Today's topic
My first culture shock in Japan and the English Professional Department
I am so happy to talk more about the English Professional Department as study abroad is so dear to my heart.
Let me explain, many years ago when I was a college student at NMSU in America my major was Hotel, Restaurant & Tourism Management.
In those days most universities required students to take some classes in a foreign language to expose to them a different culture and make students more international. For me I really enjoyed learning about various cultures around the world and with extra encouragement from my friend Eric Frappier, I started to study Japanese at NMSU. It soon then became my dream to visit the land of the rising sun and not much longer after mastering some simple phrases, learning the hiragana alphabet and a few kanji the opportunity arose for me to make the journey to Japan. I was excited as ever and imagined a lot of far-east experiences that awaited me.
Of course, to make it all happen I received a lot of help from the NMSU study abroad office, my family, classmates, friends and most of all from my Japanese teacher at NMSU
Henmi先生.
It is hard to explain something that one has not experienced and also you have to keep in mind that during this time the internet had just gotten into the mainstream so there was no Siri and you could not just google something. Overall I got a lot of help and I am still grateful to this day.
This reminds me of one of the first things that surprised me about Japan.
I was living in a mansion and at the entrance you had to put a card-like key in a slot to open the front doors and also to open up your room door but these doors were the automatic kind and growing up in Silver City, New Mexico the only places that had automatic doors was the bank and the grocery store so to have them at my place of residence was very fascinating and intriguing to me. Now this seems funny and probably strange but at the time it was a small culture shock for me. These cultural differences are one of the many reasons why I love teaching at NCFL and so proud of our students who have achieved success of their own in foreign countries.
I would love to get into more details about other things that surprised me and more about my experiences in Japan another time. Now I want to tell you more about the English Professional Department is the first 4-year program at a vocational school now referred to as a professional training college for English studies in the Chubu area. For the first-two years students improve their English skills, brush up on foreign cultures and prepare for life abroad. Classes range from general English conversation and hospitality English to IELTS and TOEFL. Then in the students 3rd year they will do a study abroad at one of our partner institutions for one-academic year.
NCFL partner institutions are Niagara College in Canada
https://www.niagaracollege.ca/
Burton and South Derbyshire College
in England
https://www.bsdc.ac.uk/
Southern Cross University
in Australia
https://www.scu.edu.au/
and
New Mexico State University
in America.
https://www.nmsu.edu
NCFL works closely with our partner institutions and we have sent groups of students to participate in study abroad exchanges on average for about one-month. I can personally say that I have stayed and experienced all of these places of higher learning and can guarantee that whichever place you go you will have the time of your life.
Upon completion of your 3rd year of study. You will then have the opportunity to continue at that institution and graduate if you met the specific graduation requirements or return back to NCFL to complete your 4th year of study at NCFL. Either way will have the full-support of all the teachers to assist you in job hunting. The English Professional Department is for students who want to do a longer term study abroad and if that is you please log on to our homepage and join us for an open campus.
