My year in Paris at EFREI

Arrival: It all began with my arrival in the „Gare de l’est“ in Paris. It was not my first time in Paris but I was happy to see two students from EFREI waiting for me at the train station. They helped me with my luggage and brought me to my residence.

The first two weeks were not actual school weeks, they were integration weeks. In the morning we had French classes, and in the afternoon we had a schedule for visiting Paris and surroundings plus help for all the paperwork. These two weeks ended with a weekend trip, called WEI, where all students from EFREI went. It was a great event!
The first months of school were not very stressful, we had a lot of time for exploring Paris and enjoy time with new friends, great time. After the winter holidays, the first exams stood in front of the door. Even though they were a bit different to the one’s I know from my school, I passed them.

Second half and internship

The second semester was a very short one, cause to the 4 month internship during the summer. I’m glad I found with the help from EFREI a place in a research centre at the University of Paris 1. 
I immediately started my work there. In the first month I was mainly focused on reading documents about the technologies I was going to use, because besides Java, I didn’t know a lot about the other ones. Once I had a good basic knowledge, I started with the design and implementation of the application.
Because I was working at the University, I had the chance to work not only in the office there, but also from other places. So I visited different libraries in Paris and worked from there. Definitely not an easy task, because there are just too many students for the amount of libraries in Paris.

Transportation

During the summer, I also experienced a very different way of transportation than the metro or bus. I subscribed to the Velib service; this allows using bikes which are placed all over Paris for free. The annual fee is only about 30€. First I wasn’t sure if it’s a good idea to drive around with a bike in the small streets with crazy drivers. But very soon I realized that it’s actually no problem at all. Most drivers pay attention, and I had never a problem. With a free application for smartphones, it’s easy to check if a bike station has bikes or free places in advance. So overall I recommend this to everyone, take a one day ticket and try it. It’s totally worth it.

Conclusion

Looking back I think that the EFREI made a great effort to welcome new students from abroad, small problems with the class schedule are easily outweighed with the overall experience. I can only recommend EFREI to other students, who are looking for an exchange school in Paris.
The housing in a foyer is great, many different activities are being held, something that is very valuable once everyone is in an internship and you don’t see your class mates that often anymore.

Sebastian Schulthess

"Broschüre: Bildung und Forschung auf dem faszinierenden Gebiet der Informatik".