Universidad Torcuato di Tella (UTDT)
Buenos Aires, Argentina
k90436
Travel report, Spring 2014
As the title states, I spent the spring semester of 2014 (or the local autumn, more precisely), studying
at the MBA program of the University Torcuato di Tella in Buenos Aires, Argentina. I knew the city
already beforehand and bursted into tears of happiness when I heard I had been chosen for the
named exchange. Also, I had heard nothing but good about di Tella from foreign friends of friends
who had formerly done an exchange there. Needless to say my expectations were infinitely high for
the semester.
1. Preparing for the exchange
As I participated to the MBA program, di Tella had already set some extra requirements for Aalto
when choosing the student. Not only had I to be fluent in Spanish (this was a requirement for all
exchange students arriving to di Tella, not only the MBA students), but also at least 24 years old and
with at least two years of work experience.
After Aalto had accepted me for the exchange, the process with di Tella itself began. I had to send
quite a bunch of scanned copies to them, including a proof of my Spanish skills (I scanned my
university transcript, high school transcript and high school diploma), passport. They also sent some
forms (insurance*, health,..) that I had to fill and/or sign. If I remember correct, most of these were in
English and all the emails from di Tella’s coordinator either bilingual or in English. I also had to write a
one-page motivation letter in Spanish. They told the visa process would be run once I was in
Argentina.
Once I got accepted directly by di Tella as well, all the communication was done only in Spanish. This
was not a problem for me since my Spanish was already very strong at this point thanks to a past
summer job in Spain, a previous exchange in Mexico and several months of travelling in Latin America.
However I found the sudden change interesting and strongly agree with di Tella’s requirement of
fluent Spanish.
Di Tella’s coordinator was very nice and helpful, just like our coordinators in Aalto. Once I got to the
University, the coordinator gave me a quick, personal orientation speech (I had previously agreed
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with her to miss the orientation day due to my travel plans and the orientation day’s focus on
Bachelor students) and then lead me to the MBA office. There are 4 or 5 MBA coordinators at di Tella,
whose job is basically to make your life easier in any possible ways (more on this topic in the next
chapter).
All in all, my experience of di Tella before and upon arrival was great. A few negative details to point
out:
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100% of the information provided on their emails was directed to Bachelor students. No
wonder, as we were only 3 (out of 70 I would guess) MBA students and altogether very few
Master’s students arriving to di Tella. However, as the semesters/study periods, requirements
and most importantly, interests of Master’s students differ somewhat from the ones of
Bachelor’s students, I would have wished a tiny bit of focus on us too.
I was pretty active myself, had gone through the University’s web pages several times etc. so I
pretty much knew which part of the information was meant to me and when to ask for more.
Luckily the coordinator was very helpful and always responded quickly to my inquiries.
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The course calendar was published only a few weeks before the study period began, which
somewhat complicated the planning of the exchange period.
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The insurance: di Tella requires all the exchange students to take a local health insurance, no
matter the student’s own travel insurances.
2. Exchange studies
Note that I’m now talking mostly about the MBA program related information.
As the four seasons are upside down in Argentina, they have summer holidays in January and
February (note: a great opportunity to travel after or prior to your exchange), and classes began the
first week of March. There was an orientation day at the end of February which I had agreed with the
coordinator to skip; again the grand majority of information would have been directed to Bachelor’s
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students. Prior to the orientation day they also offered a 3-week Spanish course for an extra charge,
but I didn’t feel the necessity for that.
Instead of semesters or trimesters, the MBA program at di Tella is divided into eight / nine
consecutive 4-week periods that run from March to November. The local students study the whole
two-year program with the same group of approximately 45-50 people, except for the few optional
courses they may choose at the end of the program. Naturally the order of the courses is fixed for
them then as well. They have two courses in every period, usually one “softer” and one “harder” one,
as they themselves say. Unlike the Bachelor’s students who have apparently all exams twice a year (at
the end of each semester), at the MBA program you have exams at the end of each 4-week period (so
every four weeks you have both exams and classes).
As an exchange student you are free to choose basically whatever courses you like and as many as
you like. The original recommendation of Aalto was 5 courses, but as the coordinator of di Tella told
that usually the exchange students take three or four courses and strongly recommended me not to
take more, we finally agreed with Aalto that four courses would be a suitable amount. Di Tella’s
coordinator also recommended me to take take the three courses from the MBA program and then
one that would be specially oriented to the exchange students (culture etc.) and I believe this is the
policy of Aalto as well (1 non-business course allowed). However, I felt the MBA courses were more
useful to me, plus all the other courses ran on a semester basis and in the daytime, unlike the MBA
courses.
The MBA courses were lectured in the evenings from 7pm to 10.15pm and on Saturdays from 9am to
1pm, each course including 2-3 lectures per week. The schedule may sound somewhat special, but
considering that 100% of the MBA students were working full day (I believe the average age of the
students was around 35), it is more than understandable. Plus, as I was writing my Master’s thesis
simultaneously (which I probably wouldn’t recommend you to do, however), the schedules suited me
perfectly as well.
One awesome thing about di Tella was the infrastructure. It was clear why it is the most expensive
University of the whole country: everything worked, and there was someone to take care of
everything. (I recommend an excursion to the nearby public university. It’s enough to see the Soviet
style buildings from outside, but if you’re still not convinced about the differences between private
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and public, take a visit to the public university’s toilets. Remember to bring your own toilet paper.
However about the education in the public universities I’ve heard nothing but good.)
As mentioned, there are 4 or 5 MBA coordinators at di Tella, one taking care of each class for the full
two years. And when saying taking care I mean handing you your personal folder at the beginning of
each course including all the possible copies needed for the course (slides, cases, homework,
literature,..), being present during every break just outside the classroom for any concerns and giving
you all the possible help you could possibly need during your stay and studies. One of them presented
the whole campus to me the first day I arrived, and when I failed one exam they did all the necessary
arrangements for me to be able to retake it, and at the end I could even pick the date and time for the
retake myself. They were simply great.
Oh, and one of the greatest things organized by di Tella was the snack buffet during each break –this
was for the MBA students exclusively. Pure carbs (small croissants and sandwiches, cereals, sweet
yogurt, cakes and biscuits, tea, mate, coffee and juice), but it was so worth it, and such a wonderful
thing around 9pm to push you through the rest of the class. Again one less thing to take care of
yourself; as said, the infrastructure really worked flawlessly, and you didn’t have to hassle about
anything but your studies. Something I would really recommend Aalto to tackle on as well. With the
MBA coordinators the thing was also that you really felt somebody cared about you and your studies;
everybody had a face and name and if something didn’t go as planned, you were not left alone, nor
did you have to go through steps of bureaucracy and people to get it fixed.
The courses themselves were very interactive, no matter the topic. For my understanding all of them
were taught in Spanish (and not in any Spanish, but with the strong Porteño accent –more on this in
the next chapter), yet some material was handed out in English. Almost all the professors worked
outside of the campus as well and had a very good attitude towards teaching, you could really see
they enjoyed and also cared. All the students had name signs (including their full name and the
current employer / company they were working at) in front of them, which facilitated the dialogue. I
personally chose two second year courses for my first period, both with the same group, and two first
year courses for the second period, both again with another group. If the courses suit you, I would
strongly recommend taking the courses with one or two different groups maximum, for several
reasons. First, there are quite a few group works and the same groups are held through the program,
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so it’s easier and nicer to work with the same group through different courses (especially the second
year students know each other pretty well and it might be a bit difficult to integrate, no matter how
social you are). As an MBA exchange student I also didn’t feel to have a strong reference group (more
on this topic in the next chapter again), and therefore it was nice to get some friends and people to
chat with from the groups you work with.
More on the courses I took:
Contabilidad Gerencial – Managerial Accounting, Olivier Garrigue, MB07, 6 ECTS
Excellent course! At the same time the very first of the whole MBA program, great energy in class.
Very back-to-basics technique of teaching, and I believe especially for that so useful. I didn’t want to
believe when the professor during the first lecture said that he would show accounting can be fun –
but that’s exactly what he did. Great closeness to reality, lots of cases to be solved in class, hands-on
financial analysis etc. Definitely useful for any economist. 100% exam evaluation, good attention and
individual work required.
Control Global – Global Control, Nestor Paradiso, MB13, 6 ECTS
Another great course of accounting. The name of the professor tells everything about him. A secondyear, more demanding follow-up course of the previous one (if you want to take both the same year
though, you have to take them the other way round as I did). My major is economics so the
mathematics of this course didn’t feel too hard at all –which at the end turned against me when
failing the first exam due to lack of personal work and sanctioning of wrong answers. In contrary to
Mr. Olivier, Mr. Paradiso has a very modern approach to teaching with fancy PowerPoints and videos,
minitests along the course, two cases to be solved in groups at home (we did them mostly on Skype –
not the easiest task) plus an exam with multiple choice plus a case at the end of the course. The
professor works as a controller and again the approach was very practice-oriented, which felt very
motivating and refreshing after my somewhat theoretical major in Aalto.
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Desarrollo de Carrera – Career Development, Paula Molinari, MB23, 6 ECTS
A second-year course dedicated especially to the MBA students who are in some kind of a turning
point in their lives after having completed the MBA. Lots of personality tests (What are my key
priorities in life? What kind of an employee am I? What kind of communication motivates me the
most?), guest lecturers to tell about their careers / success, future work life, networking, in-class CV
clinic. Evaluation based on a group work and an individual work including two career interviews (the
best part of the course). If you recognize yourself to be “engineer-minded” and never thought about
these things before, this might be for you. But if your graduation approaches and you feel a bit lost
with direction, have studies psychology in high school and gone through some career building
material and personality tests, the offering of this course may remain a bit lame for you. Nice
professor.
Técnicas de Comunicación – Communication Techniques, Patricio Nelson, MB27, 6 ECTS
Pure negotiation, excellent course! Great balance of theory and practice, very useful for anyone, no
matter whether you’ll become a stay-home dad or a businesswoman. Again a very motivated
professor running his own consulting company on the topic. Also a great glance to what’s it like to
make business in Latin America because if somewhere, there it’s all about negotiating. We
constructed a very good, basic model or a theoretical framework and then approached it from many
different viewpoints. Lots of practicing in-class. Evaluation based on an individual work and a group
work.
As you may notice, all in all I was more than pleased with the quality of the courses taught at di Tella.
Most of the professors have a degree from an Ivy League University. The Career Development course
was evaluated simply as pass or fail, others were graded according to the U.S. standards (A, B, C etc.).
3. Free time and other information
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As I guess you might know, the inflation in Argentina is very high and the economic stability
nonexistent. During the first half of 2014 the cost of living was lower than in Helsinki, but it might be
anything at the moment when this report is published. The only real recommendation I believe will be
useful at any time is that 1) bring as many euros or dollars in cash with you as you can. And 2) change
it unofficially (you save up to 40% by doing so, and everybody, I mean literally everybody does so).
The only school fee was the health insurance, and of course the visa was obligatory. Note that the visa
process might take quite a bit of time and once you have it, you’re allowed to buy for instance flight
tickets for the same price as locals (around 30% less than for foreigners), and also at museums,
natural parks etc. you will be treated with the local’s price. About the visa process the local
coordinator will tell you everything once you get there.
What comes to living itself, I wanted to pamper myself and rented a furnished 70m2 duplex in a
doorman building with an in-building gym, sauna and an outdoor pool, from a company called
4rentargentina. Although not everything went as it was supposed to (which is something you might
want to prepare yourself to if this is your first encounter with the Latin America), all in all I really
enjoyed my luxurious home in Palermo Hollywood. This treat cost me the same as any small studio in
central Helsinki.
The university itself is located in Belgrano, a very cozy area. Palermo Hollywood and Palermo Soho are
the most trendy areas and also very popular among foreigners, filled with restaurants, cafés, bars,
nightclubs, boutiques etc. From where I lived the distance to the university was about 5 km. Taxis are
cheap, public transport is great and safe and bike lanes are developing all the time. Plus, all your class
mates have a car. I bought a used bike as soon as I arrived in Buenos Aires and although I had one
accident, I really enjoyed it and most of the time went to school by bike as well. Almost the whole city
is very safe even in the nighttime.
Food: If you love beef, you’ll love Buenos Aires. If you also love red wine, then even more. Eating out
is rather cheap, wine too cheap, tip 10% depending on the quality of the service.
Porteño accent: Spanish they talk in Buenos Aires and in the surrounding areas (including Uruguay) is
way different from any other Spanish accent anywhere in the world. Be prepared, but once you learn
a few basic tricks and expressions, it’s beautiful.
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Porteños themselves: As mentioned, I didn’t feel to have a real reference group with witch I would
have identified myself with: other exchange students were around their 20s, first time away from
home –been there, done that. What comes to the classmates, the first thing they asked was my age,
and once hearing the response laughed “oh, such a baby!” In a country where you might live with
your parents until you turn 30, 25 might sound young, but for a Finn it felt quite unfair. All in all they
were very nice and made some very good friends, but as all of them had demanding careers and most
of them their own families, it was understandable they weren’t that interested in getting to know you
outside of classes that much. Di Tella also had a personal tutor program for exchange students, which
was very nice and I got to know other local people through my tutor as well.
Travels: Argentina is huge and has so much to offer for every taste. I visited Mendoza the wine region,
Glacier Perito Moreno in Patagonia and The Iguazu Falls up in North –all of which were amazing. And
if you happen to miss Tallinn during your exchange, you can always make a daytrip to Uruguay –
beautiful too. Prior to my exchange I spent a month in Brazil which is also of course worth a visit.
Traveling in Argentina is easy and fairly cheap, buses and airplanes go everywhere.
4. Final Comments
I would definitely recommend di Tella for everybody. And Buenos Aires is simply one of the most
beautiful cities in the world with a unique atmosphere. No matter how hard I’ve tried to describe it, I
find no words. It must be lived.
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