My Swansea experience was absolutely incredible. I lived in the student village with welsh students and it really helped me feel like I was actually a part of the school and the culture. I took two required chemical engineering classes for my major: Fluid Mechanics and Thermodynamics. While I did make the same mistake that many abroad students have before me by underestimating the weight and difficulty of the final, I felt that I did still get a good understanding of the topics, as I would have at my US university. Additionally, I took a philosophy and a history course due to other home requirements. It was very interesting to see how in the UK they do not cross over into disciplines and those teachers seemed intrigued and glad to have engineers in their classes. Additionally, Swansea University was great about organizing weekend trips for the students and I was glad I was able to take advantage of several of them. Overall, my time in Swansea was amazing and I would love to go back and visit my friends.
What would you improve about this program?
The main issue with the program that many of us had was the lack of details prior to arrival. While we had courses approved, we had no idea there times or if we would be able to get into them until about 2 weeks into the program. Additionally, it would have been nice to have someone from the program actually in Swansea- our closest connection after the first month was in London.
