Reviews of Universiteit van Amsterdam (UVA) | Netherlands

Useful | 0

Milena A

Lunds Universitet, Lund, Sweden
Linguistics, Graduate, Independent

Student life

Describe host city:

Students equally interact with the local and student community

Travel: Takes place mostly outside the university/student environment

Activities, Nightlife: Takes place both within and outside of the university/student environment

Personal social experience

Activities

Nightlife

Travel

Overall

Personal comments

Highly recommendable is the Café De 2 Prinsen on the corner Prinsengracht/Prinsenstraat. It is a student place for mainly Dutch student (good place to meet locals) and they give student reduction on beer and wine and have a good selection of music. Small but very cosy and nice.

Useful | 4

Milena A

Lunds Universitet, Lund, Sweden
Linguistics, Graduate, Independent

Housing

Type of housing: corridor room

Arranged by: Host university

If returning, I would choose: corridor room

Why?

It is a great advantage to live together with other students. You emeditly have a social network through the common situation. I met a lot of new friends through my year in a student accomodation. Highly recommendable.

Personal assessment

Cost

Facilities

Location

Cleanliness

Space

Personal comments

The housing at the UvA is in particular arranged for Master students. Most of them get a prety nice (and expensive) room. But there also are less nice and equally expensive accomodations, but in the end, the quality of the housing depends on the people you live with. In general I can say that most of the students were happy to have a place to stay at all and some places are really well located.

Useful | 0

Milena A

Lunds Universitet, Lund, Sweden
Linguistics, Graduate, Independent

Languages

Language of instruction: English

Local language was: Different than language of instruction

Was learning English a key decision factor?

Yes, I wanted to improve my English

Was learning the local language a key decision factor?

Yes, I wanted to improve my the local language

How much did you improve your English?

My level before: At ease in most situations
My level after: No problems in any areas (including slang)

How much did you improve your the local language?

My level before: Did not speak it
My level after: Everyday knowledge (shopping, directions, etc.)

Language difficulties

Social

Educational

Administrative / Institutional

Overall

Personal comments

Amsterdam is a very international city. nglish is spoken almost everywhere, which makes it hard to learn Dutch.

Useful | 0

Milena A

Lunds Universitet, Lund, Sweden
Linguistics, Graduate, Independent

Academic

Course recommendations

The University of Amsterdam offers a wide range of (Master) courses in English. It therefore is a good place to study abroad, but it is not necessary to lear a total new language first.

My academic experiences

Quality of courses

Variety of courses

Access to resources

Interaction with teachers

Interaction with international students

Interaction with local students

Personal comments

none

My opinion of the university assessment

Exams at end of course

Exams throughout the course

Essays and/or projects at the end of course

Essays and/or projects throughout the course

Overall

Useful | 0

Milena A

Lunds Universitet, Lund, Sweden
Linguistics, Graduate, Independent

Expenses

Main source of funding:

Family

Other sources of funding:

Personal savings

Work opportunities:

I didn't explore any work options

Personal spending habits

The prices for food and housing in Amsterdam are just very high. In addition to that is there more night life offered which is tempting.

Food, Housing, Nightlife, Overall:

was more expensive than at home.

Travel:

was the same price as at home.

Telephone:

was less expensive than at home.

Accessibility of student needs

Second-hand text books

Second-hand household items

Computers / Internet

Administrative

Money from home

Personal comments

none

Useful | 0

Milena A

Lunds Universitet, Lund, Sweden
Linguistics, Graduate, Independent

Overall

I wish I had known...

I wish to had known that you have to apply for the Dutch courses in the beginning very quickly.

In my opinion:

Everybody loved it, you will too!

Important factors in my choice
(1) Unimportant – (4) Very important

Academic reasons

4

Culture

3

Costs

2

Activities

2

Campus life

1

Party / people

3

Weather / location

3

Personal recommendation

As far as I can judge from the experience that my fellow students made is the University of Amsterdam overall a very recommendable exchange and Master university. But make sure to check if the courses you want to attend also really correspod to what you want to do.

During my experience abroad, I ...
(1) Never – (4) A lot

Became familiar with another culture

3

Traveled

2

Improved language skills

3

Met people from other countries

4

Became more independent

3

Partied a lot

4

Experienced a change in life

4

Advanced my studies & career

4

Final comments

Amsterdam is very centrally located. A trip to Utrecht, which is a very nice and cosy city, takes max. 30 minutes by train. Use the closeness to the sea in the summer. Zandfoort op Zee is also only 30 minutes by train away.

Universiteit van Amsterdam (UVA)

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