Aside from the differences mentioned in my last blog post, my classes at the Universität and ETH are similar in content from Northeastern, but with a different class structure. Unlike my Computer Science classes in America, all my classes here put a heavy emphasis on exams. Generally, more than 60% of the grade comes from the final. Very few classes assign projects/quizzes, and, if they do, the assignments are often light and easy to do. Another big difference with exams is that instead of all happening in one week at the end of the semester, they occur over the course of a month. Students at the Universität and ETH take classes from September-December then have exams for all of January before starting classes again in February. There is a similar pattern in the Spring semester.
Students here also only take 6 semesters to finish their bachelor’s degree, and most students pursue a masters as well. This follows the European system. The reason the degree is shorter is because students are required to declare majors when they enter college. If they want to change majors, they need to start over from the beginning, whereas the American system offers more flexibility. Students here are also not capped at taking 4 classes a semester. They can take any number of classes over the 20 ETC required to be a full time student. Classes are assigned ETC’s based on the professor’s opinion on how difficult and much work the class is. Most classes are 4 ETC’s, with harder ones including lab sections being 6 or 8 ETC’s and smaller seminars being worth 2 ETC’s. This system means it is very common for students to be taking 3-7 classes a semester, although the university recommends taking 4-5 classes. One of the other study abroad students from Australia is taking 9 classes this semester.
Other than the system differences, the main difference for me is that the students knock on the table as a form of applause after every class. Because I’m not used to doing this, I always forget to do it, and it catches me by surprise. There is also a 15 minute break in the middle of class, signaled by the bells that ring on the hour and 15 past. Overall the class system here seems a lot more structured than in America.
