Mobility semester in Bratislava

Information for incoming students

Welcome

Dear incoming Coxies, welcome to the MEi:CogSci programme in Bratislava, which you have chosen as your mobility semester destination. We, your host teachers, are delighted with your choice and will do our best to assist you to make the most of your Erasmus+ experience. This short material will provide you with basic introductory orientation information: if you need more, don't hesitate to contact us!

Enjoy!
                                        MEi:CogSci BA Team

MEi:CogSci programme in Bratislava

MEi:CogSci programme in Bratislava is hosted by the Department of Applied Informatics at the Faculty of Mathematics, Physics and Informatics, Comenius University. It has been running since 2006. Although our strongest in-house specialty is computational modeling, the teachers participating in the programme provide a much wider expertise in various disciplines. The teachers you will probably encounter the most frequently are Prof. Igor Farkaš (programme coordinator) and Dr. Martin Takáč (the student tutor).
Here you can find a presentation about MEi:CogSci in Bratislava.

Semester dates

The lecture period lasts 18th September - 15th December, 2016. The examination period starts in January and lasts until mid February, 2018. You should be done with all your exams and the project by the end of examination period.

What you need to do at the beginning

University-level

You need to fill in some paperwork and register in the University information system (more info on how to do it is here, please ignore the obsolete dates). This is very important, because the system keeps the record of all courses you enrolled for including your project - without their existance in the system, your teachers would not be able to fill in your marks at the end of the semester. The person of contact is Mgr. Patrik Kmetek, office No. F1-120, tel. +421-2-60295212 (or just ext. 212 if calling from internal phones within the Faculty building), Patrik.Kmetek@fmph.uniba.sk. Office hours 9:00-11:30. So make sure to visit Mr. Kmetek to sort out all the paperwork.

MEi:CogSci-internal

You need to bring home 30 ECTS for mobility. Part of this is covered by compulsory courses (10 ECTS). The remaining 20 ECTS can be divided between your project and other optional courses. Make sure to get in contact with your project supervisor ASAP and negotiate how many ECTS will your project be for (it can be for 10, 15 or 20 ECTS, depending on the expected workload - 1 ECTS translates to approx 25 hours of work, so a project for 20 ECTS amounts to approx. 500 hours spent on it).
Your compulsory courses:
Elective courses:
The full list of MEi:CogSci courses can be found here (note: only the courses with 1/W or 2/W in the 5th column are offered in the winter semester). Some specialized courses are provided in English (marked with *) and also two introductory courses which some of you might find interesting: See the course schedule for the 1st year and 2nd year cognitive science courses. The schedule is in Slovak, so a better way to look for the time and place of a course you are interested in is to first look for the course in the list of courses, then enter the code of the course (e.g. 2-IKV-102) into a search bar (left of the button 'Hľadaj', which means search) of this interactive schedule application. 
After you choose your courses and negotiate the ECTS for project, start working on a detailed specification for your project. This will result in filling in your learning contract (LC). The form is available on the MEi:Cogsci portal, a local copy can be found here. After your supervisor approves you the final version of the contract, send it via email to your home and host coordinators for their approval, with cc to your supervisor. Your host coordinator is Prof. Igor Farkaš. Detailed instructions can be found in the LC form.

What you need to do at the end

MEi:CogSci-internal

After you have successfuly passed your exams and completed the project, you need to bring home the signed and stamped LC. At this stage, include a summary (3000-5000 characters) of your project findings in the LC form and get your supervisor to sign it and fill in the grade of the project. The local coordinator then fills the grades for the courses you took and adds his signature and stamp. When back home, deliver the LC to your home coordinator.

University-level

There is some paperwork to take home, obtainable either from the study office, or Mr. Kmetek. Visit Mr. Kmetek for details.

Cogsci community

While our 2nd year students will be at their mobility semester, our 1st year students are here, so get in contact with them to get useful introduction to student's life in Bratislava. The first good opportunity to meet them, as well as your teachers and our last year's graduates, is our annual Cognitive beer event, that will take place on Tuesday 20th Sept 2016 from 19:00 in Patronsky pivovar pub. You are cordially invited. Follow also our MEi:CogSci Bratislava Facebook page.

Useful info about the Faculty

How to get there.

Opening hours

The buliding has two entrances: from the South (Physics building) and from the East (Mathematics building). Most of your classes will take place in the Informatics building which is attached to Mathematics, so you will want to use the East entrance. After entering the building and passing the reception, turn right for the Informatics building. The East entrance is open on working days bw 6:00-20:15. After these hours use the Physics entrance (both buildings are connected).

Where to eat

The Faculty has two school canteens and a cafeteria. One large canteen (FAYNFOOD) and the cafeteria are located in the Physics building - very close to the entrance, the other canteen (FREEFOOD) is in the Mathematics building at the very end of the long corridor that you enter if you go straight from the reception. The current menu, as well as other dining options, can be found here. Note: the food in FREEFOOD is not free :), the cost of a lunch in the canteens is around 3,30 eur, with a possible discount on ISIC card. Besides our Faculty, there are several buffees, a cafeteria and a pizzeria in the nearby Faculty of natural sciences, and plenty others are in the student's dormitory area in Slávičie údolie.

Library

The Faculty's library is on the basement floor of the Informatics building. Besides books on math and physics, it recently dedicated a special shelf to several hundreds of cognitive science related books.

Internet

Eduroam Wifi is available in the Faculty buildings - you should be available to log in with your home university Eduroam credentials.

Practical info about Bratislava

Public transport in BA.
Lots of other practical information about life in Bratislava can be found here.


Last modified Jan 24, 2017.