Being abroad with GEBHARDT - Mario

Während des Studiums gehen all unsere Studenten, neben eines möglichen Auslandsaufenthaltes von der dualen Hochschule aus, zusätzlich noch mindestens vier Wochen zu unserer Niederlassung nach Nottingham in England.

As ECS only has about 30 employees I got along very fast and the working atmosphere is great. The colleagues are very friendly and you can always ask them if you have any questions. The first few days it was hard to understand everything they said, because of their accent and the rate of speaking. But I got used to it very soon and was able to understand almost everything. Over the four-week period I supported the finance department and worked on invoices and other things like production controlling. Due to the fact that I already have dealt with similar topics in Germany the task was not very challenging but still interesting.

The bigger challenge was getting used to the traffic and driving on the left side of the road, but as I always got a lift to work and back home it was just a strange feeling for the first two weeks and not an issue. Although England has a really bad reputation concerning the weather, it only rained two times during my stay in June. I used the good weather to do sports and also to explore the city.

Nottingham is a really great city, with about 300,000 inhabitants and a lot of interesting places. A place you should definitely visit is the area close to the castle, which takes part in the legends of Robin Hood. Moreover just around the corner you can find a pub, which is a contender for the title of England's Oldest Pub.

In summary, I can highly recommend using this opportunity. It's a good way to collect some international experience, get to know England and its people and of course improve the language skills.

Thanks to Gebhardt for offering this opportunity to me!