Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
Thankyou, it's great to see you all here. So I'm just going to tell you a little bit
about International Studies. I studied Journalism and International Studies,
actually just completed the degree two weeks ago. So, it was five years all up. And it's
been really good, because it really you've heard about talking about getting all this
work experience, doing all the stuff on campus, but International Studies really helps to
complement all the stuff that you do on campus. It makes it even more employable. So let me
just tell you a little bit about what the International Studies degree entails.
So, International Studies is an add on degree. So that just means that you have to combine
it with another degree in order to do it. The degree involves learning a language and
culture of another country, and there are six languages to choose from; so we've got
French, Italian, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese and German. And there are these 12 countries
that you can choose from - so that ranges from Europe to the Americas to all the way
to Asia, and so basically you choose one of the major and during the degree you do for
two years or four semesters of language studies, and you don't need to have any language ability
before you start. So you can start from beginners, but if you have already done some language
studies during high school, well that's taken into consideration, you will do bit of an
assessment, they'll put you into the right level where you're comfortable at.
Yep, so you do that for two years and then around about in doing your fourth year, you
go on exchange for one year. During that time you're staying at a host university and you're
studying language and experiencing the culture, and you also have assessments from UTS that
you'll need to complete in your own time. So why do International Studies? There are
many reasons that I think you should all do you should consider doing International Studies.
One of these include that you get to go on exchange for one year, as part of your course
work. So it's kind of like a gap year in a way and so you also get a qualification afterwards
as a degree. You get to learn a language, and we know that in this time and this age
it's to get ahead in, I guess, in your career, it's really important to have another language,
and it's very attractive to employ if you can speak more than one language.
Also, the best thing about the International Studies degree is that UTS covers the costs
of Visa, flights, and also organising host universities and accommodation, and also they
cover the cost of insurance, and beyond the language and culture component I think it's
really great for developing yourself and becoming more mature. Developing your critical thinking
skills and maturity and these are all great for employers, and also for yourself.
So now I'm going to actually talk about my exchange.
I did it in Japan, and so I studied Japanese for two years. I actually -was not involved,
was not enrolled in this degree initially, I was just in a straight journalism degree,
but at the end of my first year, my journalism co ordinator had a talk with me and said,
why don't you consider adding two more years to your degree, because more time to do more
work experience and to go overseas and to learn a language, and these are very attractive
not just to journalism graduates but to everyone. So many of us might be a very bit worried
that you can't get the double degree at once. That's okay, get into your main degree first
and at the end of the first year you can do an internal transfer. You just have to get
a credit average, and by internal transfer it just means you just do it through the university.
You don't have to go back to UAC. So I chose Japan, mainly just because I had
some exposure to it in high school. I did it in year nine to 10, and I thought it would
be a great country to live in and to really experience. So I did my in country study in
my fourth year, last year between April to February this year, and it was fantastic experience.
It does sound cliché when people say it's life-changing, but it really is life-changing.
I've never, I guess, lived outside of home before. I've always just lived with family,
I've never travelled by myself. So this was a great opportunity to really learn, to grow
up, to become independent to do things for myself, and during that time I was at a host
university, one of UTS's many partner universities. It was like a prefect university. During that
time I was studying Japanese and also get really involved with student life. There was
so many experiences that I had, so numerous I probably I could spend a whole night talking
about it. So I might just share a few highlights of my experience.
So one of it was being able to be one of 20 foreign students who got to do got to be part
of a home stay tour at Hiroshima in August, so I got to two other Peace Memorial Museum,
to go to to attend the service for, memorial to remember the what happened during the World
War II when the atomic bomb was dropped in Hiroshima. That was an eye opener, and also
being able to stay and live with a Japanese family for a week. There's only so much you
can do during sightseeing, but to actually be inside a Japanese household, you see so
much that you don't when you're just travelling as a tourist.
We also know what happened in the earthquake and the tsunami. In December last year I joined
a group of volunteers and we went up to Hoku, to the region and I got to see for myself
the damage that was caused by the tsunami, and to meet people, the survivors, and hear
their stories and, to see for myself the recovery process was really an eye opener.
And also, if you see on the bottom right, I actually I joined a martial arts club called
Aikido. That was part of the university. My aim was to as part of the exchange was to
spend as much time to be with Japanese people, not with foreigners, because with Japanese
you really that's where you really engage with the people. So by joining the club I
really learned more about the culture. It was really difficult because my Japanese abilities
were not the highest and no one there spoke English, so to actually have to learn all
these difficult techniques, getting thrown about and, but having to learn it in the language
was a massive barrier, but to be able to overcome it, you feel quite triumphant. So it was really
good. There was so many times I wanted to quit the club. I was like, I can't do this,
but I stayed on to the end, even went to their summer boot camp. Where it was so hot, it
was a great workout, doing all these drills every day, and getting thrown about on the
ground and trying to do the same to other people.
But, no, through it all, it was really good just being able to do something that's just
inherently cultural and I really got, through doing Aikido, I really just had a really deep
appreciation of the Japanese culture. Things like their discipline, their perseverance,
their strong sense of group identity, social hierarchy and religion. So it's through doing
things with the locals that you really learn so much, and get it really, a new mind set.
So I might just finish off with just, how has International Studies helped me.
Well I've come to the end of my degree and I think what's really great about the International
Studies is that it gives me I can tell employers that I know more than one language, with my
Cantonese, with Japanese and English, it sets me apart, and I've just recently been for
the past two months I've been with SBS World News Australia and they've been really attracted
by the fact that I have Japanese and this coming Sunday I'll be actually doing a story
reporting on the Japan Film Festival, meeting two Japanese guests who are coming to the
country to promote their film. So, whatever you do, whatever language you
learn, it will help you. Even if it's not even if you don't end up doing a job with
that language, the skills you learn, the personal development being able to just do things on
your own, employers really like it that you've gone overseas.
So I really recommend you considering this degree, and don't and remember don't worry
if you don't get the combined, you can still add it at the end of first year.
So thankyou so much for hearing me and listen to my talk.
[Applause] So good luck with your decisions.