Introduce yourself!

Hello everyone, my name is Rafaela. I am from Brazil; I have been in Australia already 3 years. I have just started this course, the Master of Media and Communications. Before that I was doing a Diploma and Advanced Diploma in Leadership and Management, and back in Brazil, I finished my graduation in marketing. So I used to study and I used to work in digital marketing, but this is like 3 years ago. Nowadays I am just a student here.

 

How are you enjoying the course so far, and have there been any highlights?

Well it is my first semester, so I am still trying to understand how things work for university. But I am very happy with all of the subjects, and I think these subjects we are doing now, that is Media Industries and New Media Management…Through this project [media and comms website] we are creating something that is going to be online.

 

Maybe when we finish university, it is going to be there, and we can look back and say we helped to create that project. It’s happening, it’s creating more content, and growing more.

 

I think it is going to be something for our career that we can put in our resume and our portfolio and really show, what we did during the class, so I am very happy.

 

How has studying at Swinburne compared to previous study you have undertaken?

Yeah so it was a big change, because I was working as a.. in a professional digital area, and I decided that I need to have a break from everything. Like in the career, because I had just finished my graduation, and I was trying to see what I am going to do for my future. And I thought it was the perfect time to improve my English. And then I came to Australia to learn English. So for the first 6 months I was just studying English, going to school almost everyday. It was very hard.

 

In Brazil when I was doing my Bachelor, when you come to the class you just have the teacher in Brazil. Just the teacher speaking, or explaining about something. You don’t have this sense of exercise, or group activities. It’s different. So it is more of like the teachers talking, speaking, and then the students listening. And what I can see here in Australia, and specifically in Swinburne because I am here, we have this sense of participation. So the teacher is explaining things, or trying to bring some information for us, but at the same time, the student needs to go through and find more information outside of class. So it’s not just go to class and study at class, you need to go home, and study from home, and search and get reference. So it is hard, but at the same time you push yourself to really learn and see what you want to do, and how its going to be, and try to do the assignments.

 

And this is another thing,  here there are so many assignments, it’s a lot of assignments, but they are not that hard. It’s just you need to have time at home, to sit down and search, and try to finish your assignments. So it’s kind of full time, student classes.

 

What has your experience been like undertaking the Master of Media and Communications as an international student?

I think it is hard as a student and we are far from home we don’t have family to support us here. The friends that we have here, they are in the same thing. They are studying, or working, everybody is busy all the time. So it’s hard, but at the same time it’s nice like I am very happy with the course. I feel like when I come to class, I am really learning something, I am really into the marketing, into the industry. I can feel this in all of the students. Everybody comes to class with this feeling that they are going to learn something. And also our teachers they are all from the industry, so they have experience, they know what they are talking about. They can tell all the students what is the step they need to do to get a job, they have experience that they had before, so they can share with us a lot of things.

 

Do you have any advice for anyone thinking of undertaking the course?

 

It is hard to come to class every night to study, but it is not impossible. It is not something so far away that you cannot achieve. I think if you have a plan, and you have a goal, what you want to do. If you have these things, everything like very…

 

if you can imagine these things, you can through and you can achieve that.

​

So as an international student, and I am from Brazil, I can tell, if you really want to improve your professional skills, and if you feel that a Masters or a graduation or any university is too much. It is not.