Is the year abroad compulsory for MFL degree

[1y7]

I know that might seem like a daft question but bear with me ...

DD is in 1st year of a joint honours degree. French plus a non language subject.

The university has said that they don't know what funding will be available for the year abroad.

I saw a post on here which said Pippa Middleton wasn't allowed to do her year abroad whilst at Edinburgh because her marks weren’t good enough Now I know that MN isn't the best source for info on the Middletons but it did make me wonder:

Is the year abroad compulsory?
Is it dependent upon getting to a level of language proficiency before hand?

Ah you're right! This was in 2006-2007, so pre brexit.

Pippa Middleton wasn't studying MFL - you can do a year abroad at Edinburgh in third year in all sorts of subjects IF your marks are good enough. I did MFL a long time ago at Cambridge and it wasn't compulsory there - a few people didn't do it basically because they didn't want to leave their friends behind and graduate the year after them. I am sure it's tightened up now. But you'd have to ask your dc's uni for specifics

You can definitely go abroad from Edinburgh not doing MFL but then it's absolutely the case of having to have the grades. Two people I know have student kids at Edinburgh, one didn't get to go because they hadn't got the grades, one did, neither doing MFL. The one who did was doing STEM and had an amazing time at uni in Singapore. They got the air fares back from the uni and credits for the courses done in Singapore.

If you are doing a year abroad as part of MFL, you still get your maintenance grant and there is usually an exchange system going so you only pay one third of the fees in that year which goes on the loan. DS has also got two tranches of Turing funding, which have helped enormously. The stupidest thing is the letter you get from Student Finance telling you to get the cheapest travel possible and to use your student rail card. Doesn't get you very far out of the UK though. Idiots!!!

I really appreciate all your replies. Thank you!

DD did a semester in each and taught in target language in both. Apart from British Council, jobs are more difficult to get now. Uni gives dc a chance to make more friends. DD said some of her friends doing teaching assistant roles were very lonely in the evenings. Depends what you want.

I completely disagree with this, there are tons of hidden costs - travel, travel for a visa, equipment that can't be transported etc. I just don't think it's realistic to peddle the myth that there aren't costs involved when that's not the reality.

Bit niche, but does anyone have experience of DC studying Russian as sole/joint MFL degree now that spending the year in Russia has (obviously) became impossible? Have heard mixed things for Baltics (where some universities now send for example).

@buggybored Unless dc is already doing single honours Russian, I would not start. Joint honours is best - you then at least can go somewhere for the MFL. Unis abroad are not necessarily the same as here. It’s part of navigating the year abroad. In Italy, DD had loads of stories. Not sure how anyone got a degree!

Thanks but this was a specific query as to the experience of those studying Russian in their year abroad. The point being that now that it’s not possible to spend the year in Russia, I’d be interested to hear how programmes offered in alternative countries (the Baltics, Georgia for example) are going.

Again, not first hand feedback @buggybored but my friend’s daughter is 3rd year UCL, completing her year abroad in Kazakhstan. She’s living with a family (professionals, wealthy, English speaking etc) but I can’t tell you what she’s actually doing there study/work-wise, other than having a great time.

My DC is studying Russian and Ukrainian as MFL (though not in UK) and wants to do a semester abroad in Kazakhstan - the other option is Estonia. DC is planning to do a workaway this summer in Kazakhstan (assuming the visa process makes it feasible) to try and get a feel for it.

RLUS is the organisation that most UK unis use for their Russian language placements, and they're also offering Estonia or Kazakhstan. https://rlus.co.uk/

And to answer the OPs question, for my DC's degree the semester abroad is compulsory and they get graded on it (no idea how that works in practice, but assume there's a system). There's really no way round a decent period of language immersion to get properly fluent, imo.

Totally agree with Carnerloyle. DS has had to pay visa fees, some tuition fees at both the MFL unis despite also paying his home uni one third of their fees, had to take out a blocked bank account and expensive health insurance in Germany (German legal requirement, travel insurance doesn't hack it), pay for a medical for Japan plus the flights and a few kilos extra luggage allowance for going out for long periods. And in Germany at least, you have to pay for everything at the uni - here for example you can use the photocopier, there you have to pay. People always go on about going to Europe to study because the fees are lower - well yes, but the unis make their money in other ways! DS not able to work as does not have EU passport. I don't know who all these students with UK passports are miraculously finding they can work in the EU. Absolutely a condition of ds's German and Japanese visas that he cannot work and is there only as a student. They also get less maintenance grant for the year abroad - ds on pretty much full grant and it was a noticeable drop for the year abroad, though he has got two tranches of Turing money as I said up thread.

Has to be in each country for one full semester so has been in Germany since September, home for Christmas, then in a couple of weeks, then the Japanese semester is 1 April - 3 August. Single honours at his uni they have to be out there for two semesters. Edinburgh STEM student I mentioned above had to be in Singapore for the full academic year. Ds expected to get a minimum number of credits - he has to get 25 from each of his two unis and submit to his home uni the courses he is doing for their approval plus pass all the foreign uni's exams including language assessments before starting. The German language course for the language assessment was another £200+.

My niece did Spanish & Sociology at Uni of Glasgow and worked as a TA in the days before Brexit, and she found that her Spanish never got quite as good as those who had gone to the university in Madrid. She ended up having to get a Spanish tutor there, as she was teaching English during the day and living with other English students and she just wasn't making the progress the uni ones were. It was fine in the end as she spent a lot of time in South America which improved it no end but teaching in English and living in English abroad isn't always ideal.

I believe the Russian students from his uni are in various 'stans and some in Latvia and Lithuania, but would have to check with him.

@mimbleandlittlemy I think the work abroad anecdotes are pre Brexit. Sometimes about the poster themselves. It is significantly more difficult to work now and uni is the best option. Turing is means tested I believe so costs are another expense. However Brexit voters didn’t care. On another thread a poster complains about students who study English are all MC. Personally I’m not sure that’s correct but we really are giving out signals that MFLs are hard work and expensive.

Regarding unis here. They can set the work required whilst abroad and mark it. Not all unis will work like this, but that’s what DD had to do and that’s why it counted. I totally agree that if you work in English and live with English speaking people, improvement in your MFL can be slower. Being taught in your MFL at uni and living with locals gives a better chance of MFL competency. Plus it definitely teaches self reliance. My DD enjoyed her new subjects at the unis abroad but they had to do translation classes as well. So it’s not a year to miss in my view.

Pippa Middleton did English. I have never heard of a university making a year abroad dependent on marks for a languages degree because presumably the whole point is that your marks will improve because you will get better at the language. At my university it was presumed all languages students would do it but we could either be a teaching assistant (and earn money) or do the funded placement.

Usually it's expected but you can work in that country often with a pt course instead of just studying meaning you cover your own costs

bobomomo, LoreleiG - please understand that things have totally changed since the UK left the EU. Student visas for the EU mostly explicitly refuse permission to work as do student visas for Japan and Singapore, the two other countries I know about. It is just not helpful to keep coming up with statements on being abroad in the EU based on a time prior to 23.00 on 31st January 2020.

bobomomo, LoreleiG - please understand that things have totally changed since the UK left the EU. Student visas for the EU mostly explicitly refuse permission to work as do student visas for Japan and Singapore, the two other countries I know about. It is just not helpful to keep coming up with statements on being abroad in the EU based on a time prior to 23.00 on 31st January 2020.

👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼
These threads ALWAYS go this way and it's so frustrating- everything is different now!

Bloody Brexit!

As an aside, I fail to see how someone can become realky fluent in a language (assuming no-one else at home speaks it) unless you immerse yourself in it by living in the country in which it is spoken for a period of time.

You can still do British Council placements teaching English in schools in Europe, and depending on where you go this is a good option to make it more cost effective. e.g. DSIS last year got a "stipend" (so for that country, she only needed a student visa) which was about double her rent and bills for a room in a houseshare. The main issue is with paying for visas, documents required for visas, flights, and possibly flat deposits before any of the money comes in. But that's the same wherever the funds come from, because they usually only kick in the day the placement starts, not before. It's worth trying to save up between £500 and £1000 for these costs over the first two years of uni if possible.

Quite right - Rampant - it would be madness. I can’t see how you would reach the fluency required for your final degree.

Some people are conflating two separate things on here: a year abroad offered by some unis to students with good grades iat the end of Y1 so they can travel and study elsewhere, as Edinburgh does and often this is not about language learning; and the absolute necessity for a language student to immerse themselves in the language/s they are studying as part of an MFL degree. One is nice and a bit of a jolly, the other pretty much essential. In both cases though, the students I have known have been required to get a minimum number of credits required by their home uni in order to pass their third year.

@mimbleandlittlemy Im not sure all MFL courses require time abroad. I think some don’t but I suspect they are not the same quality of degree.

Some unis offer a year abroad for students not studying MFL. My DDs friend was studying engineering and went for a year to a Grande Ecole in France in y3. For engineering. He had French GCSE - no A level in French. He had to work really hard at French at uni here to be good enough to go. It absolutely was not a jolly at a Grande Ecole! The year counted and his French had to be good enough to engage in the teaching. Totally amazing experience!

See, I agree it might be an amazing experience. Or it might turn out to be a bit crap. And I agree it's probably essential to gain the fluency a French degree should lead to. It's the lack of funding that bothers me. DD will work to save up for it, of course, but the chance of her ever using the language in the workplace are virtually nil post Brexit.

Wish she'd done single honours and had the uni experience plus degree for 3 years instead of 4.

No, you're right, Tizer - bit of a jolly was a bit cavalier on my part. The student who went to do STEM in Singapore discovered it was a whole level of work totally unknown in the UK with enormous pressures put on them both by the staff and by the fellow students. The Singaporeans take academics very seriously indeed - but equally they got to do some amazing things while they were there. DS certainly hasn't been having a jolly in Germany, that's for sure. Has found it tricky negotiating the courses and the total lack of communication both from the German uni and the home uni and that seems to be universal including the EU and US students he has met on Erasmus. Fortunately the EU unis seem to shove everyone into the Erasmus programmes regardless of whether they are Erasmus or 'world beating Turing' (thanks, Boris) so he got to do some great trips even if trying to sort courses with the right number of credits that didn't clash with each other was a bit of a mare.

And yes, Turing is means tested so no guarantee a student will get any of it. Edinburgh do seem to pay for student flights though.

1y7 - having got cross with people for mentioning age old pre-Brexit experience - a friend of mine did a similar sounding degree to your dc's, waay back in the dark ages, and ended up with a fantastic job with Pfizer because of the fact she had German. She never used her German but they wanted her because she had it. Lots of companies are getting quite alarmed by all these English people who can't be bothered to learn a language and think languages are a waste of time (many on MN it has to be said) and are looking for grads with language skills, so even if they don't use it, they may well find they are extremely employable because of it.

DD is abroad teaching English at the moment through the British Council. It's not perfect as a means of language immersion as she's obviously speaking English throughout the day. But dealing with all the daily life admin and bureaucracy means it's still a great deal more language than she would be getting at home.

She's living in cheap student accommodation and getting a modest wage, so she's more than breaking even now, but the startup costs were well over £1500.

The rules vary by country -- some need a visa, some need an application for a resident's permit, so it's hard to give general guidance.