Just try to be as flexible and persistent as possible. For example, if you are studying business administration, you don’t just look at the “College of Business Administration” for courses, but also at the “College of Hospitality Management” and actually everything that could have even a small business administration connection. Especially the courses from the hospitality or tourism management area are much easier to crash than the pure business administration courses.
Finally, I would like to briefly describe the courses I have taken. Of course, the description only reflects my opinion, i.e. how I felt about the course myself.
- Business Ethics and Corporate Governance (MGT 444) with Prof. Turner-Arsenault:
- A good course in my opinion. It was relatively easy, but I found some of the topics a bit boring. In addition, there was a quiz every week and a small test every 2-3 weeks, for which one afternoon of study was enough. So I can only recommend the course. A “B” should be in there without any problems.
- Entrepreneurship with Scott Salka (Special Session):
- Scott is a great guy and the course was definitely fun. Overall, a lot of emphasis was placed on group work. In my opinion, a B or A is possible without much effort. So I can only recommend it.
- World Business Environment MGT 710 by Eva Nicasio Mercier (Special Session):
- The selected topics are actually very interesting, but in my opinion the lecturer simply could not convey the material. In addition, the course was very time-consuming and the rating was rather average. My final grade was still a B but with a lot of effort compared to the other courses.
- Living:
When it comes to living in SD, you actually have two options to choose from. Either the College Area or on the beach (Mission Beach or Pacific Beach). In my opinion you should try to live on the beach. Even if everyone here says something different, I have heard absolutely NOTHING negative about life on the beach during my semester, but I have heard a few “complaints” or “problems” with life at university.
At that time I came to SD without permanent accommodation and had only rented a hostel or AIRBNB for the first few days. On the first day, I immediately started calling and writing to people on Facebook and Craigslist, and found what I was looking for on the second day. Not everyone was that lucky, but I don’t know anyone who didn’t find a house on the beach after 2 weeks of searching at the latest. It’s certainly easier to get an apartment in the Suites on Paseo or in the college area in general. For me personally, however, there were simply too many “disadvantages”. On the one hand it’s not really cheaper in the college area, the parties mostly take place in PB or MB anyway and you actually spend most of your time on the beach anyway. Of course, that’s just my subjective assessment and everyone certainly has different priorities. .JHowever, if you come to SD to have fun, to get to know many new and nice people and still want to get good grades at university, you should choose the beach For me, it was easy to get that “feeling” of being able to leave the house at any time and be on the beach straight away. If you have the opportunity to live in SD, you should use the time and live on the beach. It’s worth it, I can promise. For me, it was easy to get that “feeling” of being able to leave the house at any time and be on the beach straight away. If you have the opportunity to live in SD, you should use the time and live on the beach. It’s worth it, I can promise. For me, it was easy to get that “feeling” of being able to leave the house at any time and be on the beach straight away. If you have the opportunity to live in SD, you should use the time and live on the beach. It’s worth it, I can promise.
- The car:
The question of how to do it with the car has also occupied me for a long time. I ended up renting a car from Express-Rent-A.Car (nothing other than Dirt-cheap-car). They offer so-called “long-term rentals” there. I paid about $430 for a month here. In hindsight I would probably rather buy a car as it is more likely to be cheaper. With a rental car you are more on the safe side and if something breaks, the rental company will take care of it. In principle, however, it is more expensive than buying a car. It ultimately depends on the risk you are willing to take.
Conclusion:
I don’t really need to say much about living in SD or traveling. It’s just a great city, a great university and the people, no matter where they come from, are incredibly friendly and easygoing. San Diego will offer you an incredibly great time. I miss the city, the people every day now. Even if it is certainly not cheap, I can only recommend it to everyone. If anyone has any questions, they can always contact me.