Martin is not in Madrid

Courtyard of the monastery

This post should had been here before the wine tasting in Buchlovice, but guys in Brno were quite nervous about not having themselves on internet, so I had to calm down, and postpone this report. So this post will be about faculty where my brother studies – Faculty of Information Technologies at Technical University in Brno.

Courtyard of the monastery, and my brother on the side

You know, there is quite a tension between Prague as a capital city and Brno as the second largest city in the Czech republic. People from Prague are hated everywhere, specially here in Morava, and nobody can ever forget about Prague-centric orientation of everything in this country. People are not upset that everything of political importance is in Prague. But that politicians living in Prague has almost never been outside of Prague, and they don’t care about the rest of the country. This sadly doesn’t apply only to politicians, but also to ordinary people as well. Some of my friends don’t know that some places in our country even exist! The short view of people from Prague is just incredible. Everything on the east from Prague is Balcany for them.

View from the side of cafeteria

And I have to say that the same view is in my school. I think that my school should actually shut up, and be jealous what do they have in Brno. Not only that Brno is more famous in the computer science in the country – there is also quite good Faculty of Informatics at Masaryk University, but both campuses (VUT and MU) are way, way better than our campus. Also there is not that much political tension at our faculty – specially after what we have seen in the last week where dean of our faculty called out head of our department after they proposed a new faculty of informatics at ČVUT. There is a lot more to say about this, but I gave up to even think about it. I just want to finish the school, and get off to the life.

Corridor

So back to the point. At FIT VUT, they have a brand new campus. It is in the place of an old monastery with some new buildings. They even have an old baroque church, although it doesn’t serve to it’s original purpose anymore. I was pretty impressed, the campus is the best one I have ever seen. They have lot of space, students can spend free time between classes in school, unlike we (we don’t have a single room for students, chairs in the corridors are full all the time…).

Bridge between monastery, and new buildings

The campus has also nice architecture – although built on the base of old monastery, it really looks really modern, and looks like it is done by one architect with unified style around the whole campus. Really nicely done.

A new hall in the monastery

I have to note also that they have a good menza. Unlike at ČVUT it doesn’t suck. It looks like it is here for students, and not to make money on students. They also have a normal restaurant one floor downstairs, but with prices for students. But the fact is that in Brno it is not like in Prague where you are just squeezed when you want to go to eat out. In Brno all restaurants are much cheaper, and I would say much better. I’m not really happy with the quality of eating out in Prague. Here you just eat either good and very expensive or bad and expensive. Of course, some exceptions still apply, but in general it is like that. And with the restaurant in the school with special deals for students, the situation in Brno is even better!

Two teachers looking for something at the fountain

I think Prague’s universities, specially our, should learn a lot in Brno. At first, there is no progress. Pointing out that we are an old institution, and not driving it anywhere is not good situation. Really, nowadays the school is referring to the old tradition, and is not willing to change anything in the old structures. And secondly the ability to give students some space in school is super important. This is not only to give them space to be in school between classes. To give them space where you can create something, to give them motivation. All these things are missing here in Prague…

When I think there are just two great things in Prague – some great teachers, and the ability to go abroad with Erasmus or some other programme very easily. Also multicultural atmosphere in Prague makes a lot.

One of the new pavilons