International Students to St Mary's University College are usually of two types, ERASMUS students from partner institutions in Europe and reciprocal fee waiver students from the USA. The International section on the Homepage is the place to find general information. The following links in the section are the most commonly used but please feel free to look at the others to get a flavour of the International activities in the College.
http://www.stmarys-belfast.ac.uk/international/policies/default.asp
http://www.stmarys-belfast.ac.uk/international/admin/default.asp
Please bear in mind that information will be updated on a regular basis (particularly with respect to the course booklet and the general student booklet) so use it as a guideline only.
All ERASMUS applicants and those from the Universities of Mississippi, Millersville and Indiana, Pa, USA must initially contact the International Admin. Assistant - Briege Ellis. For semester one students this must be done by June 15th and for semester two students by October 15th. Your acceptance will then be confirmed and pass you over to Angela Vaupel who is the Academic Coordinator for International Students. She will allocate you to your Reception Tutor who will arrange your courses with you, coordinate your arrival in College and take care of you until you have settled here in College. Dr. Vaupel will then monitor your academic progress and will issue the final Transcript of Records. Briege, the international administrative assistant will answer queries about accommodation and local matters. You will be sent out an E pack with further information and all the necessary forms. These must be returned to Mrs Ellis as soon as possible. Please note that all courses are assessed, normally by written paper or presentation. Course credit will not be given without this.
Applicants under the American Scholars Scheme must initially apply to Dermot McCartan. He will take care of your pastoral and academic needs when here. All other enquiries for admission to the College should be directed to Trevor Abbott
Outward Students
The International Outreach Programme for St Mary's Students, operates in the second semester of the second year and gives you an opportunity to go to study in any one of twenty two institutions in the rest of Europe and the USA with which we have learning agreements. European countries include Greece, Spain, Portugal, Norway and Holland. Students normally stay at the host institution for three months ( some stay for four ) and in that time follow a variety of teaching programmes, some of which are similar to those offered at our own institution, some of which are totally different. For example students who went to Norway this year spent a period of their time doing outdoor education which involved skiing, skating and basic mountaineering. Students can also do work placement school based work abroad.
The time spent abroad is fully recognized by College as being equivalent to that spent in College and results gained abroad are seamlessly fed into the College grading system. Students on Outreach Study Courses follow normal classes until the end of December. Then they sit class tests as part of semester one assessment and normally go abroad in mid January-early February. On return, Education students do a reduced period of School Based Work. No further examinations are required.
The College tries to impose as few limits as possible with regard to selection for the programme. Basically, anyone who wishes to go on ERASMUS can, as long as they get marks of at least fifty percent in the work of Year 1 and a recommendation by their HOD. Education students normally require a grade B/C+ on School Experience. On selection, each student is assigned to both a College and a Host coordinator who develop the learning programme, help to arrange accommodation and give advice on travel, living in the foreign country etc. To help with costs, a grant is awarded. This varies according to country of placement and is in addition to any grant, loan, bursary which you may receive from elsewhere. Apart from the academic advantages of going on ERASMUS, the social and personal skills are also enhanced and it is a useful addition to a CV. See the International Section for further details.