TAMK’s Blog Award 2013 to Finnish Language and Culture for Foreigners Blog

The blog Suomea oppimaan! - Finnish language and culture for foreigners received TAMK’s blog award of 2013. The blog was founded by Senior Lecturer Marja Oksanen, who teaches Finnish language at TAMK.

The awarded blog was selected by TAMK’s social media pioneer Cai Melakoski.

– The blog is a great achievement of a teacher who is up to speed. It helps creating a place and time independent learning environment. Students’ participation is the most important feature of Marja Oksanen’s blog. The blog is a great example of collaborative learning, Melakoski praises.

Oksanen founded the blog with the thought of inspiring foreign students to study Finnish. The blog includes Finnish language exercises and links to diverse themes students can learn by themselves.

An important part of the blog are the stories, photographs and videos of foreign exchange and degree students. The topics cover hobbies, events in Tampere, nature experiences, winter swimming, and sauna culture.

– Foreign students have so few Finnish language lessons that there is not enough time to bring up cultural issues. I was surprised by how eagerly students have shared their experiences in the blog. It is important that foreign students have a channel to tell about their experiences here. Incoming students and those considering coming to Finland can also find interesting stories in the blog, Oksanen tells.

Oksanen especially wants to thank the diligent contents producers. Anzhelika Manasheva, Russian student from the Degree Programme in Environmental Engineering, has written about her hobby, volleyball. Dumitru Coretchi from the Degree Programme in International Business is also interested in making videos. Moldovan Dumitri collected a Finnish story on celebrations in other countries into the blog together with other students.

Go to the blog Suomea oppimaan! - Finnish language and culture for foreigners

Photo: The blog is being developed continuously but every now and then there is time for taking pleasure in the successes. Dumitru Coretchi (left), Anzhelika Manasheva, Marja Oksanen, and Cai Melakoski.

Visitor from Carinthia University of Applied Sciences, Austria

Ms. Aleksandra Jama (in the middle) is discussing with the International Coordinators, Mr. Janne Hopeela and Ms. Ulla-Maija Takkunen and the CUAS students Felix Wiesinger and Magdalena Hamm.

TAMK was privileged to have a guest from our Austrian partner university, Carinthia University of Applied Sciences (CUAS). The Head of International Office, Ms. Aleksandra Jama, was here to discuss about the future cooperation in student and staff mobility.

TAMK and CUAS have many common study fields and interests in higher education so the partnership will be fruitful in the following years, too. At the moment, CUAS is a possible exchange destination for TAMK students in Business, Hotel and Restaurant Management and Social Services.

Ms. Aleksandra Jama met also the CUAS students currently in exchange at TAMK so they could share their first impressions of the Erasmus period in Tampere.

Text and photo: Kaisa Merilahti, TAMK International Services

Goodbye Tampere!

Check out the video of winter impressions made by TAMK exchange student Stephan Besseling from Hogeschool van Amsterdam:

The video has been shot in Tampere, Helsinki, Baltic Sea and Lapland during Stephan's exchange period. He studied International Business at TAMK for Spring 2013 Semester.

The spring season showed the very different faces of Nordic climat for international students. The spring semester started with cold and snowy winter months and ended with sunny and bright, even hot days in May. In March a rare phenomenon occured when the clear and colorful northern lights were witnessed in Tampere.

At the same time when the summer arrived in Tampere, the exchange students started to get prepared for returning to their home countries. It's time to say goodbye and thank you for this academic year!

Text: Kaisa Merilahti, International Services

New exchange students are here

While the degree students were still on holidays, the exchange students already started their semester with the Orientation on 3-4 January 2013. The Main Exchange Student Orientation gathered around 60 new students together to learn about studying and living here.

Exchange students in International Business, Tim Denissen and Valeriia Gorlushko, on snowy TAMK Main Campus

The new Erasmus students Valeriia Gorlushko from Poland and Tim Denissen from the Netherlands didn’t face any big culture shock when arriving to Finland. In their opinion, the weather is not too cold but the only thing Valeriia is missing is the sunlight. During the first weekend in Tampere, Valeriia and Tim were lucky to see the sun when having a walk on the frozen lake. They also saw people ice-fishing  and the fishermen were proud to present their catch of frozen fishes for the foreigners. It was funny!

The first day of orientation with different forms to fill

The students taught each others some Finnish words they had already learned

The main part of the arriving exchange students are from Europe. This spring the biggest groups come from Spain, France, Hungary, Netherlands and Belgium. However, there’re students also from more distant countries like South Korea, China, Japan, Kyrgyzstan, Mexico, Mosambique and Canada. 

In total, there will be over 120 exchange students at TAMK this spring. Almost 40 out of them will study in the Degree Programme in International Business. The Degree Programmes in Media, Nursing and Tourism will also receive more than 10 students each. 

Text and photos: Kaisa Merilahti, International Services

Tour de World – Torn between three places

America.

The one country in the world everyone seems to have an opinion about, including me. In August 2011 I started my journey to unravel the mysteries and stereotypes of the country. The destination: Bemidji, Minnesota. Excuse me where? Exactly my thoughts. I had no idea a place like this even existed but I was excited to see what it was all about. I arrived in Bemidji, Northern Minnesota, close to the Canadian border, in the middle of the night and straight away it was clear that the place was not too big; only 13,000 inhabitants. I still decided to give the place a chance and boy was I surprised!

The term “Minnesota Nice” really is accurate. People understood my situation as an exchange student and were willing to bend over backwards to make my stay as smooth as possible. From driving me to the Supermarket all the way to lending me clothes, people were very helpful. When it comes to friendships I made, I have to say that Americans (and Canadians) are easy to get along with. People are very friendly and interested in you, and as in my case, your home country.

Bemidji State University offers a variety of classes for business students and a lot of the courses are very different compared to the ones at TAMK. My favourite was Advertising Management where we actually designed and executed an advertising campaign for a local company all the way from newspaper ads to radio and television ads and billboards. Personally, I really wanted to learn as much as possible about the country as well, where the course Introduction to American Politics came in handy. I now have a better understanding of the country and how it works, which will help me in both my personal and professional lives.

Bemidji State University – Main Gate

Cheering for the BSU Ice Hockey team with the school mascot, Bucky the Beaver



I have to say that my thoughts about American people totally changed during my stay in the beautiful town of Bemidji. It is safe to say that I fell in love with the people and the place. Friendships built to last were made during my stay and I know I will always have a home in Minnesota. Obviously leaving from Bemidji and leaving everyone behind was hard, but at the same time I had something exciting to look forward to…

My internship in Melbourne, Australia.

Before my time on the other side of the world I had to return to Finland. Home. After almost five months in America I was happy to see my family and friends again even though I was sad to have left all my new friends in Bemidji. At the same time I was getting very excited to start my internship in Australia, my “home away from home”, thanks to my exchange period over there while I was in high school. But then again, I was not ready to leave my family and friends again as I just got home. Makes sense? Not really, at least not for me, and that is the exact reason why I felt I was torn between three places; I wanted to be everywhere and nowhere at the same time.

Now, after almost a month in Melbourne I understand what I have experienced so far and what I still have ahead of me. Spending an entire semester in America and then working for five months in Australia are going to look good on my resume! And it is not all about the professional life, even though I hope my time abroad will give me an advantage over other people. I have gained so much in my personal life as well. From the obvious of meeting new people and networking to me pushing myself out of my comfort zone; once again I got confirmation of the fact that I can do anything, as long as I set my mind to it and am open to new experiences. TAMK really offers the students an amazing chance to gain international experiences and to be prepared to work in the global business environment of today.

Enjoying the internship…

And to conclude, my favourite quote and the motto I try to live by: "To venture causes anxiety, but not to venture is to lose one's self" - Soren Kierkegaard

Text and photos by Iina Saikkonen, a student of TAMK International Business