Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Course Registration at Yonsei

Yonsei offers several course registration opportunities for (exchange) students. The first one was on the 7th of August. Here's what I noticed and how I was able to enroll for all the courses I wished.

It's quite a process, course enrollment. I am not used to enrolling myself for course that I want, since I get a premade curriculum at the Hague University. It was therefore a fun process for me, as I could choose all the course I wanted. I had a few ideas of courses I wanted to take, but my eventual wish list became:

1. Free trade agreements
2. International management
3. Corporation and its legal environment
4. Intensive Korean (level 1)
5. Introduction to Korean studies

In a perfect world, I would have chosen human resources in stead of introduction to Korean studies, but unfortunately there's a three business course-limit, which means students can only choose 3 business and economic-themed courses (I believe, cause I am not sure on this whether courses under the Exchange faculty/international office also fall under this limit, I will inform myself once I arrive at Yonsei).

How to enroll (2014):
I'll now explain how you can enroll for the Yonsei courses, however be aware that I write this in August 2014, so the process may change in the future. Check the course guide to be sure!

Step 1: check your e-mail for the course guide, which you should receive in July. Read it carefully.
Step 2: Go to the portal on the registration day, and make sure you log in at 7:00 am Korean time, so that you can make a wishlist. I guess you don't have to be there at 7, since the wishlist isn't on a first come first serve basis, it's just a wishlist.
-> you make a wishlist by clicking on the orange button on the left (under the "add to wishlist" column).
Step 4: Wait until its 10:00 am Korean time. Make sure you are ready to click on the course title in your wishlist at 10:00:00, this way I got all the courses I wanted.
-> use a clock that shows seconds, 9:59:59 is your time to focus. 10:00:10 is too late.

Did not get all the courses you wanted, for example because there was a 5 max. cap for certain courses? Don't worry, there should be more opportunities to enroll for courses.

Tuesday, July 29, 2014

Welcome!


Well hello there! My name is Frans, I'm 19 and from the Netherlands. Starting August 26, 2014, I will be on exchange for one semester at Yonsei University in Seoul, South-Korea. With this blog, I am going to write about my experience of going on exchange, discoveries in South-Korea(n culture), and my process of learning the Korean language. 

The purpose of this blog is to share with those who are interested in my exchange, whether they're friends or family, or when they will be going on exchange to Yonsei too. I hope to provide some useful information and things I noticed while going on exchange.

About me
As I said in the introduction, I'm 19 and I am currently in my third year of my bachelor of European Studies. I study at the Hague University of Applied Science. My study focuses on European politics, economics and cultural studies; however, it is quite a broad bachelor program, in a sense that it teaches us to use skills that are useful anywhere in the world (such as doing research, intercultural communication and presentation skills). I majored in business courses, mainly focusing on marketing, export and strategic management. My main interest lays with languages and marketing.

Why Yonsei
It may have been one of the first weeks at the Hague University when I found out there is a possibility to go on exchange to Asia. Since it is such a great opportunity, I started doing research in an early stage and found out South-Korea was one of the possibilities. I sort of forgot about the exchange during my first semester of my first year, however at the start of semester 2 I started orienting a bit more. However, it wasn't until the first semester of year 2 that we had to really orient and really start making hard choices for where we wanted to go on exchange. Then I just knew it for sure, South-Korea was my goal.

You might wonder why someone doing European Studies is going to Asia. Well, for several reasons! To begin with, the amount of trade between the European Union (the Netherlands in particular) and South-Korea is increasing, offering great opportunities for a future career. Second, South-Korea is a highly developed country with great technological development and an increasing and strong economy. History and the current political situation also played a part in my choice of South-Korea, since it hasn't been too long ago since the Korean War, which is a war I hope I will learn more about during my exchange.

To conclude, I hope whoever reads this blog will find useful information for their exchange, as it is quite a big step in your educational career. I personally cannot believe I will be flying out to Seoul in less than a month.. but I really cannot wait.