Hello everyone!

This is my first post as a student ambassador for LiU and I am already very excited for what is to come in the following year! For those of you that don’t know me: my name is Iris, and I am a double degree student from Vienna, Austria.

Some of you might ask themselves, what is a double degree student? I have to agree, this is not a very common concept and a lot of people raise their eyebrows in question to this. But let me explain!

I started my master’s program, which is called “Medical and Pharmaceutical Biotechnology” in Austria. As part of a cooperation between my home university and LiU, a small group of students gets the chance to study “Experimental and Medical Bioscience” for one year. After one year in Austria, one in Sweden and two master thesis defenses, those double degree students get two master’s degrees for the price of one.

As soon as I heard, that this is an option, I knew I wanted to apply and go to Sweden. After being here for about two months now, I can say that this is one of the best decisions I have ever made!

If you are Austrian or know the culture a little, you know how fond we are of titles. So having two titles in two years gives you so much bragging opportunities. Okay, this might be a little exaggerated but there is a grain of truth in there!

Apart from this, there are so many other positive aspects about studying biomedicine at LiU.

The learning concept in this programme is so different from the one I am used to, that it took me a little to adjust. However, now I absolutely adore it! Back home, our courses mostly resolve around lectures and laboratory. Sometimes there is a group presentation, but this is not the daily agenda. At LiU lectures are only one puzzle piece.

For example, in our “Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine” course we had – apart from lectures – PBL (problem based learning) or tutorial groups, where a short text or figure is discusses within a group of students, and a laboratory. It also included a seminar, where we came up with our own stem cell therapy for a disease.

I have to admit, that this approach is much more work during the year. However, as you constantly read papers about related topics and formulate your own opinion, you become much more involved. I have strengthened my knowledge about stem cells so much, that I am now confident in discussing it with my peers.

The approach here is much more orientated on real-life applications, rather than exam based learning. In my opinion, this is very valuable in biomedicine!

If you are interested, you can check out the Instagram Account of LiU, which I am taking over from October 13th to 18th.

Now I am going to continue with the preparations for the next tutorial group. See you soon!

Iris

Pin
Comments are disabled for this post