Postgraduate Student from USA

Living abroad was something that I have always wanted to do. When I came to Dublin for a brief holiday in November 2015 I immediately fell in love with the charm of the city - its culture, the people, and the time spent here stuck with me well after I was back home. I started to look into postgraduate programs in Dublin and stumbled upon DCU's MSc in Public Relations and Strategic Communications program. I applied, I interviewed, and I was accepted.

I attended a university back in the states that has 55,000+ students. DCU has around 30,000 students and, although that is still a plethora of people, it hardly ever feels like you are just a number to the university as it did back home for me. Being an international student means I am a little needy and sometimes clueless. Thankfully, the DCU staff is superb and their response time to my emails and questions are always within a 24 hour window. My university email is bombarded daily with updates on events around or on-campus so there isn't a lack of student activities for someone far away from home.

This is the first year DCU is offering my course so the professors are learning just as my cohort is. What I appreciate the most is that the professors listen to our suggestions on how to make the program even better for the following class. For example, the course is a blended learning course so half of the lectures are done online. During the first semester, many of my peers struggled with the online portion of the course and made their frustrations clear to our professors. It is now the second semester and we still have online lectures; however, the professors rented a room on-campus for those who prefer to attend in-person than online. Their willingness to tailor the program to the needs of the students really proves to me how desperately they want to help us succeed.

I will never regret my choice to move abroad to Dublin or my choice to study at DCU. I recommend this university to anyone who is looking to study abroad for just a semester or a year. You will not be disappointed.