Was learning Spanish a key decision factor?
Yes, I wanted to improve my Spanish

How much did you improve your Spanish?
My level before: Everyday knowledge (shopping, directions, etc.)
My level after: At ease in most situations

Personal comments:
When I first arrived in Madrid I had an everyday knowledge of the language and although I encountered some problems the majority of time it was fine. But for the first few months of university I was lost, along with my colleagues. Because we are considered normal students of the university, we are in classes with spanish students (some of which had spent the first two years of the programme in Dublin, while others had spent the first two years in the UK, France or Germany, along with students from these countries). Then after the first semester we had to do an internship and I found that quite difficult too regarding the language aspect. But this year, the final year of the programme, I've had little or no problems at all with language at the university. We even had to write our thesis here in spanish and I remember back to first year thinking "oh my god that'll be impossible" and well in the end it has been a challenge but surpassable. I handed mine in to the office today, completed and bound. Yes!