Gleb Ivashyn (FMF): „I felt like professors were truly passionate"

 Studies in the Partner Institution 

Campuses and Structure of FH Joanneum:

First, I think we should go over the structure of FH Joanneum, as I feel like it is quite important to understand for exchange students wanting to study at the university. FH Joanneum has 3 campuses: Graz, Kapfenberg and Bad Gleichenberg.

Graz is the main and the biggest campus. Depending on which studies you wanna take you might end up on a different campus. Initially, a lot of students, including myself, think that they will study in Graz, even though the subjects they chose could be in a completely different place. If your field of study is IT or engineering, with almost 100 percent certainty you will end up in Kapfenberg. Most of the other subjects are in Graz.

Keep that in mind, if you would like to live in a bigger city like Graz, because Kapfenberg is a small and remote town with not a lot of life in it, which I can admit could not be for everybody. I will discuss student life and other aspects of living in a different section later though.

Campus 

Now, let’s talk about studies.

I, as an IT student, was studying and living on the Kapfenberg campus, which is an IT/Engineering one. So, I will be talking only about it. The campus itself is quite new. It consists of 2 parts: the first one was built in the early 2000s and the second one was built in the 2010s I believe. So, everything feels really fresh, modern, and new. I felt very comfortable staying, studying, and being at the university all the time. Classes are filled with all the necessary equipment you might need for your 3 chosen study subjects. Ranging from robotics, server tech, or even a class full of Macs for people studying IOS development. Every class I was in was equipped with modern light control, high-quality projectors, and all kinds of other cool things. The campus also includes a huge lab for chemists, robotics engineers, and other studies that require very expensive and specific equipment. I believe that place had industrial 3D printers and looked really cool. However, access there is not permitted for everyone. And I couldn’t explore it in detail, because I’m an IT student. 

The campus also has a huge auditorium for some events and conferences, a nice cafeteria, and a bunch of places to just sit down and study. And snack and coffee machines are on every floor, which is a cool bonus.

Study procedure and professors 

Important things to note about studies in Austria: 

Once again, I feel like I have to say a very important notice for students, that you must realize about Austria. There are 3 very important things, that could be very different from your country and that could potentially be a problem: 

1. Subjects are low credit in Austrian universities of applied sciences: 
   
   So, all subjects in FH and all other universities of applied sciences are very low credit.
   
   You could have noticed that if you were ever looking through the study subjects list. What I mean by that is here in Lithuania, for example, we have most of our subjects either 6 or sometimes even 9 credits per subject. Sometimes 3 for electives or not very important subjects. In Austria, almost every single subject is worth 2-3 credits. So, you can imagine that in Lithuania to get 30 ECTS you would need to have usually 5-6 subjects. In Austria having 9- 10 subjects is normal to have 30 ECTS. Which, to be honest, can be kinda annoying, because instead of focusing and going in-depth on a specific subject, you will have to scatter your attention across 9 subjects and not get super deep into every single one of them.  
   
   Just as an example, here’s what my subjects looked like during the semester:
   
   
   
   
   
   As you can see, I had 9 subjects. 8 of them being 2-3 credits and only 1 being 10 credits, which is the project work. So yeah, if you need to get 30 ECTS you will have to choose some sort of big subject like a project work (which technically is master’s subject) or scientific work.
    
2. Schedule is not consistent:
   
   
   Another thing I feel is worth mentioning is the fact that you will not have a consistent weekly schedule. Subject hours will be scattered across the whole semester. That means during one week you could have lectures in the evening and every day, and another week you could have like 1 lecture in the morning. That personally wasn’t really an issue for me.
   However, if you plan to do some part-time job, this could be an issue. 
   
   
3. Autumn semester In Austria starts in October and ends at the end of February: 
   
   
   Technically, the semester starts I think on the 1st of October and ends on the 28th of February. However, it will strongly depend on which subjects you take. For me, as far as I remember the first lecture was even earlier, on like 30th of September. And the last exam for me was on the 4th of February.
   
   
   Every subject’s exam will have 3 time slots to pass it: 1a, 1b and 2. 1a and 1b are “you can choose the date whichever you like more” and is the 1st attempt. 1a will be earlier, usually during January. 2 will be the second attempt and is usually at the mid-to-end of February.
   
   Master’s exams tend to start later.
   
   
   So keep that in mind I would strongly recommend taking 1a attempt for every subject, otherwise, you could have a situation, when the semester in your home country has already started, but you still need to pass some exams. For me personally, the last exam was on 4th of February, which was a Master’s subject I took. If you choose only Bachelor’s subjects and take 1a attempt you could probably finish your semester even earlier.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   Having said all of the above things, I did enjoy my studies a lot.
   
   The subjects were really cool and interesting to study. Every single professor was super chill, nice, and professional at the same time. It was a daily norm to throw some random stories and jokes around with the professors during the sessions, which I feel is fantastic and should be more common in the university environment. It made me feel more connected to the professors and made the learning process a bit less serious and way more fun and engaging. I felt like professors were truly passionate about what they were teaching. All the above things made it easier and more fun to study.

Probably one of the coolest things about FH is that there are a ton of subjects that are available in English. And not only internationals take those subjects. A lot of Austrian students have their studies in English which is very cool. Everyone speaks English almost perfectly at the university. I never felt uncomfortable not knowing any German. Speaking of  German, if you know some of it that’s even better because an exchange student can take courses that are available in German as well. You will not feel missed out though if you only take courses in English.

Speaking of the complexity of studies: for me personally, the studies were not very complex. I would say a moderate complexity. However, for some students, I feel like it could be somewhat complex. Keep in mind that you do need a quite good understanding and experience in computer science and coding to take courses comfortably if you’re considering taking courses similar to mine. At least a solid basic understanding of OOP in Java, C, and JavaScript is absolutely essential. I have been working and studying quite a lot on my own outside of the university, during the first 2 years at Vilnius Tech. So, I felt pretty comfortable with the subjects. If you didn’t work or study intensively during the first 2 years, the studies could be pretty challenging for you.

Speaking of my favorite subjects, I would say 

software design, software security, and server technologies have been the most fun for me, as I am a Java fan and a “wannabe” back-end developer. 

Accommodation possibilities and life in Austrian cities

If your campus is in Graz, you have a lot of options. 

There are a number of dorms and from what I’ve heard they’re not bad. If, however, your campus is in Kapfenberg – you have limited options. 

Here are 3 ways you could study on the Kapfenberg campus:

• Live in Graz (either dorm or flat), but take a 50 min train ride every time you need to go to university to go to Kapfenberg. 

• Live in the WIST dormitory right near the university in Kapfenberg 

• Rent a place in Kapfenberg. I personally was living in the WIST dormitory in Kapfenberg. However, I can recognize that not everyone would prefer that for reasons I’ll explain later. 

Kapfenberg and WIST dormitory

So, Kapfenberg is a small town. Its population is only about 20 thousand people. The town center is quite small and there’s not much to do there at all. There’s one shopping mall in Kapfenberg center, where you can get quite a lot of stuff. But if you want to do some clothes shopping or something very specific you will need to go to Graz. The same goes for clubs and all the fun stuff – you’ll have to go to Graz for that. Luckily, trains go every hour and take about 40 mins in total to get there from station to station. 

 Kapfenberg is quite spread out, so the population density is very low. Sometimes it felt like there were no people in the town at all. However, for me living in Kapfenberg was not a problem. It was quite the opposite. I like small and peaceful towns that are very close to mountains and nature. The surroundings of Kapfenberg are pretty. It is surrounded by hills and mountains. If you are into hiking and mountain biking you will enjoy being very close to nature. If you’re into a peaceful life or want to escape from big city life Kapfenberg is a nice place for it. 

However, I feel like most students want the opposite of their exchange, so I would say Kapfenberg is definitely not for everyone. I have known people that have gotten quite lonely and depressed being in such “isolation”. And that’s also a reason why I would not recommend renting a place in Kapfenberg. Because you’re just going to be completely alone. If you do decide to Live in Kapfenberg I would highly recommend living in the WIST dormitory, because that will be your best way to live a great social life in Kapfenberg. The people there are extremely nice because there’s not much to do outside of the dorm, the community there is really tight together. 

The WIST dormitory is located 5 min walking distance from the university. It is almost completely occupied by the students from FH.

Quite a lot of them are internationals arriving for either full-time or Erasmus studies. The majority of residents are just Austrian students, that come to live in the dorm from all over Austria. The dorm has a study room, a movie room, a party room, a common room, where people can get together and do some stuff, and a gym. Almost every evening somebody was hanging out in the common room, so If you feel like you need some socialization activities you can be almost certain that there will be at least a few people to hang out with in the common room. 

 

Also, there are students that are employed by the university to make life more fun in WIST and Kapfenberg. 

Those guys are awesome. 

They organize parties, game nights, movies night and so much more. They would often plan group trips to some cities in Austria or even neighboring countries. Because of them, life in Kapfenberg was a lot of fun even for very extroverted and social people. It felt like something was going on or planned every week, which is just awesome.

In general, I would say my recommendation would be as follows: 

If you want party and city life with ease of finding new acquaintances – live in Graz and just go to Kapfenberg by train. If you want to live in a tight community of students close to the university in a peaceful, remote, and pretty place – live in Kapfenberg

Transportation 

The transportation in Austria in general is absolutely wonderful. The railway infrastructure is supreme and will be your primary mean of transport to travel around the towns of Austria.

I would highly recommend getting a “Top-ticket”, which is a special train pass for students for a whole semester. It will allow you to travel around the Styria region completely for free! And it costs approximately 150 euros, which is totally worth it if you’re going to be using it a lot.

There is another cool thing to Top Ticket and Kapfenberg: if you decide to live in Kapfenberg you get a Top Ticker completely for free! 

Trains are usually always on time or like 2 - 3 minutes late which is never a big deal even if you have connections. Some exceptions might occur, but they are quite rare. 

The Austrian railway system also has a great app. So you can see train arrivals and departures in real-time and plan trips very comfortably.  

Expenses

Life for me in Austria, and more specifically in Kapfenberg, wasn’t way more expensive than here in Vilnius surprisingly. I guess that just goes to show how expensive Lithuania has become now. But yeah, food prices are pretty much the same. All the other stuff as well. 

 The only things you will be paying way more for are taxis and transportation in general, as well as general entertainment like clubs, sports and alcohol. Here's an approximate estimate of my expenses, for living in Kapfenberg: 

• The rent in the WIST dormitory - 318 eur/month. 

 • Groceries - 250 eur/month (I eat a lot and very healthily. You can manage to eat cheaper) 

 • Sports, fun and other stuff - 100 euros. (I was going snowboarding) So, the approximate total for me was about 650 euros, which for me is not much different from life in Vilnius. 

What the study exchange gave me?

In general, my exchange experience has been extremely positive. 

I feel like I have learned a lot in multiple aspects of my life. The studies were great, so I feel like I greatly improved my hard skills. Also, living in a very international environment, being the dormitory, I have learned a lot about other countries and cultures. It’s really cool to now have friends from so many countries all over the world. I have also learned a bit of German and gotten to know a lot about Austrian cities, culture, nature, and people