Anya Raymond

I have wanted to study abroad since high school. I have always wanted to travel and experience new languages and cultures and living experiences. I have never wanted my study abroad to impact my moving forward in my education, doing a semester abroad where I could learn in a new and different institution across an ocean seemed like the perfect opportunity. I think that third year burnout was starting to hit me, and I was looking for something new and exciting that would add to my academic career. I was very motivated to go and experience something new.

I chose this institution because it was a catholic university and I wanted to experience a catholic education. As well as this, I chose it because it was in a good location and not too big, but not too small! I originally wanted to take courses in multiple faculties, so I needed permission from my host university to have this freedom and UCO allowed me to do this. It was hard but they helped me make it work!

I chose to do a semester abroad because it was the most flexible option with my degree, and I was able to take all my elective courses abroad. This was the least stressful option especially because the credit system and course equivalencies are different from Trent’s.

I chose to study in France because I am bilingual, and I thought that picking a university in a city where I already could speak the language would help me adjust more easily. It also helped me gain a lot more confidence in my French speaking abilities and allowed me to make international and French friends!

UCO as a Catholic and private institution was quite different from Trent. I found that courses were more participation based and there was more group work or more necessity to study and work with your academic community. In my faculty, there was a lot less individual work, a lot more studying and understanding course content rather than writing papers and handing in weekly assignments like there is at Trent in my streams. I found that professors in theology were very open to debate or disagreements, and they really cared about their students understanding. I have found that my professors at Trent have been less willing to go out of them to help you understand than my profs abroad. There was a lot of pressure to perform and study well in France because it is a private (paid by students) institution whereas there are free university (public institution) options. I found because of that my professors were of a very high quality and expected a lot of their students. I found it easier to do well at Trent than at UCO. I found I had to work 2-3 times harder for those same grades. 

I was physically in classes 27 hours a week. I was taking 15 courses. My workload was very heavy because I was studying in another language, and I was in a very academically demanding faculty/courses. Many of these courses only included attending classes during the week (attendance was very mandatory) and some had very little additional work. Some courses only had a final exam worth 100%, others had 1 or 2 additional projects/assignments/papers, some only had schoolwork every week and no final exam.

The most challenging part about being abroad was balancing school, traveling, and spending time with friends. I think because I picked courses that meant a more demanding academic semester, I found this to be difficult. I wanted to do the best that I could, while enjoying myself and traveling within France and spending meaningful time building friendships. I also found it difficult to make friends with French students. They were quite distant, and I needed to constantly insert myself into conversations and invite them out if I wanted to hang out. It took a few months, but eventually they all opened a lot, and it was lovely in the end. Just took more time than I expected which was hard and getting used to a new country.

I was able to travel within France on weekends, the ERASMUS program at UCO organized trips and we just paid and joined which was good. I went to La Rochelle, Paris, Étretat, Mont St Michel, etc. Outside of France I went to Ireland and Italy on my two (1 week) winter breaks. After exams, when my semester was over, I took about a month to travel to Greece, Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, and Iceland. My favourite spots were Ireland and Iceland, and I did cool hikes in Greece and Bulgaria!

Some advice or things to note would be not to take the trains in Bulgaria (so awful) and note that in Eastern Europe people tend to be a lot colder to tourists.

Benefits include: 

• I learned so much in a new academic setting (different profs, expectations, and abilities) 
• Allows you travel more than you could easily in Canada. 
• Pushes you outside your comfort zone 
• Make lifelong international friends 
• Teaches you how to be adaptable and grow in hard/unexpected situations 
• Teaches you resilience

I lived by myself on a campus residence called Bourgonnier with a shared kitchen with 40 other people. I loved my neighbours, but the residence itself had a bunch of random people some students and others weren’t so it was weird. I didn’t like it, but it was cheap and easy, so it was just fine.

 Advice: 

• Make sure you communicate with written traces of everything 
• Enjoy your courses, it is 5 months of your life so might as well like it 
• Prioritize your physical health, take time to make good friends, don’t just study 
• Tell your professors and reach out when you don’t understand especially at the beginning 
• Try and only take courses in 1 faculty, it's easier with their weekly changing class schedules

 Favourite memories 

• Trying to master the French accent 
• Daily mass at the chapel at school with professors and peers 
• Study dates with French friends 
• Sunday brunches in our communal kitchen 
• Trying different restaurants in town 
• Drinking in our rooms and going out for ice cream with my neighbour Sara

I would tell them that it is the greatest and craziest adventure and if that’s something that they want, to go for it. If they don’t think they are adaptable, then not to go because it is hard, but you meet and find people who are going through and want people to lean on through the hard you are all experiencing together.