Student Report
University:
Students:
Contact:
Exchange semester:
University of Macau
Janeed M. Azeem, Tom Erik Kristianssen
jjaneed@hotmail.com and tomerikkristiansen@hotmail.com
Spring, 2011
GENERAL INFORMATION ABOUT THE SCHOOL
The University is located in Taipa, which is the center island in the Macau district. (Macau
district consists of Macau Island, Taipa and Coloane). More specifically on a hill near the
Pearl River.
The University is splitted in different buildings. Most of the classes for business students are
at J-building, which is located right on the top of the hill.
Academics at the university consists of Faculty of; Business Administration, Education, Law,
Science and Technology and Social Sciences and Humanities.
We were over 50 exchange students mostly from France, Belgium, Spain, Germany, Sweden,
Netherlands and Japan. (Most of us were undergraduate).
As for the study structure, one must attend 80% of the lectures to give exams. Not all teachers
are very strict about that. Most classes are 3-4 hours a week. Tests and assignments during the
semester are also very common there. The exam period is around two weeks at the end of the
semester. And don’t be surprised if you have an exam in the weekend.
PRACTICAL INFORMATION
Macau was colonized by Portugal in 1887 after being important trading port throughout the
16th century. Macau was handed over to China in 1999.
Macau is under the policy of “one country, two systems". Macau maintains its own legal
system, police force, monetary system, customs policy, and immigration policy. While the
Central People's Government in China is responsible for the territory's defense and foreign
affairs. Macau (and Hong Kong) are referred as SAR – Special Administrative Region.
The main income in Macau is generated from tourism and casinos. Macau has the highest
revenues in gambling in the world. In 2010 only one casino (named Sands) had higher
revenue than all the casinos in Las Vegas.
One can use both Pataca (MOP) and Hong Kong Dollars (HKD) in Macau.
Approx 1 MOP = 0,7 NOK, and 1 HKD = 0,75 NOK.
Information before we left
Before departing, we received a lot of practical information. Such as the school address, how
to there and also information about other exchange students.
The only problem we met before leaving was regarding the course selection. This also made it
difficult to fill the learning agreement from BI.
Visa Procedure and travel experiences
Traveling from Oslo to Macau is a time consuming task. The most convenient way is book
tickets to Hong Kong rather than directly to Macau. You can get to Macau by jet-ferries from
Hong Kong International Airport (it`s not necessary to go to central Hong Kong for that).
One-way price for the ferry is around 150HKD. And it takes just over one hour from Hong
Kong to Macau.
We arrived at Macau Island and took taxi to the campus in Taipa. The taxi driver might take
you on an alternative route in the city to make some extra cash. Our taxi driver didn’t do that
though. The drive is around 10 minutes and the price from the harbor to campus is
approximately 50-60MOP. The price on the bus is 4.2MOP and it takes up to 30 minutes to
get there.
Norwegian citizens don’t need visa before arriving either to Hong Kong or Macau. You will
be granted 3 months of tourist visa for free at the border.
Later in the semester you will get student visa with help of your contacts at UMAC (Grace
and Gary).
Like mentioned, Hong Kong is not far away from Macau. And Hong Kong is more
westernized city than Macau. This makes it a hot destination for partying in the weekends.
Ferries departures frequently and the price is very reasonable (150 MOP/HKD) as well.
It is easy to get around in Asia from Macau. There are flights to most of the big cities in the
region. The most popular airline companies are Air Asia, Philippine Airline and Air Macau.
The prices on the tickets are quite reasonable. A return ticket to almost any destination in
South-East Asia lies around 1000-2000 NOK, sometimes less.
Reception:
The initial reception at UMAC wasn’t that great. Only dorm was open, while the rest of the
campus was closed. We arrived the first day of introduction week; therefore we missed the
first day.
The introduction week program in itself was good. We ate in some good restaurants and some
really bad ones. We went for sightseeing two days, went to karaoke, visited casinos etc. Most
of the exchange student really got to know each other.
We had some problems with selecting the courses. Because we had to select all the courses
individually having our time schedule in mind. That’s why we had to choose other courses
than the ones which were approved by BI in the learning agreement.
The Chinese/Macanese students were really very friendly throughout the semester, not only in
the introduction week. The buddies did take good care of all the exchange students. Although
they were skeptical about working with the exchange students in some of the courses, they
were really helpful, and helped us increasing our knowledge.
Housing:
UMAC provides dorm at “East Asia Hall”, but we didn’t live there because of the housing
standards, which are very low compared to Norway. We found an apartment through a real
estate agency. The apartment was at 34th floor in a building of 37 floors and had two
bedrooms, two bathrooms, drawing room and kitchen.
Monthly rental for the apartment was 11000 MOP, 5500 MOP each. The price did not include
electricity, internet or gas.
Costs:
Food – We used approximately 3000 - 4000 MOP on food each month as we didn’t cook
much at home.
Rent – 5500 MOP each month.
Electricity, Internet and Gas – 700 - 800 MOP each month.
Taxi – Starts from 13 MOP, regardless of how far we traveled (in Macau) the bill didn’t get
higher than 60 MOP.
Books – 1500 - 2000 MOP
The International Office
The international office is very near East Asia Hall. Grace and Gary are the contact persons
for exchange students at UMAC.
They both did a great job informing and helping us. We received a lot of relevant information
from them.
Exchange promotion
There was an international day at UMAC in February. All the exchange students participated
in an international cooking competition. As Norwegian exchange students we, with Sweden
and Finland, served smoked salmon with bread. We didn’t win the contest though, but the
local students liked the food made by us.
Social Activities
The relationship between all of the exchange students was great. Most of us didn’t know each
other before arriving, and were introduced to each other when we got there.
The introduction week helped the students coming closer and later on there were arranged
many parties where most of the exchange students showed up.
We played football at UMAC`s football team. Where we played until we left for Norway.
That was a great experience as we got to know many African students (from earlier
Portuguese colonies) who studies in Macau.
Culture and Language
Since Macau used to be a Portuguese colony, English is not fluently spoken there. Rightly the
majority of international students there are from Portugal, Brazil and parts of Africa (which
were or are Portuguese colonies as well).
The Faculty of Business and Administration taught most of their courses in English.
Therefore, it will not be difficult to communicate with the local students at UMAC.
But the most inconvenient part is that the taxi drivers can’t speak English. Some of them don’t
understand a single word of English.
Cultural and Social Effects from the Exchange Experience:
The exchange program has been a great experience for us. We learnt a lot about the Chinese
and Macanese culture, at the same time as we had a great time making new friends from all
over the world.
ACADEMIC INFORMATION
The Teaching situation:
The teaching system can be compared to the one in Norwegian high school. Each class has
20-30 students, minimum 80% attendance is required (or else you will fail the course),
discussions and tasks are given in class, some teachers give assignments, mid-terms and final
exams.
The workload in courses there are much higher than the courses in BI. You will be really busy
with studies throughout the semester as there are so many assignments and/or projects each
week.
Some of the courses only focused on theory, while some were very practical and close to the
real life.
Required Literature:
Literature is in English, like the lectures.
The level of syllabus is much more difficult compared to the courses at BI. (At least the
courses we had).
Exams:
The final grade usually consists of midterm, a couple of assignments or a group project with
presentation and a final exam in the end of the semester.
Attendance and class participation can also make the grade better in some courses.
Other:
There are many computer rooms in the campus, while the library has also got some computers
which are available for students. IT is used in the same way as BI, where notes from classes
and announcements are available.
Courses:
ECIF484 – Financial Economics:
Topics to be covered includes CAPM, consumption-based asset pricing theory, arbitrage
pricing theory, state preference theory, option pricing theory, market efficiency, the term
structure of interest rates, forward contracts and future contracts.
FINC409 – Case Studies in Corporate Finance:
This is a case-method course in Corporate Finance. Students will learn to make investment
and financing decisions in the financial manager perspective and focus on maximizing
shareholders’ value. This course provides an in-depth study of financial decision making and
the process of value creation.
FINC411 – Portfolio Management:
This course focuses on the design and management of investment portfolios that meet the
targeted investor’s objectives. Application of capital market theories including efficient
market hypothesis, behavioral finance theories would be discussed. The goal is to develop
practical investment management skills such as portfolio performance evaluation, security
analysis and writing investment policy statements
FINC483 – Fixed Income Securities:
This course provides an overview of the techniques available for valuing riskless and risky
fixed income securities and their derivatives. Topics include fixed income mathematics, term
structure models and price sensitivity measures, securitization and fixed income portfolio
management.
MGMT464 – Leadership:
This course introduces students to the major areas of leadership theory and perspectives on
the nature and importance of leadership. Both theory and application are combined by the use
of case studies from a variety of contexts.
MGMT471 – Intercultural Communication for Management:
The aim of this course is to provide students with fundamental knowledge regarding
intercultural business communication and develop their ability in handling intercultural
communication and negotiation.