Two Graduating International Students Give High Praise to BGSU

We hear about the great experience our American students have in the College of Business, but what about the perspective from students who travel far from their native countries to come to Bowling Green?  Why did they choose this midwestern university as a place to obtain their business education? Two international students, Evangelos Lefkonikiatis and Andreas Fylaktou, hail from Cyprus, a small island country east of Greece.  They chose to study at BGSU for two main reasons - the College of Business’s national recognition and good recommendations from BGSU alumni. After completing their undergraduate business degrees in May 2014, they both have high praise for their college education.

Lefkonikiatis specialized in management information systems (MIS) and business analytics and intelligence.  He chose BGSU because of the high ranking of the business program and his brother, who earned a master’s degree from the University, suggested his sibling enroll here. Fellow graduate Fylaktou, specialized in accounting and information systems auditing and control.  He, too, was impressed with the business school’s ranking and took the advice of a BGSU alum to come here.

“BGSU, overall, is a great university with a lot of resources for students,” states Lefkonikiatis.  He adds, “The College of Business gives you a lot of opportunities and helps students in any way it can. Professors help students in class and out of class as well. There are events for finding jobs and also they bring in guests to speak about their jobs to give us a good idea of what to expect in the future. They try to prepare us in different ways and this is very important for our future.”

Fylaktou also praises the College of Business for successfully preparing students to be “future businessmen and women.”  He states, “Through its specialized events and activities, the CBA is trying to expose its students to real-world examples and help them decide their career path as early as possible. They also schedule numerous workshops in the weeks previous to the job fair so students can sharpen their skills and prepare for interviews. Instructors, advisors, and the rest of the staff are always available to help every student with any questions, suggestions, or conflicts about their assignments, schedules, or future goals.”

Both recent BGSU graduates talked about the real-world business projects they worked on as part of their classes.  Fylaktou gave an example of a case study with Target and students had to give recommendations to company representatives about changes to the retail store in order to be more competitive and to better serve Target customers through technology. Lefkonikiatis was part of a team that presented a marketing plan to the Wood County Humane Society.

As far as most memorable experiences while at BGSU, Lefkonikiatis credits the great international interaction he had with classmates and instructors. “I worked with many different groups of students for different classes and had the opportunity to meet a lot of people and be able to work with other people. Working in groups helped me to understand the materials better because we helped each other and it was fun to work with others from different cultures.”  

Fylaktou feels the same way about the value of working in groups to complete assignments.  “In addition,” he states, “the interaction with the instructors offered a priceless exchange of knowledge that is difficult to achieve from any class discussion.”

Both graduates plan on pursuing masters degrees. In fact, Fylaktou is remaining at BGSU for the Master of Accountancy program while Lefkonikiatis wanted to remain here, but the University doesn’t offer a master’s in MIS. They both said they will continue to tell students in their homeland to come to BGSU. “This university helped me to be prepared for the future and gave me the appropriate tools to be ready. BGSU offered me great experiences,” concludes Lefkonikiatis.