Is that really true?

Past experience shows that students from different countries often share their impressions of and opinions about German students and vice versa. We have collected some of the most frequent comments and present them for discussion:

German students often think that international student

• party more often,
• are less active in class,
• need more help with their homework,
• have more frequent overnight visitors,
• do not have many German friends,
• make friends mostly with other international students or students from their home country,
• more frequently occupy the common kitchen,
• seldom participate in the social events of their departments,
• hardly become involved in students' organizations,
• talk on the phone often and loudly,
• keep strong ties with their families at home.

International students often feel that German students

• show little interest in them and make little effort to reach out to them,

• would rather do group work with Germans,
• get impatient when international students have a lesser command of German,
• are not aware of the learning challenges international students face,
• have a popularity scale based on where students come from, in which Chinese and Eastern European students rank low,
• do not appreciate it when international students stay among themselves or within their national groups,
• feel bothered when international students talk to each other in their native language,
• do not make the effort to pronounce the foreign names and surnames correctly,
• are not interested in hearing more about the background of Chinese and Eastern European students.