Nanyang Technological University, SP 2014 (105 KB pdf)

Linee guida per la stesura del rapporto di mobilità
Nome e Cognome: Duden Alexandra Flaminia
Università di destinazione: NTU Singapore (Wee Kim Wee)
Periodo di studio: Spring 2014
1. INFORMAZIONI ACCADEMICHE
Informazioni generali sull’università di destinazione
 Breve descrizione dell’università
NTU Campus is completely different form USI campus. You can’t really compare the two
places. USI is basically two buildings on the main campus. NTU is basically a small village
where to go from a building/faculty to another you use a shuttle service.
Big does not mean that it’s not organized. All exchange students are provided with maps of
the campus and lists of the offices in each building. Going around at the beginning is not so
easy, but after a couple of days you will figure out your way. My personal experience was that
I spent all of my time in Wee Kim Wee (Communication building) and went to the main
building only the orientation day and to pick up my passport after the application for the
student permit was done.
 Facoltà
Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information. Building is very new and well kept.
All classes, library and various offices are in ac rooms. The break, lunch and chilling areas
are open air but clearly under a roof.
 Numero di studenti
Dipends of the course you follow. I followed all in all 4 courses. In 3 courses we were 30
students during lectures. While during tutorials students are divided and you have a maximum
of 15 students per tutorial. The 4th class I followed was a compulsory class for the first year
students. Because it’s compulsory all students of the first year have to take it, so you have a
quite big affluence (120 students during lectures and 30 during tutorials) yet the big number of
students didn’t impact the quality of the course.

Organizzazione degli studi
Situazione d’insegnamento
 Lingua dei corsi. Eventuali problemi.
English, no problem what so ever.
 Come valuteresti il livello di insegnamento rispetto a quello dell’USI?
I wouldn’t say that there is a big difference between USI and WKW. I guess that since WKW
is part of Nanyang Technological University there is a quite fundamental part that involves
technologies and their use.
 Tipo di insegnamento: pratico o teorico?
Classes had both, practical and theoretical parts. Some classes were very dedicate to the
work on field, like filming or so. Yet other classes were more based on theory and group
works that mainly involved using noctions given in class.
 Quali sono i metodi di insegnamento?
Lectures, tutorials, PPT during lectures and tutorials.
 Come è il carico di lavoro (confronto con USI)?
Depends a lot on the course you follow. I know students that had a lot les to do that I did.
Guess I just choosed some very time consuming courses. Compared to USI work to do is
quite a lot more if you want to acchieve good results.
 Quale è la relazione tra la facoltà e i professori e gli studenti?
Teachers are just like in USI, very disponibili and willing to help you in any way they can. For
emergencys you even have their phone number. Since the number of students per class is
quite small teachers know their students by name, in classes where the number of studens is
higher the teacher will remmeber the names of only the students that stand out diring class.
Descrizione dei corsi
 Nome e ev. codice del corso
Creative Strategies CS2031
Genre and Narrative Strategies CS2027
Media Presentation and Performance CS2026
Visual and Litteracy Communication CS2006
 Prerequisiti (se rilevante)
As far as Creative strategies is concerned there are no prerequisites I recommend, go to
class, follow the lesson. Every week there is a different assignment to work on with your team
mates and prepare a PPT, sounds quite easy, but trust me it is not (groups are made up at
the beginning of the semester and stay the same till the end. Try to choose group mates
basing your decision on your time tables and not who you like most. Because we all have
different timetables is VERY difficult to find time all together to work on the assignment. We
often ended up working on a fb chat. Not the best way to brain storm and work on a subject
so much based on creativity).
Honestly this was the course I liked less, but this is my personal view. If you happen to
choose it make sure you are sure about it and try asking some students from the third or
fourth year what do they think about it.
Genre and Narrative strategies is a very interesting course, you watch a lot of movies and
analyze them under a genre and narrative view point. There are quite a lot of readings to do
before class for this course, so if your English is not too good you might want to improve it
first. Keep this course in mind, especially if you like movies and watched quite some during
your life.
As far as Media presentation and Performance (teacher of this subject is really very good and
funny, his lectures and tutorials are a pleasure to follow) and Visual Literacy Communication
(Visual Litteracy and Com and Genre and Narrative Strategies have the same teacher, she is
wonderful) you don’t really need prerequisites to follow the courses; yet if you know how to
use Final Cut Pro, a professional camera and make videos, you are one step ahead. I didn’t
know any of these things but I still learned them and had a lot of fun.
 Modalità d’esame
Depends year by year and subject. I had only 1 exam (Creative Strategies) but part of my
final mark was already given by following the class and weakly assignments. All the other
subjects I had didn’t have a final exam but had small quizzes during class, weakly
assignments and papers to write, group works and/or a final paper you had to work on at
home and then give it in.
 Valore ECTS
As an exchange student you are not allowed to follow course with 6AU (8ETCS). You can
only choose from the 3AU (6ETCS)
Commenti: Importanza, grado d’interesse, coerenza con il piano di studio all’USI,
grado di difficoltà, è possibile scegliere corsi di un’altra facoltà?, eventuali altri
commenti (p.es. consiglieresti il corso ad un altro studente?)
All courses were very interesting and equally important, the study program has very little to do
with the USI one, but because is so different you learn so many more and diverse things.
Generally speaking subjects were a little harder in WKW. I tryed to follow courses from
Economy faculty and Psycology, so I could have the exams I was missing in USI when I was
in exchange. Unfortunately my application was denied. I know though a student from
Ecomony faculty who followed a course of Communication, so it is not impossible.

Of all the courses I followed I would not reccomand one in particular, they were all very
interesting. Personally I didn’t like a lot creative strategies, this is my opinion but my
understanding is that many students don’t like that course: it sounds very different on paper.
Altro
 Breve descrizione biblioteca
Fornita ma non ci sono stata molto.
 Breve descrizione delle infrastrutture: mensa, aule computer, …
Never eat in uni, so no idea of how the food is. But I can say that there is a very big variarity
and you have many different stands: vegetaria, fruits, shakes, sweets, japanese cousine,
Indonesian cousine, chinese cousine, western cousine, indian cousine, StarBugs coffe,
McDonalds and so on. You can change evry day and still never get bored.
Never spent a lot of time in the computer room but it’s basically the same as in USI, just
bigger screens and a vast selection of programs.
2. INFORMAZIONI PRATICHE
Informazioni prima della partenza
 Come è maturata l’idea di un soggiorno presso questa università?
I already knew quite well Singapore and wanted to go back. On top of that a sememster in
exchange at NTU is something you like to have on your UNI CV.
 Come hai raccolto le informazioni relative all’uni di destinazione?
Thanks to USI’s servizio relazioni internazionali and internet.
 Quali documenti occorre procurarsi e relativa tempistica
NTU sends emails and reminders for everything, no need to worry about it. Just make sure
you have already a passport, if not apply for one, the rest comes by it’s self.
Also rmember to print all he emails NTU sends to you and the relative attachments. Always
better to have a hard copy of them. On top of that when you get to NTU and you do the Visa
application (NTU takes care of everything) make sure you bring a hard copy of your “Letter of
enrolment” (think to remember it was called like that) and a passport size photo, with a white
background, if you don’t have it you can make it there, but it will take you more time.
Viaggio
 Con quale mezzo?
Aereo
 Altre informazioni rilevanti
Cabs are very cheap compared to Switzerland. I went to uni everyday by cab and spent less
than filling up the tank of my car.
Arrivo
 Come è stata l’accoglienza: attività ad hoc organizzate per gli studenti ospiti?
Many activities, lots of fun, a very open and familiar place.
 Come è stato il primo giorno?
Normal? Like the first day in USI, not big deal.
 Quanto tempo prima è consigliabile partire?
5 to 6 days more or less.
Alloggio
 Come hai attuato la ricerca?
Internet.
 Dove hai alloggiato? Pregi, difetti.
In town (NTU campus is in Jurong West Area, so 20/30 min away from the center of SG, by
cab). I prefered to stay in town, more activities to du during the week and places to go to.
Clearly if you ar enot on campus everyday you have to go up and down and wake up earlier,
but for me it was worth it.
 Suggerimenti?
Choose accordingly to your habits and preferences. Clearly if you stay on campus you will
socialize a lot more with the other exchange and local students. Staying off campus
(especially if you are in town as I did) gives you less chances to socialize with NTU students,
but on the other hand you meet many other people.
Costi
 Descrizione dei costi princiali
Rent 1000CHF if you leave in town in a shared apartment. Prices can be very different
accordingly to the area. But you can’t really spend less than 700/800CHF.
Food: very cheap unless you go to expensive hotels.
Cigarettes: 9CHF per pack.
Drinks: depends but more or less like in Lugano.
Shopping: depends on what you buy.
Supermarket: depends where you go. But not much different from Lugano.
Taxi: very cheap.
MRT (subway): extremely cheap.
Attività extra-scolastiche
 Rapporto con gli studenti del luogo.
Very helpul and curious to know where you come from. Kind but also quite competitive and
precise when it comes to study and work.
 Rapporto con gli altri studenti di scambio
Also very helpful, we are all at the beginning quite clueless of how to moove, what to do,
where to go, how to do. But we all worked together to figure things out and make our lifes
easier.
 Vengono organizzate attività dedicate o a quali attività è possibile partecipare?
Many activities were organised but to be honest I didn’t really partecipate, I was really too
busy studying. Anyways generally speaking there were parties, outings, small events on
campus. A FaceBook page was is dedicate to all exchange students in NTU, we all
communicate there and help eachother. Organise outings and partyes. (The Exchange goup
is NTU Exchange 2014 so if you come to Singapore in August 2014 you will still find me in the
group, if you need anything please contact me)
Lingua
 Quale/i è/sono la/e lingua/e parlata/e?
English is spokenn everywhere. Malay, Chinese and Tamil are also spoken, but to go around
Enslish is more than enough.
 Ci sono state difficoltà? Se sì quali?
No.
 E’ necessario un diploma che attesti il livello della lingua?
Si, un TOEFL or IELTS. You need to know enough english to understand classes and follow
with no problem. You can also decide to go there to improve your English language skills, but
the you will have a very hard time and might not pass the final exams. But at least your
English is a lot better.
Altro
 Consiglieresti questa esperienza: sì / no, perché?
Yes, of course. It is an international experience, fun, interesting, it widens your horizons.
If you have the chance to do it go for it, it is worth it and it makes a difference in your schoolin
cv. Singapore Wee Kim Wee at NTU is a very well known uni. You really should considere to
go for a semester especially if u wish to have the chance to work in Asia in future.

Eventuali commenti o aggiunte
 One thing you should bare in mind when you go is that the subjects you choose might
not be available once you get there (or you cannot follow them because they require
previous courses and know hows you don’t have.). If this happens don’t forget to
write an email to USI to tell them and consult with them.
 An other issue is that most courses at WKW are quite different fromt he USI piano di
study, so you might get VERY different courses and ideas of how to approach
communication. In USI generally speaking we have a lot to do with people,
psycology, sociology, what in italian we call lato umanistico. In WKW is quite pronted
on the technologies (photography, video shooting, editing, pre and post productions
of smal footage). It is really a lot of fun but very hard at the beginning (when I saw the
first professional camera or sound sistem I had no idea what buttons to push).
Because WKW is so much about technologies, and USI not so much, it gets hard to
find courses that have equipollenza in USI. There are quite some, but you might not
be accepted in them or they might be offered during a different semester (I went
during the Spring, and all of the courses I choosed for my equipollenze where during
the Fall semester or I wasn’t accepted). But you might be lucky and not have the
same problem.
 One other very important thing is making up your time table. In USI it’s made for us
and we have no big issue about it. In WKW you have to make your own timetable,
two weeks of delirium.
o Problems you might have are: overlaping times of lectures or tutorials
(usually there are different time slots for the tutorials so you can choose the
one that fits best your timetable. On the other hand the lecture is only one. So
if you have ovelaping timings you can’t do much but choose the lecture you
prefere the most).
o Other problem is that even when you you choosed the classes to follow you
first have to be accepted in to it. Some classes try to keep the class with little
students so you might not be accepted: don’t panic. Before you don’t get
accepted make sure you go talk personally to the teacher and explain your
situation. My experience is that most teachers are understanding and will
help you out.
o So during the first two weeks try to go ad follow most lectures you are
interested in, so you have a clear idea of what the course is about and if it is
as interesting as it looks on paper. Talk to the teacher if you wish, but make
up your mind, once you enrole in the course you don’t really want to drop off
because you don’t like it. You can play around with your time table during
those two (or maybe three, don’t remember) weeks.
 It’s not a MUST but you might want to buy a local SIM card, makes easier
communications, but up to you. Don’t forget to leave with an ATM card and possibly
also a credit card (just in case for emergencies).
 Check out your health insurance and what it covores exactly, and also bring you
health insurance card with you.
 Driving licence you will for sure not need in Singapore, but if you decide to travel
around and need to rent a car, bring your international driving licence (aks the
transportations authoroties of your country)
Sono disponibile a essere contattato da altri studenti per avere consigli sul soggiorno:
sì, e-mail: [email protected] \ \
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