I, French, once chatted with a German and a Russian guy. We've all been students in excellent universities/schools.

The German said: "My studen room was so small, like 16sqm, you could just fit a desk, a bed, a shower and a sink."

I, French, said, believing I had a tougher experience: "I know what it looks like: We were 2 per room for the same size. In winter, heating was on and off, we had to pay attention not to touch the walls while sleeping, otherwise the dew would wet our blankets."

Then the Russian guy came... They were 3 people in the same surface. Heating was optional. At the coldest of the winter, the whole building's electricity would cut off for the night because it couldn't sustain the student's heating units. They didn't have showers at all. They had three common "bathrooms" for the building with sinks only. They could use them at will in the evening, but they had to take turns for the mornings. As in, Mondays and Thursdays. It was a reputated school in Russia.

Visiting a campus in Australia is surrealistic. I'm so speechless to describe the difference in living conditions that, when I want people to imagine the life in Sydney, I tell them to imagine banknotes falling from the sky. That's what the living conditions feel like compared to the old continent.

I am surprised to hear that you consider 16 m^2 small. In Norway, the vast majority of rooms that you can rent from the semi-public student welfare organizations are roughly 7-13 m^2. If you want a bigger living space, you'll either have to shell out for a full-fledged apartment (not affordable for a student unless you have a good part-time job or a "bad" part-time job and make sacrifices with regards to entertainment and alcohol). If you decide to rent a private room or apartment, you will probably get a few more square metres, but will run the risk of an asshole landlord who might steal your deposit, living with people who are not studying and have no plans to do so, and if you're slightly unfortunate there might be mold in your bedroom and/or bathroom as well. The best option is possibly buying an apartment, but that's not possible without heavy monetary support from family or lots of saved-up money from working for years before studying.

All in all, 16 m^2 is definitely on the high end when I look at the private rooms my student friends live in. I probably know more people who live in 5-6 m^2 than live in > 16 m^2 rooms.

With regards to the state of university campuses, it's not even worthwhile to compare private American universities with massive endowments to European public universities (i.e. most European universities) that get all their money from the government, and not one cent more than they need. Why would the government spend millions on campus landscaping when they can move the money to more worthy budgetary posts like health or kindergartens? Private universities in the US and elsewhere simply do not have these restrictions.

"Visiting a campus in Australia is surrealistic. I'm so speechless to describe the difference in living conditions that, when I want people to imagine the life in Sydney, I tell them to imagine banknotes falling from the sky. That's what the living conditions feel like compared to the old continent."

I had the same reaction when visiting US campuses like Stanford and Duke, that looked like resorts compared to the universities I attended in Europe.

On the other hand, I was able to get a perfectly serviceable degree at about 1/10 of the cost...

I'm french and doing a year abroad and seeing the campus of McMaster in Canada was like being in a movie. It's surreal as you say.

16sqm isn't bad, that's about the size of most US dorms I've seen (2 people per room). Heat cutting out is completely unacceptable though. Why would you put up with that?

You ask as if it were some kind of voluntary choice.

The difference originates from who is paying for the college. In the United States, the consumer has a direct choice on the college selection process and the payment process. These choices force the provider, college, to identify things to make it a appealing to the consumer; e.g. nice dorms, safe facilities, new books, etc.

In Germany and France, the college is paid for directly by the government. The most effort is made to reduce costs where possible, including delaying the purchase of new books, dorm room upgrades / accomodations, and infrastructure.

There needs to be a middle ground between these two methods, the college approach in Europe produces people who were developed from middle school for college, those who were not college material were moved into technical schools or apprenticeships; but it lacks ability to change course in later years easily. The American system of college takes everyone who can tie their shoes if they can afford it, some blossom within a college environment and prove their guidance counselors wrong.

It doesn't look so sad to me: http://www.univ-paris8.fr/en/?The-University

It's france. We invented perfume :) Just like third world countries always keep one or two monuments extra clean and luxurious as a flagship, all universities have one or two brand new building, hosting very few students, to keep a good image. If you want real world images, have a look at this blog ( which shows all universities, but you can find some of paris 8 among them) : http://universiteenruines.tumblr.com/

And those pictures really don't show the worst things i've seen.

Looks like German universities I have seen. Of course that short article had to contain at least one sentence bad mouthing private institutions :-)

Did you have a look at the older posts ? I found some really bad ones of paris 8, which doesn?t surprise me. I would be shocked to hear that germans accept this level of dirt.

In my very limited experience, German universities are generally the same, just with proper maintenance. There's no luxury there either - it looks old, but not worn down.

Ancient egyptians, according to history, invented perfumes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_perfume

Of course, you're right. That's just a joke we have, that people at the french king's court and the king itself used perfume instead of washing, which helped make perfume popular and fashionable.

And MySpace happened before Facebook.

It's their PR photos. There are these too (and many more on that blog) : http://universiteenruines.tumblr.com/image/103057236913 http://universiteenruines.tumblr.com/post/104835621673/nosta...