CELOP | About | Students | Fathema Nafsaniath

Fathema Nafsaniath

Fathema is originally from Bangladesh, where she completed a BBA in Management and MBA in MIS. She came to the United States in order to pursue a two-year MBA in Management Information Systems and E-Marketing at Rochester Institute of Technology, under a Fulbright Scholarship program.

Fathema took a one-month Pre-MBA program at CELOP, and she completed her program on August 18, 2006.

Fathema was assigned by IIE (International Institute of Education) to do a pre-academic course in Boston University, but she “had no idea about the course” when she arrived in Boston. She actually expected a simple course that might include field trips or orientation programs. She was pleasantly surprised to find

a very well organized and systematic program that greatly helped the foreign students to adjust to American culture and the educational system of the United States.

Since it is my first time abroad, everything was new to me. CELOP was perfect for me because it provided me with a solid foundation for my MBA study as well oriented me to different aspects of American culture.

Fathema found the program really helpful and her achievements are well beyond the expectations she had. The progress she made at CELOP is invaluable to her, and she is confident she will be able to profit from it in the future.

Fathema says that her teacher at CELOP is a very friendly and respectable person. He was cooperative and responsible, and evaluated each and every student very closely. She highlights his ability to identify each student’s weaknesses and strengths, which really helped them make improvements.

Fathema would certainly recommend CELOP mainly because it really helps students cope with the US education system, which she admits she would have found too tough without this experience.

As I have just started my MBA, I am observing that in every aspect of my study I am using my CELOP experience. The US schools have very tight quarter schedule, so from the very first day, the schools start in full swing. So, there is no time to adjust to the environment. My suggestion is, before starting the actual program of study, every student should take pre-academic courses at CELOP.

Fathema says that CELOP has some special features that really help a foreign student adjust to the United States education system. The program deals with business terminology and pronunciation difficulties, as well as reading skills. It is mainly based on discussion and reading materials, so she became more fluent. Not only did she learn specific business terms but she also became more resourceful regarding general vocabulary. Fathema points out that oral presentations on particular topics were very useful in that she was able to improve the quality of presentations, she learned how to use projectors and other devices and, since the presentations were video-taped, she had the chance to evaluate herself.

She remembers that every class included group discussions. Working regularly in small groups helped her to share her viewpoints with confidence and develop teamwork skills.
Fathema had the opportunity to study a lot of business related cases and discuss them in class, thus developing business analysis and decision-making skills. Moreover, working intensively on writing assignments helped her correct grammar and sentence construction errors, as well as master her professional writing style.

Fathema and her classmates visited some companies and this gave her a general idea about the organization of business in the United States. Guest speakers from different companies shared their business experience with the students. Hearing about challenges and difficulties in real business scenarios, Fathema says, was really interesting and informative.

Sharing the program with other foreign students provided a truly cross cultural environment. “We had a good friendly relationship among us, we met both in class and outside of class and we explored Boston together”. It helped me to have a nice group of friends outside my home country.

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