A new stage of my life...

Hi All!

Not only am I new to University but also to blogging, since this is my first blog post ever. I am Bence Jenőfi, a 19 years old freshman at Utrecht School of Economics, studying Economics and Business Economics (how suprising :D) I am hungarian and I came here to study for 3 major reasons. I wanted to study in English, I wanted to study at a highly ranked University with a multidisciplinary approach, and last but not least I found Utrecht as a place awesome. I am living here since August and the last 3 month just made me more certain, that I did not regret my choice. The freshman week was unforgettable...(indeed I remember evrything :P )

As the weeks passed by, I got familiar with various economic concepts from different social scientist and also developed my optimizing skills in math. However, the midterm exams went reasonable well, I am still waiting for those crucial endterm results from 2 weeks ago. Cross your fingers guys...there is something at stake! Meanwhile I started my second period of studying this week with two brand new courses (Microeconomics and Financial Accounting).

One thing you should keep in mind is, that friendships come just as fast as bikes go by! (I meant here: bikes from your inventory) I also cant help but mention the two major types of Utrecht Universitiy social life: There are the ones who study hard and those who party harder!

I am really happy to mention that I am an active member of the ECU '92 study association both in the Relaxcie (party organising) and the Investment committe. There is an interesting project going on in both of them so I am not bored at all. Also, one of my great friends visited me this weekend who has never been in Utrecht before, so it was a fun time to guide her through the best places.

I dont know the policy about making advertisements :D but guys, if you want a really nice experience besides drinking only, look up De Belgie and Olvivier. These two places are unique in their own atmosphere.

And now...I have to go back to my studies. Hopefully you will hear from me again after I got my endterm results...

Exams!

Do you know this accelerating feeling of just having finished an exam, you feel like the weight is taken off your shoulders, the sky seems a bit bluer and you feel like the world is your oyster?
(Please sense the overdramatic touch here).

Well then the feeling that follows should also be familiar: „Dang, this was just one out of three exams for this week and I actually have to continue studying- like right now!”

If you can connect to this situation, then you have an idea how my day was. I told you that I would report about my studying efforts for exams, but surprise! I was too busy studying instead of writing this blog. This was my first exam (International Business Ventures) of the master and it was comparable to a Bachelor exam at USE. Well we actually had only two hours time, while normally almost all exams are three hours. But the amount of content and questions was of course designed for two hours, so overall it was not a problem to finish writing within this time constraint.

Now I have to start studying for a theory exam on Wednesday of Empirical Economics and after that there is one more on Friday (The STATA (statistical computer program) exam). After I am done with the study marathon, I hope to get back to you during the weekend after I caught up on enough sleep.

Graduation Ceremony

During the last three weeks the Bachelor and Master graduation ceremonies took place. They were held at the beautiful academie gebouw (academic building) in the heart of Utrecht, right next to the Dom. There were small-scale ceremonies each night and I was happy to hear that I had mine on one evening together with some of my closest friends.

Already a couple of weeks before the actual event we had to hand in our CV, a short description of our thesis and some personal information on which the individual speeches would be based.

On the day itself I was quite excited about the evening, since my parents and my grandma would come from Germany and my grandma has never been in Utrecht so far. Also two of my best friends from my Bachelor studies, who continued their Masters in different countries, came back. Therefore I am glad that USE is one of the fewer faculties that actually still offer traditional evening ceremonies at one of the most beautiful locations that the University has to offer.

On the evening we first got our cap and gowns and had to line up, while our guests already took place in the hall. It is a great feeling to enter the ‘Senaatzaal’ (senate hall) surrounded by your fellow students, who you got to know well over the last three years and your family and close friends awaiting you. Shocked by all the flashlights (yes, even video cameras) it was almost a celebrity-like moment, even though the big, black gown made you more feel like a Hogwarts student.

All the graduates took place in the first row and when your name was called, you stepped in front to receive a more or less personal speech followed by the signing of your Bachelor diploma. The whole ceremony took around one hour and afterwards more celebrity shots were taken, while there was a reception with drinks and little cheese (what else?) snacks. Some people took a bit too much advantage of the open bar and you would expect that especially students, who can be excused due to lacking financial means to be overly excited about anything offered for free, were the first ones in line for the drinks. However often they were beaten to the punch by a thirsty grandma or professor.
The reception was also the moment when everybody met each other’s parents, which was entertaining; since resemblance was often so striking that there was little doubt to whom everybody belonged. Some guessing games were already played during the ceremony before you were officially introduced, next to finding the only three ladies on the paintings in the Senaatzaal (which was quite a challenging task, since they were all wearing long-haired wigs).

In case you are concerned about your outfit, I can only say: Choose your shoes wisely, since that is more or less the only thing which is still visible underneath the gown you are wearing for the ceremony.

Now I am going to dive back into my study books and I will soon report about my current exam preparations: Exams are coming up!

Utrecht University: Good choice!

Welcome and hello to all of you out there!

In the upcoming months I am going to share my personal Utrecht Experience with anybody who is interested and willing to give up some precious minutes reading my blog. I hope to compensate your time by offering you insights into the exciting live of an international student at Utrecht University.

My name is Jana, I am 24 years old! (!yes I do feel old around here, but later more on that)  from Cologne, Germany. I am following the Master at the Utrecht School of Economics (USE) in „International Economics and Business“ and I decided to specialize in „International Management“.

Before I started the one year Master Program, I already completed a three year Bachelor study in “Economics and Business Economies” also at USE.  The questions I hear the most when I tell people that I am from Germany are: Why did you come here? How come that you decided to study in Utrecht?

Well, let me explain once more: After an High School Year in America, I realized that I want to follow a study completely taught in English. However, there are not many English Bachelor studies to be found in Germany and having been staying abroad once before, going again seemed appealing. Having been so far from home for already one year, this time I wanted to keep it close. Well, it ain’t getting much closer than going to your neighbor country. I like to have the option to be home fast and relatively cheap, while still being in a foreign country and “doing my own thing”.  Of course the academic aspect was not unimportant either: Dutch universities always score top positions at international rankings. After considering Maastricht University (with around 60% Germans, I felt that there are more German ‘Bier’ drinking habits and ‘Schlager’ songs than a small city and its citizens can handle), Utrecht University proofed to be the right choice. 

Tot snel! Bis bald! Talk to you soon!

Jana

For this is the end...

It’s been quite a while since my last blog and many things happened in the mean time. I finished my thesis and therefore officially graduated from the Utrecht School of Economics for my masters International Economics & Business, track Globalisation and Development. Before I will shortly summarize the main findings of my thesis, I will discuss the last few weeks of the writing process. In contrast to the early weeks, the contact with my supervisor was very limited because he wanted me to deal with the process and its problems on my own to be able to critically evaluate my research skills. I felt quite comfortable with this situation as we already discussed the main issues in detail before. In the meantime, I was still enrolled in the application procedure for an traineeship at the Dutch government, for which I was selected in the last round, the interview. This effectively meant I had to buy my first ever suit, which didn’t go as smoothly as I would have hoped. With my limited student budget I had to shop around for a good bargain. I found some pretty cheap suits in the renowned department stores, but none in accordance with my taste. At last, I found a tailor shop where I bought a very decent suit for a good price. They even adjusted the suit slightly for it to fit perfectly to my build. After watching a YouTube-tutorial to tie my tie I was ready for the interview. Although they considered me an adequate candidate, the stiff competition for the available trainee positions unfortunately meant I did not pass the final round for the Infrastructure & Environment department. One week after my rejection I received another invitation for an interview at the department of Foreign Affairs. Again, the interview went smoothly but they picked another candidate. As mentioned before, I was still writing on my thesis in the mean time. I will now shortly discuss the main findings. In my thesis I examined the relation between foreign ownership structures and productivity for a selection of 31 countries in Eastern Europe, Central Asia and Central America. As I had some difficulties finding proper firm level productivity data I used the number of skilled workers, or the skill intensity, as a proxy. I found that firms with a higher share of foreign ownership hire relatively more skilled workers compared to firms with lower shares of foreign ownership. This is in line with expectations from the literature and indicates that foreign owned firms are relatively more productive than domestic owned firms. The second part of the thesis focused on two subgroups of foreign owned firms, joint ventures (partially owned) and wholly owned subsidiaries. It examined the differences between the two groups in three respects. First, contrary to the expectations, the thesis finds no difference in terms of the number of skilled workers, or productivity. Second, wholly owned subsidiaries export relatively more than joint ventures, which could be the result of the vertically integrated firms in the data. Last, the key result of the thesis, joint ventures are more innovative than wholly owned subsidiaries. As I officially graduate the end of the month, this effectively will be my last post on the blog. I tried to give a true reflection of the Master year at the Utrecht University School of Economics.

Cheers! 

While writing my Thesis...!!

In order to carry out the research of my thesis, I have to make use of firm specific data, in this case from the Worldbank enterprise survey. These data are not publicly available and can only be used for research purposes, so I had to ask permission and explain the goal of my research before I gained access to the enormous dataset. My first task is to filter the interesting data which I can later use for my regression analysis. During the course of my research I will have meetings with my supervisor on a regular basis, to guide me through the process and provide me with helpfull feedback. I started 2 weeks ago, but haven't seen my supervisor even once. Was he sick, you might wonder, or can't he be bothered? None of all this is the case. As he is really into modern communication he prefers to 'meet' on Skype instead of in his office. This has worked perfectly well so far and we are both very happy with this way of coummunication. As I mentioned before I have to plan my near future and make a decision on what to do when my studies are over. I'm consisering to apply for some traineeships, because I regard them to be the ideal way to get a job in the current jobmarket. For one of the traineeships I applied for, het Rijkstraineeship at the Dutch government, I just heard I was selected to participate in the next round of the application procedure. As this is something I would love to do, you would understand that I'm currently very excited about it. I will complete this capacity test next week, so I will be happy to update you all in my next blog!
Cheers!

It's Thesis time!

I will start writing my thesis from next week onwards. The goal of my research is to assess whether there exists a home market effect for foreign subsidiaries of multinational companies in developing countries. In short, does the extent of foreign ownership influence these firms' productivity? If everything works out as planned I will finish my thesis and therefore my Masters' studies in about 10 weeks, so I should start thinking about what to do next. I really would like to enrol in a traineeship-programme. The application deadline for many traineeships is in the course of this month. This effectively means that I find myself writing several motivation letters for the most attractive traineeships, before pimping my CV one last time, hoping to be invited for an interview or to succeed to the next round of the application procedure. In the mean time, I’m working out my take home exam for the course Multinational Firm, which is officially my last exam ever. I’m not so sure if this is exciting or sad. While writing this blog I once again realize that I'm on the brink of starting my professional career. But before I will dress up in suit and tie, I will enjoy every last bit of my life as a student. In  my next blog I will tell you all about the progress I made with my Master thesis research, as well as my quest in search of a challenging and exciting traineeship.

Cheers!