EF Educational Tours

Placement organization

Name of organization: EF Educational Tours
Town/city: Rome
Country: Italië
Website: http://ef.com

Student

Name of student: Leon Bladder

Specialist area: MT
Placement period: 2016-2017

Information about placement organization

Type of organization: Educational tours
Organization’s activities: EF in general:
Creating and providing tours to Northern American and Canadian students.

EF Rome Regional Office
Assigning tours to Tour Directors and providing help, assistance and support to Tour Directors on tour.

Target group of the organization: Nort-American and Canadian students
Company culture: There is a very informal and relaxed atmosphere. Everyone is approachable and easygoing . Always in for a joke but also always ready to help and support you.
Number of employees: 5-6
Dress code: casual
Did the organization meet the agreements you made beforehand? yes

Information about your placement

In which department(s) are you working? I am working in the regional office in Rome at ET/EA (Educational tours / Explore America).
Brief description of your daily activities: Checking if there are upcoming tours and if so, sending out PTC (pre-tour contact) and TDI (Tour Director Itinerary.

Managing:
– criminal background checks of Tour Directors
– Metro tickets
– Applications
– TDLinks (tablets that the Tour Directors use on tour)
Brief description of your company assignment: To Analyse the application-, selection- and training process in order to find out if there are ways to improve the effectiveness and efficiency. For example: I created an online application form because the “old skool” forms were not always clear to applicants or they did not fill in certain fields. With the online application form, some fields are required to continue.
Comment briefly on your supervision by the organization: You will get a lot of responsibilities and have to be able to work independently but everyone is always ready to help and support you.

Requirements for students on placement

What kind of personal skills are required for this placement? Work independently, sociable, flexible, stress-proof, enthusiastic, take initiavie
Additional company requirements for this placement? Basic knowledge of MS Office (especially Excel)
English: Advanced
Spanish:
French:
German:
Italian: Basic
Other languages:

The trip

Mode of transport to reach your destination: Plane

Accommodation

How did you arrange your accommodation? I found my room on easystanza.it but housinganywhere and facebook groups can help as well.
How did you go to work every day? Bus

Visa / work permit / vaccinations

Do you need a visa? No
Do you need a work permit? No
How did you arrange the necessary documents:
How much time did it take to arrange the necessary documents? I would start as soon as possible to arrange your Erasmus and Studiefinanciering
Did you need certain vaccinations? No
How long in advance?

Language course

Did you take a language course before you started your placement? Yes
Would you recommend to have a language course prior to this placement? not really, English is sufficient for in the office. For your social life however, speaking Italian is a must. It is hard to meet Italians when you do not speak Italian.

The costs in euros

Travelling expenses (e.g. return ticket): € +/- €250
Accommodation (monthly): € €500
Local transport (monthly): € €35
General costs of living (monthly): € Depends on what you want to do, but €300 p/m is enough for the basics.
Costs of visa: € €0
Costs of work permit: € €0
What did the company pay for/to you? Plane ticket, monthly pass for public transport and €5 lunch money per working day

Culture

How did you prepare for the country’s culture?
I did not. But it would have been good to look into the mentality and such. There is a more relaxed culture and traffic is complete chaos.
I would suggest to search the internet and ask people who have been to Rome how they experienced it.
In my opinion Rome is more chaotic than the Netherlands. People are more stressed and more relaxed at the same time; in traffic it is the survival of the fittest but people take more time to enjoy their food and coffee.
Did the culture of the country influence your performance during the placement in any way? No

Future students on placement

Future students are free to contact me for further information: Yes
My e-mail address: 133156@edu.nhtv.nl

Other information

Recommendations on what to do and what not to do: I thought it would be a good idea to go live with an Italian family/couple in order to meet local people. But at the end it did not work out like that. It is quite hard to meet and befriend Italian people because of the language barrier; most Italians/Romans have little English skills and thus avoid speaking it. For me, when looking back, I would have chosen to live with other students. But this is just my experience.

Do:
– Try to speak as much Italian as you possibly can; order in Italian when you’re in a restaurant or coffeebar. People love it when you try to speak their language, they are very patient and willing to help you.
– ask for house wine (vino della casa), it is much cheaper and in most cases quite nice
– only take white taxi’s, preferably at the special taxi stands

Don’t:
– Order a cappuccino in the afternoon or evening. (Italians only drink it in the morning because it is to heavy on the stomach)
– Ask for pineapple or chicken on your pizza, people will get offended, angry or just laugh really hard
– Ask for ketchup on your pasta. (just don’t)
– Believe in- and act on the cliches you heard. (most, but not all of them are true)
– Rely on the public transportation too much

Leisure possibilities in the city/surroundings of where the placement took place: Rome in general is a fantastic city, it is like a living museum.

Places to go to:
Trastevere is a neighborhood and is the place to be to go out and meet students from all around the world. In Trastevere you will find many good restaurants, clubs and bars which makes it the hotspot for youth and students.

The EF office is located near the Pantheon, this neighborhood has many restaurants, bars and shops. But also lots and lots of tourists.

And last, you should try the typical Italian aperitivo. At an aperitivo you pay for one drink and eat as much as you like from the buffet.

Media

Youtube link Youtube placement video link