Sara Correira on Erasmus+ student exchange from Portugal

Sara Correira is a student of Cinema and Audiovisuals from Porto in Portugal. For half a student year, Sara was an Erasmus student of the Media production study program – Video Production module at Academia, Maribor.

As Sara said she decided to choose Academia because of the practical side of the courses. After analyzing the program, she figured that most of her classes focused on the practical aspect of teaching. At this point, Sara knew that this would add a lot to her academic experience since her Faculty in Portugal mostly focuses on theoretical studies.

In every class the teacher would start with some theoretical fundamentals – in the second part of the classes we grabbed cameras and went outside to shoot videos or take photos, depending on the subject matter. That was really helpful due to the fact we learned how to use most of the gear: from cameras, lights, to microphones, mostly by figuring it out ourselves. If we did not manage to figure a gadget by ourselves, the lecturer lend us his hand.

Sara continued that the college has great conditions, a studio, good material, a lot of computers and offers a subscription to all the Adobe programs while you’re a student there. What she also enjoyed about Academia was the workshops that the school offered. Here, she learned how to shoot photos with a pinhole camera and reveal them in the darkroom properly; Sara even ended up making a documentary about it. During another workshop, she learned about graphic design, how to make a logo, and how to use programs like InDesign. Both of these were really helpful.

The fact that Academia is located in Maribor, Slovenia was a big deal for me. I was first interested in Slovenia because of its geographical location. I knew I would want to travel a lot and visit other countries. Slovenia had the perfect neighbouring countries for me: Italy, Hungary, Austria and Croatia. I ended up visiting 13 countries in 5 months, which was a very enriching experience. After that I started looking more into the nature of Slovenia. It has beautiful natural places that I was lucky to visit such as Lake Bled, the Logar Valley and Postojna Cave. It also has beautiful cities like Maribor, Ljubljana, Piran, Koper and Ptuj. It’s also the perfect place for someone who likes hiking. It was a brand new experience for me.

Besides all the beautiful things Sara saw and learned during her stay in Slovenia, the best part of this experience was meeting a lot of new people. She met people from all over the world. ESN Maribor (a student organization for Erasmus people) was a very important part of this process.

This was the most enriching experience of my life, I enjoyed it a lot.
I will repeat it if I have the chance and I would advise everyone to do it!