Matteo's Exchange to Northern Arizona University | USA
I arrived at NAU after almost 2 months of travelling the West Coast where I met some amazing people. Arriving in Flagstaff was like a bowl of fresh air after crossing the Californian desert and going through the hot, humid, and stormy Phoenix.
The pine forests there are vast and still open to the public for recreation, hunting, farming… and the local community is very outdoors oriented. In fact, Flagstaff is considered by many as the “weird hippy” town of Arizona. It has a much more liberal and progressive philosophy than the rest of Arizona, which is generally more conservative with a “wild west” mentality. The landscape is also very different from the rest of Arizona since Flagstaff is perched up nearly 2000m above sea level, much higher than the rest of the country which is low, hot, dry and flat. The campus is quite big, especially in proportion of the rest of the town (students make up about 1/3 of the habitants). The whole community there actually seems to revolve around university life, I arrived a couple of weeks before orientation and the town seemed very empty but when school kicked off the streets and shops got flooded with students.
Living on campus is very easy. There’s pretty much all you need within the campus and free buses take you around easily and quickly, although biking is very often faster and more convenient (bikes can be rented for free from the uni). This can actually be a trap as some students will stay within the campus and never really see what the rest of the town is like. You will find a stunning amount of sports and recreation facilities all in wonderful conditions and of course for free! Just to list a few: swimming pool with diving boards up to 10m and jacuzzi, gym on 2 floors with more gear than I could count, tennis, basketball and volleyball court, a couple of ovals, a covered stadium… to cut short, the school feels more like a recreation center for rich kids. Regarding accommodation, I was placed in a dorm with other American students. There is a possibility of living in the I-house which I recommend since that’s where most of the international students live and that’s where most of the social life happens. Orientation was the usual, but it’s a great way to make friends. I personally ad a great experience regarding the social life. Parties were often held either in the I-house or in houses of Americans living off campus. The group of international students was very active and involving in organizing road trips, excursions and hikes. The main problem you will encounter is the lack of cars amongst international students and many decided (although a bit late) to buy a car since renting is expensive for people under 25 and cars are quite cheap to buy. The love life is incandescent there, and many leave the country being in a relationship or having had a lot of fun. Studying wise I was a bit frustrated to find the teaching model to be much like in high school. Teacher will treat you as such and often will expect your thinking abilities to be in line with that. Attendance is primordial which will limit your travelling opportunities. The study load is very consistent with regular homework (easy) and quizzes to test students’ memory. Classes are mostly small, ~20 students with some bigger lectures with max 50 students. You will find a lot of multiple choices based tests. There are also much less holidays than here at Murdoch with only 10 days in fall for Thanksgiving. The health center is really good and located in the middle of the campus, very accessible in case of need. The Meal Plan offered were very convenient and many students found it cheaper than cooking themselves. The variety of options to eat is decent even though you’ll crave some non-GMOs/healthy food after a while! With a group of friends we travelled to Utah to see the canyons, do the Angels’ landing hike and camp out in the woods. It was a great experience that I would recommend as well as Fossil Creek waterfalls on the way to Phoenix. Many people travelled to California, Las Vegas and Phoenix during weekends.
I would definitely recommend going on exchange at NAU, expect the teaching style to be different and get involved with friends to travel around and you’ll make the most out of it.
- Matteo studied abroad at Northern Arizona University in Arizona, USA
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