Impressions from the first year in the Faculty

hhFelix Hoffman is a BA student from Germany, who is studying International politics and development at the Faculty. After being here for one year, Felix agreed to share his perspective.

What motivated you to choose this field of studies?

I have a strong general interest in politics and history. Specifically, a word “development” seemed to be interesting, since it looked more about applied politics, than theory. For me it means to look into exemplary cases, into current development politics of specific players, looking into history and thinking about the future.

What did make you interested in this particular program at PMDF?

I decided to come to Lithuania because of personal reasons in the first place and then started to look for an international program to study in. The choices for international students in politics and history weren’t too many, so I decided to choose international politics and development. I thought this program would suit my personal interests the best. Moreover, I liked the idea of learning another language, which was provided by this faculty.

What were your first impressions about studying here? Did they change over the time?

The concept of giving first and second year students a required amount of general education seemed a really great idea, quality of the side classes could be improved, though.

In the first semester I had an introductory class to Development which was really good! The lecturer had deep knowledge of her field, held very interesting conversation, always had a suiting exemplary case for any question connected to development, tried to challenge the students and their opinions and most importantly, she spoke really good English!

What do like about studying here?

There are a lot of opportunities to engage into university life besides the curriculum and you are encouraged by the university to take opportunities for internships, exchange programs, etc. As a student you definitely get not overloaded with work, yet personally I like to be pushed and challenged more often, also within the subjects!

The Moodle and the FirstClass online systems, as well as a general strong online presence, surely are big plusses for the University and studies. I also still believe that teaching general knowledge to younger students is a great idea.

How would you estimate the quality of the teaching?

Of course, it depends on the particular subject and lecturer. There are classes like my Arabic course, which I was very happy to attend, because I knew I would learn something. On the other hand, at some classes I wasn’t happy with the quality of teaching.

Which are your favourite subjects?

Arabic, History of Civilization, History of Lithuanian culture, introductory class for development, International relations and governance.

In your opinion, what could be improved in your program?

There should be more classes connected to the actual field of studies (Politics and development), in my opinion. Yet the language classes should be kept up, I believe it’s important to speak more than one or two languages in this field of studies, but maybe one more mandatory political class could be added.

Interview was taken by Anton Chernetskyi (student of the Faculty of Political science and Diplomacy).