Open for all questions
In times of coronavirus, the International Counter is available online
2021/04/23 by Campusreporterin Mia Arnold
Since most of the TU buildings are closed to the public due to the coronavirus pandemic, international students cannot simply drop by the International Counter in karo 5 if they have any questions. But of course they still receive support: The International Student Services team can be contacted online.
The International Counter is the first point of contact for international students. It is run by the International Student Services of TU Darmstadt, ISS for short. The counter at Karolinenplatz 5 is closed due to current circumstances caused by the coronavirus pandemic. However, the ISS team remains available online – digitally, you will as usual find helpful contacts who can answer international students' questions about studying at TU Darmstadt.
The contact persons are all TU students themselves who work as student assistants at the Counter. So they know their stuff and can help with many questions. Almost all of them are international students. An advantage of this is that communication between the Counter staff and international clients is not a problem: “Advice sessions can easily be held in Spanish, Arabic, English and many other languages”, says Natalie Wocko, Digital Services Project Coordinator for International Students.
International Student Services mainly deal with non-academic matters. This includes, for instance, topics such as health insurance, residence permits and organisational tips on living in Germany. If the question is more complex and requires an individual meeting, an appointment for an ISS consultation via Zoom will be arranged.
The Counter is open for one hour Monday to Friday. During this time, the Counter is always staffed by a student assistant who waits for visitors who log in online and first enter the waiting room. As soon as the student assistant is available, they admit the visitors into the Zoom meeting individually one after another. So you can just wait your turn in the waiting room.
The International Counter employees hope that they will soon be available on site again. Nonetheless, online consultations do have some small advantages: “The online consultation now makes it possible to establish a slightly more personal contact via Zoom from the home country. Before the pandemic, this was only possible via mail and hotline contact,” says Wocko.
The counter often receives questions on topics such as residence permits, TUCaN, registration deadlines, events and the like – but you can actually ask anything here. If a question does not relate to the ISS's area of expertise, the assistants will be happy to pass it on to experts who can certainly help.
Times and further information are available at www.tu-darmstadt.de/iss. Here you will find the specific times and with one click you will be forwarded directly to the consultation on Zoom – just click on the “Counter” button. The required password is also available on the website. Once this has been entered, you enter the virtual waiting room.