Study abroad

In April 2013, Ellie Wood dropped out of her undergraduate degree at the University of Liverpool, just seven months after starting.

In this time, she’d been forced to take on crippling debt just to afford university housing and the other expenses that come with living in a big city. Ultimately, the cost was too much to bear.

My first experience of the ENS Lyon was as an Erasmus student. I’d opted for Lyon over Paris in a bid to sidestep some of the inevitable year-abroad clichés. Neither the city nor the university disappointed; I left Lyon to finish my degree, wishing that I could stay.

See the Times Higher Education World’s Best Small Universities 2016 table here.

Angelina Pham, a nursing student at Oregon Health & Science University, tells her story:

See the Times Higher Education World’s Best Small Universities 2016 table here.

Aaron Martes, a forensic psychology student, on the benefits of a small campus:

If I had to describe my top three favourite things about studying at a more intimate institution, it would be family, opportunity and adventure.

See the Times Higher Education World’s Best Small Universities 2016 table here.

Alex Lussignoli, an Italian-Swiss student at the University of Neuchâtel, describes his experience at this small university

See the Times Higher Education World’s Best Small Universities 2016 table here.

Clara Carrera, an international student at École Polytechnique in Paris, explains the benefits of a small university for international students

I was not convinced about my choice to attend Polytechnic University of Catalonia in Barcelona, and I feared that I would feel as i

I’m Marie Rosszell, a year-4 foreign student in the Faculty of Business Administration (FBA), specialising in brand management. I am half Japanese, half Canadian and I grew up in Tokyo, Japan. I’ll start my full-time job in sales at Google Japan in October 2016 after my graduation in June.

View the 200 most international universities in the world 2016

Stella Sakellaridou shares her story and experience as an international student:

I am from Athens, Greece, and am currently a PhD law candidate at the University of Geneva and the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies. 

View the 200 most international universities in the world 2016

When I started looking for my degree course, I knew that it needed to have a year abroad. I’ve always had a love for French, and I wanted to take advantage of this skill and try something different. I found my perfect degree, physics with European language, at England’s École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL).

For students looking for an international experience abroad or at home, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Hong Kong or even Qatar might be the best bet.

Times Higher Education has released its ranking of the world’s most international universities, and these countries are home to the five universities with the highest scores.

University of Geneva, both in the top five.