Student Report
Name of the University: Universidade Catolica
Exchange semester: Fall 2012
I. PRACTICAL INFORMATION
Before leaving Norway
When and how did you receive information from the exchange university?
We received a lot of information by email all the way until school start, and we also got an
acceptance letter by mail.
Any difficulties in preparing (application, housing, contact, courses, etc)?
The international office at the Catolica Lisbon is very helpful and will help you with any
issues. Three of us booked our apartment on an online page in April, while one used the last
week in august to find an apartment.
Applying for a visa (if applicable)
You do not need a VISA for Portugal
Travel
The travel to Portugal from Norway is easy; we booked with TAP, which has a direct flight
every day. When flying with TAP as an Erasmus student, you will get an extra 10kg of
luggage if you send them an email to notify that you are an Erasmus student first.
Housing
Universidade Catolica Portuguesa doesn’t provide housing, but they will help you get housing
if you have any problems in the first and second week. But we heard from other exchange
students that the help the school offered was not that helpful. So we recommend you to search
for an apartment rather early. We used different pages like CustoJusto.pt and vacation home
pages. We would recommend booking your apartment in good time. One of us waited to
search for accommodation until he got there. It took him three days and you have to be aware
that you must be patient. A lot of the apartments you will see have a very low standard and
some of the house lords can be a little bit sleazy. Areas we recommend to live in are
Baixa/Chiado, Rossio, Marques Pombal, from there you have great access to everything.
Costs
Lisbon is one of the cheapest capitals in Europe, but when everything is cheap you will buy
more. All of us paid 500 euros per month for our apartments. Still, this is considered as
expensive in Portugal. We know other students that paid between 270-400 euros. Of course
the standard of the apartment is not the same and the apartments are not located downtown in
Lisbon. So we would recommend that you pay a bit more for your apartment. You are only
living in Lisbon once and we don’t regret living that central. From Chiado it will only take
you five minutes to walk to the famous Erasmus corner located in Bairro Alto and all main
streets where things happen in Lisbon are located nearby.
You really don’t have to buy books, but it can be clever in the bigger courses. The average
prices of books are the same as in Norway. We bought two books and the total price was 120
euros. Food is something that is very cheap in Portugal; you can have a good dinner at a
restaurant for 10 euros. Food at supermarkets is even cheaper, for 80 euro a week you can buy
yourself a lot of good food. A monthly metro card cost 35 euro and to take the train to the
beaches will cost you 4 euros, that we are sure you will do a lot;) You can buy wine at the
supermarket for 1-2 euro and a beer at Erasmus corner cost 2 euro for 0,5 liter. You also have
to buy a pre-paid card for your phone. The first day at school you are given a Moche pre-paid
card. With this pre-paid card it is free to call and text all Moche users. Each month you have
to refill it for 5 euros, so pretty cheap.
To sum it up for we used an average of 1400 euros a month and for this amount you will have
a lot of fun
Culture and language
Did you have any language problems with the faculty or other students?
We didn’t have any problems with language with either the faculty or the other students. The
English level overall is good. Still, the teachers speak proper English, but some of them have
an accent that can be difficult to understand in the beginning.
BUT, we have to warn you about something. The Portuguese view about time efficient is very
different from the Norwegian. We actually don’t think watches exist down here. They are
almost always late, and to buy groceries in the supermarket will take you some time. On
average you can easily spend twenty minutes in the supermarket just to buy something to
drink.
None of us did the Portuguese language course, and you don’t have to do it either. Most of the
people here speak English (except the taxi drivers) and you will easily get around just by
speaking English. It is also difficult to learn how to speak Portuguese in four months, and
especially since most of your time you spend with people speaking English.
How were the possibilities to experience the country and the culture?
There are fantastic possibilities to experience the country and the culture, the school and
student associations arrange trips all over the country, and they are extremely cheap. It’s very
easy to rent a car and the prices are very low, for a small car for 3 days you will pay about 50
euros including insurance. Hotels are also cheap. We did a lot of travelling and we
recommend visiting other cities than Lisbon. Portugal has a lot to offer and there are a lot of
places you should visit. In the north of Portugal there are a lot of wine farms that produce
famous port wine.
Cultural and social effects from the exchange experience
We have met a lot of people from different countries, and it is fun to see how different people
can be and the exchange has of course made us more open to other cultures. This period has
definitely opened our eyes about the possibility to maybe work abroad in the future.
II. ABOUT THE SCHOOL
The campus is small, in total about 1000 undergraduate and 400 masters, including Erasmus
students (about 150). The university is located outside of the main part of Lisbon. It took us
20 minutes to get there from our apartments, 10 minutes walk and 10 minutes metro trip. The
area where the school is located is a very quite area, there are few shops and supermarkets
near by. The closest supermarket is 15 minutes away, so you should bring your own food to
the school, as the cafeteria is not that good. They only sell “sweet” food (croissants etc.) and
pizza during lunchtime.
The facilities at the school compared with what we are used to from BI, are not that good.
There are few computers available and there can be difficult to find a workplace sometimes.
Nevertheless, what the school offer is what you need. We’ve just been spoiled back home at
BI.
The study structure at Catolica is not what we are used to from BI. You have to work steadily
throughout the semester and it is often a submission of homework and group reports. This
type of structure makes the workload in the end of the semester easier and you are better
prepared for the final exams.
Course registration
Before arrival you will receive a lot of emails from the school explaining how to submit your
registration of the courses. By June, if we remember correct, you have to submit your
registration online. But don’t worry; you can change all your courses during the first week in
September. Still, there is a chance that the course you favour is not available any longer.
Therefore, we recommend you to start early looking at the different courses Catolica offers.
Academic calendar
Arrival date:
First day of the semester:
Last day of classes:
Examination period:
Any special events/holidays:
Other:
03.09.2012
14.12.2012
03.01-16.01.2013
No holidays
Arrival
The first three days are welcome days and you have the opportunity to get to know all the
others Erasmus students, the school and the teachers. Those who needed help in the search of
accommodation could get that. The school offers a lot of trips the first days that we
recommend you to take advantage of. You will receive an email before school starts giving
you information about the program the first days and eventual costs.
You will also receive an email during the summer vacation where the school offer you a
Buddy. This is a student from Catolica that will provide you a lot of help if needed. They can
pick you up at the airport and help you with accommodation and what else you need.
The International Office
Is there an international office?
Yes. The people working there are very helpful and the doors are always open.
As an exchange student, did you receive sufficient and relevant information? In English?
All the sufficient and relevant information were in English.
Promoting BI and Norway
The university had an International Day were all of the Erasmus students had the opportunity
to promote their own school. There was an award to the students that presented their school
best. All of us participated this day and we actually won the whole competition. What we did
was that we visited the Norwegian embassy were we picked up a lot of brochures to offer the
Portuguese students all the information they wanted about Norway and Oslo. We strongly
believe there will be a lot of exchange students from Catolica at BI next year;)
Social activities
It is difficult to get a close relationship with the Portuguese students. They usually don’t hang
out in the same bars as we did, and we didn’t share many classes at school with them. Still,
we had the best experience of our lifetime. We got a lot of new friends and the Erasmus
“community” is amazing. You do everything together and especially hanging out at the
beach We probably did this every weekend until middle of October. We also had a lot of
dinners together and went to see football matches together, something we strongly
recommend. If you want to try surfing this is something you definitely should do in Portugal,
you have a lot of great beaches nearby where you can get cheap lessons. These lessons usually
last for two hours and the price is about 10 euros, all equipment included.
Is there a student organization, and if so, are the exchange students a part of it?
There is a lot of student organization, maybe too much. You can buy these different Erasmus
card from the organizations that somehow shall provide you a lot of benefits, mainly free
entrance at some clubs. We bought some of them and regretted, we had no use for it. So
before you buy one, make sure you actually need it.
III. ACADEMICS
In the classroom
All the courses we had were taught in English, and we experienced no language problems
with the teachers. As mentioned before you will experience a lot of different accents since the
professors at the school are both Portuguese and foreigners. The size of the classes varies
from 15-40 students, and there is a lot of interaction between the students and teachers. The
teacher will often ask questions and expects the students to know the correct answer.
Therefore it is important that you are well prepared to all the classes and the study structure
can remind you of high school. The workload at Catolica through the semester is high
compared to BI. You have to submit a lot of hand in and there is a lot of group presentation,
but again, then you are better prepared for the final exams. A huge adjustment to us were that
all the classes consisted of 1,5 hours of teaching. We actually never got used to this. What we
did like was that most of the classes were practical and theoretical. We believe this mixture
made the classes more fun and it was easier to remember and learn new knowledge. The
quality of professors varies; some of them are just professionals with relevant work
experience. They have a lot of knowledge, but as a teacher they weren’t that good.
Nevertheless, all of them are very helpful and they will answer all questions you should have.
Course materials
All the course materials we used were in English. As mentioned earlier we only bought two
books as most of the teachers told us you don’t have to buy the books. In some courses it
didn’t exist books. Mostly all of the course materials were slides from PowerPoint or articles
handed out. In some courses it was difficult to establish an accurate overview of all the
teaching material.
Exams
We have only had one exam and that was based on the lectures. The other teachers have told
us that the exams will be based on the lectures. Your final grade is usually based on your class
participation, individual assignments, casework and presentations and usually the final exam
only count for 30-40 per cent of your grade. To pass the courses you need an average grade
above 10 from a scale of 0-20.
Library and technology
The school has a large library. We only visited once, and as far as we remember it was not
that much of places to sit down and read, so it not like we are used to at BI. One thing that
annoyed us a lot was the problem to find a plug to charge the battery of your computer. If you
want to read at Catolica we recommend you to sit at the 3rd floor where there are five large
tables with a lot of charging plugs available. If you don’t bring your own computer (you
should) you have a computer room in the basement with 30 computers and a printer. The
school also have their own copy centre that is useful when you are handing in large group
assignments. All information from the school is sent to you on your email. You also get your
login number and password to login on all the computers and on the school’s homepage.
Description of courses (we had 6 courses each)
Decision Making – Bachelor (5 ects)
This is a class where you learn theory about the way we do our decision. In the beginning we
thought it was not that interesting, but after we understood the course better it got better. Our
final grade was based on exam, homework and class discussions. This is actually the only
course we have had our exam in so far. The exam was ok, and you are also allowed to bring
cheat – sheet to the exam. Overall the course is ok, and it is not that hard to pass.
Capital Market and Institution – Bachelor (5 ects)
This course is interesting and goes deep into the financial world BUT if you choose this
course we strongly recommend that you have some understanding of finance from earlier. We
did not and this is the hardest course for us. Our final grade is based on the mid-term and the
final exam.
Bank Management – Bachelor (5 ects)
If you do capital market, you should do this one as well. The two courses are very similar and
the topics are the same. But capital market is a harder course and goes deeper within each
topic. We had the option to do a mid-term or not. If you didn’t your final grade was only
based on the final exam.
Strategy (6 ects)
In this class we had two teachers, one teacher for the theoretical classes and one for the
practical classes. The practical classes were much smaller and here you usually discussed
cases you had to read for each class. We also had a lot of presentations and individual work in
this class. Overall this was a very interesting course that we recommend everyone to choose.
Our final grade was based on group works and hand-ins. The final exam only counts 30 %.
Strategic Management of Innovation (5 ects)
Every week you get a Harvard case, of 15-30 pages, that you will have to read. The teacher
will ask you direct questions from the case, and you will (as in most other courses) to some
extent be graded on class participation. The syllabus is rather small, and you will not have a
hard time learning it. The course revolves more around protecting innovation than innovation
itself, and the learning from the course did not meet our expectations.
Strategic Alliances ( 5 ects )
This course includes a lot of theory (A LOT), and is to some degree interesting. Guest
speakers do some of the classes. The course has some presentations and hand-ins trough the
semester and a final presentation with a 30-page hand-in (35% of the grade).
Public Policies Analysis (6 ects)
This course is based on the theory that the market can regulate everything by itself, and no
control is needed. Then it describes the market failures that would arise from this situation,
why intervention is needed, how intervention should be done, and compare these situations to
each other. The course makes you think and teaches you a lot about how government
regulation works and why it is necessary. Only one of us had this course, but he found it very
interesting. He would however recommend that you have some knowledge about
microeconomics (supply/demand curves and market surpluses, the basics), but half of the
class didn’t have this.
Marketing in the New Era (5 ects)
This is one of the best courses, it attacks the marketing topic in a different way than we are
used to. It focuses more on the sustainability of your business and how to get funding and to
create a competitive advantage. Guest speakers present most of the course syllabus and all of
them are one of the best in their area in Portugal. There is a final presentation where you
present your project or product to a group of investors, some of the grade is based on how
much money your product or project gets from the investors. (35% of the grade).
We hope you will have an equally good experience as us!
If you have any questions at all, feel free to contact us through the International Office at BI.