In April, 2011, I took part in an Erasmus visit at Oulu University, Finland. I was impressed by the effectiveness with which the English department is run and their concern to cater for the individual needs of the students. This was the most evident in the large number of online courses, which, however, does not mean that the students have hardly any personal contact with the instructors. Such online courses start with an intensive block of 6-10 contact lessons, which are followed by a period of individual work and online consultations. During these consultations, the instructor and 2 students discuss assignments and further tasks through a video-telephone system requiring personal presence. The written assignments are sent to the instructors through a special system called "Urkund", which checks if the particular essay has borrowed parts from online resources and highlights these parts for the instructor. For this reason and also because the language level of the students is, in general, impressively high, and they can exercise a lot of choice in their study matters, the idea of cheating is almost unknown, and the students have a positive attitude to learning. I was interested to see though, how they cooperate with a foreign lecturer as I had been forewarned that students are in general quite passive despite the fact that they have many such intensive courses with "fly-in" teachers. My experience was absolutely positive: the students were very cooperative and volunteered to share a lot of information about their language and culture. Overall, I enjoyed my stay very much; it was interesting to see an educational system and a lifestyle so different from ours.

Magnuczné dr. Godó Agnes