The Year Abroad

Year Abroad students Four-year courses with integral Modern Languages components involve spending a year abroad in a country where the major language is spoken. Please note that all Modern Languages and combine programmes students who need to spend their third year abroad as part of their programme of study will need to achieve a Year Mark of 53 in their first year and a pass mark of 40 in their core modules of their second year.

Where Will I Go?

The year abroad is normally spent either as an English Language Assistant in a school (British nationals under 30 are eligible to apply for a salaried post as an English Language Assistant) or as a student at one of our partner Universities, which are:

France: Lyon 3; Nice; Paris II
Canada: Laval (Quebec City)
Germany: Berlin (FUB): Trier (usual destination for Intensive route)
Spain: Murcia; Madrid (Complutense); Madrid (Francisco de Vittoria - for Business Mngt & ML only); Granada; Salamanca; Cadiz; Almeria
Argentina: Catholic U of Cordoba
Mexico: ITESM (campuses all over Mexico), UDEM (Monterrey), UADY (Merida)
Chile: Universidad Chileno - Británica, Santiago, Chile (paid assistantships available)
Colombia: Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá
Italy: Bologna, Trento, Urbino
Portugal: Univ of the Algarve
Brazil: Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina - Florianópolis, Universidade Federal da Bahia - Salvador

Option to Study Abroad

If you spend the year studying at one of these institutions, you enrol for a full module load at your host university (this will normally be 60 ECTS credits), and you complete all associated module work and exams. The results are reported back to Essex, converted to conform to the Essex marking scale. The lowest marks (up to a value of 15 ECTS credits) will be disregarded, and the remainder will then count as three out of the eleven components in your degree (the other 8 components coming from the courses taken at Essex in your second and final years). Students taking two languages to Final Honours level also spend a minimum of 16 weeks in the ‘other’ country: there are no specific requirements on how you spend these 16 weeks.

The modules you take on your year abroad will be chosen to complement in a coherent way the rest of your course work here at Essex, and can even provide the opportunity to take modules in subjects, (notably Geography), not taught here. In addition to taking three assessed modules, you will be able to follow other modules on an un-assessed basis.

Keeping in Touch

You will have a local supervisor who will provide guidance on academic and other matters in much the same way as your scheme director at Essex. You will keep in regular touch with both this local supervisor and with Essex. You will normally receive a monitoring visit from an Essex staff member during the year. You will remain in contact with Essex (and with one another) via email and the Study Abroad Office.

Accommodation

In France and Germany, accommodation will be provided for you (if you wish) by the host university. In the case of the Spanish and Italian universities, they will find you accommodation for an initial period before you find your own in the private sector, which is normally not difficult.

Fees and Grants

If you are a British or other EU citizen, or have official permanent residence status in the EU, you will be eligible to apply for a SOCRATES-ERASMUS grant, which will cover at least some of the extra costs arising from the fact of being abroad for the year. Undergraduate students spending a full academic year studying abroad, whether compulsory or elective, are required to pay tuition fees to the University of Essex for that year, except for students going to Europe under the SOCRATES-ERASMUS initiative. These fees can currently be found on the Study Abroad Office pages.

Please Note: The above fees apply only to undergraduate students studying abroad for a full academic year. Students going abroad for part of the year, including SOCRATES-ERASMUS students, will pay fees as normal to the University of Essex; there are no deductions for the period spent abroad.

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