Class Time!

The week of classes finally arrived! Things are beginning to roll and we are settling in quite nicely. Things this week have been rather repetitive, so we thought we would limit our blog posts to once per week.

First off, wow! The buildings here are incredibly nice! Hyundai Motor Hall, their newest building, puts Gatton to shame! LG-POSCO is also really nice, but definitely feels less modern than Hyundai.

Our first class is International Trade Theory in Hyundai Motor Hall, Mondays and Wednesdays at 9:00-10:15 AM. We were pretty nervous as we sat waiting for the professor to come in. When it was about time for class to start, a guy in a suit came in and started speaking to us in Korean. There was a slight moment of panic, but then the guy left the room. Apparently it was just some sort of advertisement for some internship opportunity or something. The professor entered a short moment after that. He told us this horror story of a top student who did bad on his final exam and received an A in the class, not an A+. It was hard not to laugh at just how silly this sounded to us. 

There is a 3 hour break between that and my next class, but Colby has an Operations Management (Analytics) class at noon. He said the professor is really relaxed and he was guaranteed a B if he showed up and did the work. I really wish I would have waited to take Analytics here!

The final class of the day is International Business in LG-POSCO at 2:00-3:15 PM. The class seems very discussion-based. There are long pauses in the discussion, which felt incredibly awkward, but apparently these pauses are normal. The professor told us that he wants to focus on Asian companies, which is what we came here to learn about!

On Tuesdays and Thursdays, we don't have class until 10:30-11:45. That class is International Finance in Hyundai Motor Hall. The professor went on a tangent talking about teamwork and related to video games like Starcraft, WoW, and Battlefield. I think I will like her class. She goes through her notes really fast, but posts them online as well. 

We then have a break until our 2:00-3:15 PM Investments class in LG-POSCO. Nothing much to say about that class really. The professor seems pretty nice in there as well. So far it has been a lot of stuff I learned from my finance course from last semester. Still, I think this might be the toughest class this semester.

I say toughest class, but they all seem relatively easy compared to some of the courses I would take back at UK. It's really too early to feel confident about that statement, but I honestly feel like this semester won't be as stressful as I thought. I came here expecting heavier course loads and tons of homework. So far, it seems like the opposite is true. There is practically no homework in any class. The international business professor said he might want us to write a paper every now and then, but most of it will be in-class discussion. However, every class does have one group project, which could be good or bad. I enjoy presenting, but so many group projects can be hard to juggle. Then again, I don't have to worry about piles of homework, which makes things a lot easier.

So, classes are much less intense than I thought they would be. All of the professors seem incredibly nice and actually have pretty good english (despite telling you otherwise.) It's actually a very pleasant surprise! Even better, no classes on Friday! That means we have even more time to immerse ourselves in the rich Korean culture...and by that I mean we get to go out with our wonderful new friends!