Hello all,
For any of you Sutrofarians that are considering coming to Copenhagen, I've been asked to contribute some knowledge on what it's like here. With a couple of months left of classes, things have been overall well so far. I'll comment here about the academic issues and below in the last paragraph about daily life in Copenhagen. The academics at the university are by-and-large quite good and kept to a high standard - the professors are all very sharp. I've heard from other students that first year SUTROFOR studies at Copenhagen are much more natural science based than the second year studies. The second year is divided into two nine week blocks of classes with a week break in between, starting in early September and finishing in late January (with a week break for Christmas). They are centered around livelihoods and qualitative social sciences methods, and it is very common to be lumped in with the Agricultural Development students at the Faculty of Science in your classes, with no classes specific to SUTROFOR.
The first block is composed of two courses, Research Planning in which you learn a lot of theory about research design and have the opportunity to develop your plans for a thesis and Qualitative Methods in Agricultural Development, in which you learn some useful skills of data collection in the field. There was a decent amount of overlap between the two courses, and it's tough (read:boring) having two theory classes at the same time, but overall that first block was a very useful start to thesis planning and I'm glad I did it when I did. The second block is more science based, with an online course in Participatory Forest Management and Rural Livelihoods and Natural Resource Governance - I say this because you are not allowed to choose your courses, they are chosen for you.
Overall, I would say that the academic quality is higher than at my first year institution (Bangor) and I am generally pleased with the lecturers. There is a strong tendency to have multiple lecturers for a single course, which gives a broad array of perspectives. I do have some qualms with the style here at Copenhagen - the grading system is arbitrary and often ridiculous, the QMAD course had a lot of research and work, presentations and data collection, but ultimately the final mark was decided in a 15 minute oral exam that a lot of people walked away from quite disappointed. Apparently that's a typical thing in Danish education. Another reason that I was initially interested in Copenhagen is that it's a wealthier university that I perceived to have more funding opportunities available for the thesis work. I have been tentatively told that the university can provide some funds towards buying the plane ticket (and told that it's unsure whether this will continue in future years), but all of the other funding is up to me to find - there are lots of opportunities if you are diligent and know how to look, but they are all competitive. If you want to work in a poor country, you can apply to Danida (the state development agency) but they only fund countries with a certain GDP - Brazil, for example, is too high and won't be considered. It seems like if you want funding you can probably find it, but I haven't received the decisions from any of the funding sources I've applied to, so can't tell how competitive they actually are. Overall, I'll only be here seven months, and with the sun going down before 4 PM now, that's okay with me.
As for the daily life in KBH, it's an excellent city. Bicycles are must-have here, and bike lanes are on every major road. The city is extremely expensive, with a beer usually costing 5-7 euro, although there are opportunities to save when you look (for example there is a student bar on Fridays where beer is 2-3 euro). The Danes are nice enough people but difficult to access sometimes - most of the classes are made up of 30-50% Danes and 50% internationals, and the Danish are in general quiet unless approached. The city is beautiful, not many tall buildings, and not very large, with plenty of parks and green space. There isn't much to offer in the way of outdoors, although there are some impressive stands of forest in Zealand and Skane in Sweden. Public transportation, within the city and long distance, is quite pricey, but you can get an under 26 rail card and have half off long distance transport. Prices to rent a place in the city are very high, but you can get lucky too (I'm paying less for my lady and I to live in a small room in a shared apartment than I was for just me in Bangor, but I haven't met anyone with a rent as cheap as mine and most people pay double what I pay just for themselves, so it takes some diligence to find a cheap spot). The social life is good and, being the capital city, there's always something interesting going on (films, workshops, dinners, dancing), but being from the mountains, I find myself missing them sometimes.
If you want to email me with any further questions, marcustaylor2@gmail.com
For any of you Sutrofarians that are considering coming to Copenhagen, I've been asked to contribute some knowledge on what it's like here. With a couple of months left of classes, things have been overall well so far. I'll comment here about the academic issues and below in the last paragraph about daily life in Copenhagen. The academics at the university are by-and-large quite good and kept to a high standard - the professors are all very sharp. I've heard from other students that first year SUTROFOR studies at Copenhagen are much more natural science based than the second year studies. The second year is divided into two nine week blocks of classes with a week break in between, starting in early September and finishing in late January (with a week break for Christmas). They are centered around livelihoods and qualitative social sciences methods, and it is very common to be lumped in with the Agricultural Development students at the Faculty of Science in your classes, with no classes specific to SUTROFOR.
The first block is composed of two courses, Research Planning in which you learn a lot of theory about research design and have the opportunity to develop your plans for a thesis and Qualitative Methods in Agricultural Development, in which you learn some useful skills of data collection in the field. There was a decent amount of overlap between the two courses, and it's tough (read:boring) having two theory classes at the same time, but overall that first block was a very useful start to thesis planning and I'm glad I did it when I did. The second block is more science based, with an online course in Participatory Forest Management and Rural Livelihoods and Natural Resource Governance - I say this because you are not allowed to choose your courses, they are chosen for you.
Overall, I would say that the academic quality is higher than at my first year institution (Bangor) and I am generally pleased with the lecturers. There is a strong tendency to have multiple lecturers for a single course, which gives a broad array of perspectives. I do have some qualms with the style here at Copenhagen - the grading system is arbitrary and often ridiculous, the QMAD course had a lot of research and work, presentations and data collection, but ultimately the final mark was decided in a 15 minute oral exam that a lot of people walked away from quite disappointed. Apparently that's a typical thing in Danish education. Another reason that I was initially interested in Copenhagen is that it's a wealthier university that I perceived to have more funding opportunities available for the thesis work. I have been tentatively told that the university can provide some funds towards buying the plane ticket (and told that it's unsure whether this will continue in future years), but all of the other funding is up to me to find - there are lots of opportunities if you are diligent and know how to look, but they are all competitive. If you want to work in a poor country, you can apply to Danida (the state development agency) but they only fund countries with a certain GDP - Brazil, for example, is too high and won't be considered. It seems like if you want funding you can probably find it, but I haven't received the decisions from any of the funding sources I've applied to, so can't tell how competitive they actually are. Overall, I'll only be here seven months, and with the sun going down before 4 PM now, that's okay with me.
As for the daily life in KBH, it's an excellent city. Bicycles are must-have here, and bike lanes are on every major road. The city is extremely expensive, with a beer usually costing 5-7 euro, although there are opportunities to save when you look (for example there is a student bar on Fridays where beer is 2-3 euro). The Danes are nice enough people but difficult to access sometimes - most of the classes are made up of 30-50% Danes and 50% internationals, and the Danish are in general quiet unless approached. The city is beautiful, not many tall buildings, and not very large, with plenty of parks and green space. There isn't much to offer in the way of outdoors, although there are some impressive stands of forest in Zealand and Skane in Sweden. Public transportation, within the city and long distance, is quite pricey, but you can get an under 26 rail card and have half off long distance transport. Prices to rent a place in the city are very high, but you can get lucky too (I'm paying less for my lady and I to live in a small room in a shared apartment than I was for just me in Bangor, but I haven't met anyone with a rent as cheap as mine and most people pay double what I pay just for themselves, so it takes some diligence to find a cheap spot). The social life is good and, being the capital city, there's always something interesting going on (films, workshops, dinners, dancing), but being from the mountains, I find myself missing them sometimes.
If you want to email me with any further questions, marcustaylor2@gmail.com
