University of Applied Sciences, Fulda

The Second Part of the Interview

Question 1

With this question the writer hoped that the interviewees would talk about all those areas which were totally new to them and whose existence they had been unaware of before. It must be noted that this question was only posed in the context of education and did not refer to personal relationships.

Question 2

In this question contact with students and professors was the focus of attention. The contact with the professors, as was indicated before, could influence the mood of the students and encourage them to study deeply. The contact with fellow students, on the other hand, could ease the consequences of culture shock and help the students to recover more quickly.

Question 3

The question aimed at parts of the study program which did not meet the participants’ expectations and had caused frustrations. These are the areas which, at home, would have been familiar to the students but are functioning in a different way in the new environment.
The areas of importance referred to in question 3 covered those parts which were the most problematic. The following example can clarify the point. For one of the students the grades for some of the courses were necessary for the places she wanted to apply to for a job after her studies. These subjects were the ones which were passed or failed only on the basis of attendance. This made her so uncomfortable that she finally changed the university to make sure she would not be rejected because of this system of evaluation.

Question4

As was explained before, the city of Fulda is a small city in the middle of Germany. Like in most small cities, most of the residents belong to older generations, and not much is going on in the city during holidays and weekends. Some of the participants wondered if the city was appropriate for a program whose aim it is to get involved more and more in intercultural communication.
The issue took up a good part of the discussions on the evaluation day. Therefore, upon the suggestion of the advisor, the question about the city was added to find out what the students expected from the city or what kind of city they would deem appropriate for such a program.

Question 5

Although most of the participants had received scholarships, there were still many who had to earn their living. Due to the size of the city, it was difficult for these students to find an appropriate part-time job. Furthermore, some of them had negative experiences with the employers. In some cases they were denied the job because they were foreigners. The aim of the writer was to find out how
the participants had solved this problem and what kind of help they expected from the university.