The choice
to go on exchange in general was pretty easy for me, as I have always aimed to do so
during my studies. I think studying abroad is perfect not only to broaden your academic but also your cultural horizon. Especially in natural sciences and
medical research, it is - at least to my mind - quite interesting to learn
about the approaches and methods applied by other countries and see everything
in another perspective. But also the cultural aspect is quite important to me:
going abroad helps you to improve on a social level and allows you to make a
lot of interesting inter-cultural contacts. Last but not least it enables you
to get to know a country of your choice in detail.
As I've always been pretty fond of the Scandinavian culture and landscape, I
planned to spend my year abroad there. KI was the optimal choice for me in order to also
benefit the most possible on an academic level, since KI is one of the leading
medical universities in the world and is well-known for its great medical
research.
The exchange information given by KI was pretty good. Everything was really
organized, the description of the courses you were allowed to take was very
detailed and corresponded really well to the actual course content. As I
planned on doing a practical training during my second semester of the
exchange, I was looking for interesting research groups at KI and the
associated hospital. The very well structured homepage of KI which is also kept
in an exceedingly up-to-date state, helped me a lot in that. There I could find
a lot of information describing the respective research projects of the
different research groups associated with KI.
Also the study abroad information provided by KI in form of a booklet was very
helpful in giving invaluable information on what to do before coming to Sweden and how
to proceed after arrival. Actually there were not that many things to do for
me, coming from Germany,
i.e. no vaccination to take, no certificates to bring etc. The most important
thing to do was to find accommodation and that was as well made very easy by
KI. As an exchange student I was offered accommodation by UAC in one of the
student dormitories.
Also very helpful concerning the first steps in Sweden was the
introduction/welcoming week organized by the International Student Coordinators.