Seven students from EUAS had an opportunity to participate in a short, 5-day Blended Intensive Course “Transforming a business model for a sustainable future” from February 25th to March 1st, 2024 at EPHEC Business, located in Brussels, Belgium. Aleksandra, a second-course student majorin in Human Resource Management, reflected on her experience of how a nerve-wracking decision to take part in the Erasmus program ultimately became one of the most rewarding decisions she has made during her academic journey.
My name is Aleksandra, and I chose this course because I am interested in ecology and when I was younger my favourite studies were biology and environmental protection. This is very important nowadays with our climate change – to develop sustainable models for the future. Also, the course was short – 5 days and at the beginning I wanted to try short course and participate short period to test myself out.
This was my first experience in Erasmus program. In my daily life I do not use English quite often, so at the beginning I was not sure that I remember my English and if can even pass the test. At the beginning I was scared a little bit, but preparation was done on-time and Erasmus coordinator supported us a lot and answered different questions and always on-time.
We lived in hostel in the centre of Brussels. Course was organized perfectly – presentations, games, group works, small excursion – not only theoretical part, but practical part too. We had enough free time in the evening to enjoy local food, explore Brussels and meet new friends.
The most unforgettable memory for my short-term mobility period was that our international group received II place with developed solution for big events including Decathlon brand and its products. At the beginning of the course, we were divided by groups – there were 10 groups and in each group was at least one country representative. All the groups got the circularity challenge task – ”How to improve the sustainability of my event in Belgium by using Decathlon’s products and services? We had to choose an event, develop the idea and represent it for the panel. The panel included teachers and Decathlon representative. The preparation part was awesome, but most nervous moment was to present your idea before the panel and other students. At the end we got applause and some time later we got a results and out of all the teams, we got II place!
During my stay in Belgium I explored different cultures, heard different languages around me and made a lot of group works. On the second day I already spoke fluently in English. ERASMUS helped me to improve my language skills, and not only English, but a little bit French as well.
This experience gave me more courage and also gave me new adaptive skills, improved my language skills, I got many new friends from different countries – Belgium, USA, Canada. I came across many interesting cultures and learned a lot of from their cultures and traditions.
I highly recommend each student at least one time per studies to try to study abroad and ERASMUS program will help you with it!