Memories of learning in Liverpool

Sep 29 2008 by Peter Elson, Liverpool Daily Post

Dr James Roberts and Erasmus students at the Athenaeum _320

Liverpool is quietly ingratiating itself with the brightest young Europeans, reports Peter Elson

EVERYONE knows Liverpool is crowned Capital of Culture for 2008, but few know of other personal links which have been long-forged across Europe.

For many years, some of the brightest young Continental students have been lured to Liverpool by the Erasmus scheme, to expand their post-graduate studies in the city’s universities.

Although attracted by its academic excellence, many students come with only a vague romantic idea of Liverpool, while others were intimidated by its rough, blue-collar seaport image.

Crucial to the students’ enjoyment is the guidance and advice offered by the Erasmus Student Network’s Liverpool co-hosts Dr James “Ken” Roberts and Nigel Green, who run the International Society.

These two leading lights are among the many people who make the scheme such a success.

At a reunion in Liverpool Athenaeum, Erasmus students in the classes of 2006-8, from Germany, Lithuania and the Czech Republic, told me they were won over by the city’s friendliness, music, old buildings and dynamic cultural atmosphere.

Robin Mueck, 25, from the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany, who studied ancient history while in Liverpool, says: “My parents were thrilled by my time in Liverpool on seeing how much it had changed me.

“The Erasmus experience is more about personal experience than academic achievement. I’m so glad that I took the chance to come to Liverpool.

“It gives you the opportunity to feel the vibrancy of the city. Every second Liverpudlian owns a guitar and there’s so much live music in living rooms, pubs and clubs.

“Liverpool is the first place where I sang in front of an audience – they seemed to like my mixture of German, Lithuanian and Old English songs.

“I also met someone who will not get rid of me so soon, too. Music and love are Liverpool to me and vice versa.”

Inga Norkute, 24, from Mykolas Romeris University, Lithuania, studied the psychology of health and developmental psychology while in Liverpool.

“I repeated the same courses in Liverpool that I’d taken in Lithuania, which wasn’t that useful, but, interestingly, the methods of teaching were very different,” says Inga.

“I felt that the teaching in Liverpool was less creative than in Lithuania. The Liverpool lecturers like to do much more presentations showing slides.

“But I’d never had a course such as the psychology of elderly people, and I thought that was very good.”

While she knew Liverpool was the city of The Beatles on the River Mersey, and a major seaport, there were some surprises.