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A podcast about international social work. Made by SocNet98, an European network of 18 universities that graduates students in social work. In this podcast you can listen to a broad specter of topics that is all connected to social work in an international perspective.
Welcome to The Social Pod, a podcast brought to you by Socknet 98, a network of universities
sharing the common interest for social work in an international perspective.
And welcome to this episode of The Social Pod.
And we are still at International University Week here in Linz.
And this episode is actually the students episode.
So I'm just going to facilitate it.
My name is Steinand Wikold, and I'm an assistant professor at the University of Southeast Norway.
And as I said, this is the students episode.
So what do you need to make a good students episode?
Students.
We need students.
Yeah.
And I have three students with me here.
And please introduce yourself.
Yes, I'm Marius Dahl.
I come from Norway and I study at the University of Southeastern Norway.
Yeah.
Why did you come here?
I wanted to come here to Linz to explore a new country and see different cultures within
the subject I'm studying and to meet different people.
Yeah.
And the next student here.
Yeah.
My name is Joan Talleda.
I came from Spain and I study at Girona University.
And well, I came here because I thought it would be a great opportunity for me as a professional
or as a student.
But also when I saw that Mathausian Camp possibility, I thought that it would be something for me
to grow as a person because I'm very sensible about these subjects.
And I also expected to make new friends learning from other cultures, which is also nice.
Yeah.
Did you come here to be in a podcast?
No, but for me, that's great.
That's great.
And?
Hi, my name is Mary.
I'm from Germany and I study on the Ernst Abbe Hochschule in Jena.
And I came to Linz because I never had an Erasmus and I really like to meet new people.
And also I'm very curious about how social work is practiced in other countries.
Yeah.
And right now it's, I have to check, it's Thursday.
So we are kind of in the end of the week.
And you guys have been joining a lot of different kind of workshops.
Can you just, what is the workshops that you kind of really liked?
I really like the one from the US about the prisoners.
And how to deal with prisoners as clients because the system in the US is very different
to us in European.
And it was very cool to hear the difference.
But yeah, we talked about that later on in groups of the study with the students and
private.
So that was very interesting.
Yeah.
And we also did a podcast episode on that.
So if you're wondering, listening to this now and wondering more about that, you can
actually listen to the podcast episode just before this one, where we're actually talking
to Rosia Garcia about her workshop because she did it two times and it got really, really
great responses.
Of course.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, in my case, I would say that I liked all kinds of workshops because I got the opportunity
to learn different points of views.
I think that all teachers were really good.
And I also tried to work with different nationalities in order to meet these new people and these
new point of views.
So I think I could get everything from every workshop.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But how has it been?
We're talking about meeting other students.
What have you actually learned from the students?
Well, I would say they have different point of views, not only about social work, but
also about life.
We have different cultures.
We have different point of views and trying to interact with others who maybe don't share
all you have seen in your life.
It's so good.
You're nodding.
Is there other stuff that you feel that you truly learn from other students instead of
us teachers?
I just learned that people from France do have times for eating because we as Germans,
we eat when we're hungry.
Like we go and get some food and the French people was like, oh, you go now?
We just used to eat at eight.
I was like, they were just shocked about that we go eat now.
So just was thinking about meeting new people.
Yeah.
So learning about different kind of cultures.
Because there are students here from maybe, I don't know, eight, ten?
I guess ten countries.
Yeah.
That's really nice.
From the Nordic countries to Germany, Spain.
Yeah.
Do you have any like certain workshops that you thought was really good?
A lot of the workshops been really interesting, but we've had some of or talking about participation
and inclusion.
And we've had some workshops about memory or memorization of certain things when you
get older and practice trying to explain and have a activity for other students from other
nationalities.
Yeah.
So trying to explain and organize activities for them was fun.
But what was the main thing that you actually learned from it?
That's a good question.
Because sometimes it's just maybe right now it's kind of maybe something a little bit
hard to reflect on.
But sometimes when you come back home, suddenly it was like, oh, that was the thing.
What was like the take home thing you were thinking about?
The memory thing was more about a fun, like how to organize for other people and how to
make it so other countries with other languages could partake in that activity.
But in the participation and inclusion workshops, it's been more about how other countries look
at it and how they include and participate in the community.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's true.
I was surprised because I saw that every country has its own way to deal with their social
problems to prepare those services.
And I think that going all here, sharing that knowledge, it's something that it's better
for us because we can learn maybe new ways to deal with our problems because we have
those different ways.
But I think we have most of the time the same problems.
So I think that it's something that's good for us.
And that is just for the workshops.
But you guys had your your it's more than the workshops.
You guys been hanging out with other students, talk a little bit about that.
When you're living together in what's the it's a hostel, a hostel.
Yeah, that's right.
What have you learned from that?
From the hostel?
Yeah.
I like how it's living together.
We always used to hang out in the evening and having some beers or talking about different
things like about the workshops, but also about something completely not social work.
Yeah, of course.
Other things.
And yeah, this is very fun to me.
There are some groups now like the Czech guy always go to the Germans and the French people
meet the Spain people.
So it's very multi cultural.
Yeah.
Is it easy to get to know other students?
For me?
Yeah.
I don't know.
There are some like the French people again, they are very afraid to speak in English because
their English is not so good.
But we used to participate them.
Yeah.
And just say, yeah, let's hang out.
And it's like some Germans also can speak French so they can talk in this language.
That's great.
Because the language thing is a thing.
So for most of us, we do have some Americans here so that they do have English like the
first language.
But for the rest of us, we are not speaking our first language.
Have you?
What's your experience?
It's definitely more challenging to talk to some countries than others because of the
language barriers.
Like Norwegians, we learn English at an early age and most of us know it quite well.
But for some people, like you said, the French people or people from France, they tend to
speak just French and might be scared to speak English.
So it's kind of difficult to adapt and have social gatherings.
But we do have certain ways of getting around it.
We might use Google Translate, for example.
Works really well.
Yeah.
Another big part of International World Week is also going on field trips.
Where have you been?
We've been in the emergency sleep shelter for homeless people.
Was very interesting.
And so like we Germans, also the French people, I guess, and another international group was
very, very shocked about the system here and how they help the homeless people because
it's too less.
Like we don't know that there is so less help and we have another system.
So we were very shocked.
And what was the most shocking part of it?
The most shocking part of it was like that they can just come there from, I guess, 8
p.m. to or till 8 a.m. in the morning.
And even if they are very sick, they need to go.
And what was more shocking was that some people are even not accepted to go there.
Like when they when the middle of their life is not in Austria and when they need a shelter,
they just need to go on the street.
And this was like it's not very human.
Humane.
Humane.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I visited an AIDS center about the disease.
AIDS.
Yeah, exactly.
But I would highlight the one I did yesterday, which was at Adma 1000, because I'm very concerned
about that subject.
Although in Spain we didn't take part in the Second World War, I like that part of
history.
I'm interested.
And I saw for the first time memorials about Spanish Republicans in a concentration camp,
which I didn't know.
And of course, I have been told about that part of history.
I have watched lots of videos.
I have read lots of important information.
But always going to a place and seeing in front of you what humanity did in that period
is something that's shocking, really shocking.
Is it relevant like social worker?
Yeah, I think that it's something relevant as a social worker, but also as a person,
because it gives you a point of view and a point of humanity trait that you can get in
a class.
You just have to be there to see it.
Yeah.
Did I get it right that in Spain was the Second World War not topic in school?
Well, it's a topic, but it's something that is just not our part of history.
So we just have it a look and then we pass.
Okay, great.
Yeah, like the Germans are very into.
This is why I also decided not to go because we had this in school, like we visit Buchenwald
and I was just I'm a very emotional person.
I was like, why should I go another round in this?
I already did this.
I saw this.
I had this and I'm not going to be sad today.
Yeah, but what just happened now around this table is the added stuff that you're actually
now starting to ask each other.
What do you learn in school?
Didn't you learn this?
And then you realize something.
There's some differences like you're all in Europe, but what you're learning in school
is might be a little bit different from country to country.
And that is truly like one of the learning outcomes that is hard to explain.
That this just happens when you have students from different countries coming together and
then you start learning stuff from each other by talking.
Of course.
Yeah, that's true.
And we also had the host of the opportunity to ask other students about their countries
because I can be curious.
I can search information, but having a person who lives there and who can explain me some
certain things, I think it's better.
So that has been a great experience.
Have you been on any visits?
I was also on the HIV and AIDS expedition where I felt like it was a lot similar to
what we have in Norway, like a health station where you can go and get tested and all that
stuff.
But it was interesting to see how they did it down here.
And then we also visited the concentration camp, which was really interesting considering
we've had it a lot in school.
But when I went to school, we didn't get to visit any camps.
So yeah, it was an experience.
When going to that or talking about that, sometimes you can feel that, well, this is
pretty similar to what we have back home.
Did you notice anything that, yeah, but it's not quite like the small nuances that is kind
of, yeah, making some differences?
For example, I went to the homeless shelter.
And yeah, I think we have some something like that in Oslo, our Norwegian biggest town.
But it was like there was something that I couldn't really put my finger on that was
kind of a little bit different.
I think it was something about cleanliness.
It was something about indoor smoking, I think it was.
So I had a feeling to it that was quite unfamiliar to me.
Yeah, I saw on those workshops that, for example, in Spain, we try to highlight the personal
part of clients.
In fact, that surprised me because in Spain we call them users, not clients.
So I saw that here they have a more professional perspective.
They also have their own ways.
But in Spain, we try to go through that way.
And I think that's some kind of difference.
But as I said, I think that in the end, we just try to solve the problems in our own
way.
So for me, it's fine.
Now we are talking about the workshops, the teaching, the living together with other students.
But later today, there's a student party.
Yeah, yeah, we are all excited.
You are.
And this is also a part of going to international university, also having fun.
I know that a couple of students, they arrived here the weekend before, been driving through
Europe, for example.
Is that also having the fun and touristy part of it?
Yeah.
And also, we as Germans, we have so many drinking games.
We introduce the other ones and they are like, oh, this is such a cultural thing.
But let's get started and have a part of it.
And also have you connected to other students so you keep in touch?
How by Facebook Messenger?
We created on the first day, a big WhatsApp group with a QR code and everyone's, I guess
everyone's in there.
And we're always writing like, who's going to go there to this workshop?
Or we are now in the city center having lunch at this and this restaurant.
Does someone wants to join?
Or in the evening?
Like, this is a fun fact, we went to a bar and there were so many people joining us.
And now we found out that this bar is the place where is the party today.
Like, we already visit this one.
Yeah.
Yeah, I think that's for me the greatest point about my personal life here.
Because I haven't had the opportunity to travel so much in my life.
But I also like a lot to meet people from different countries because of that cultural
differences, that points of view.
And also another important thing, we have stereotypes.
And when I meet people from different countries, I can see that those stereotypes are not always
real.
I can compare.
And for example, I love other people.
And when I come here, I can see that I can keep in touch with people who lives maybe
1000 kilometers from me.
And I did, for example, last year, I had International Week at Girona.
And one year later, I am keeping in touch with those people.
And we send messages to the others.
And sometimes I met them.
That's because I made a friendship because I can see that countries are not barriers
for a friendship.
Yeah, that's great.
And I think that was so perfectly said.
And we're just going to end the episode here.
Thank you so much for joining the podcast episode.
And I hope that you have a fabulous student party.
Thank you.
Thank you.