PRE ARRIVAL
INFORMATION GUIDE
Academic Calendar
This calendar is for all Unicamp courses and all incoming exchange students. Save the dates!
2nd Semester of 2022 (August – December)
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August 15th, 2022 |
Classes begin |
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December 14th, 2022
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Classes end |
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From 15th to 21th of December, 2022
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Final Exams |
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August 19th, from 1:30 pm |
Welcome meeting
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August 16th, 17th and 18th |
Unicamp International guidance sessions
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August 15th and 17th |
Language Placement Interview – Portuguese for Foreigners
Language Placement Interview will be offered after this date. e-mail: cel@cel.unicamp.br For further information, please check CEL’s website – here. |
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August 22nd and 23th, 2022
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Enrollment at DAC system |
To find out about specific dates in the academic calendar, such as national and municipal holidays, exam and study week, among others, students should always check the DAC website.
Credit System
At Unicamp, each credit equals 15 semester hours of academic activity (lectures, labs, tutorials, etc). So:
A 4-credit course = 60 hours of academic activity per semester
A student taking 24 credits will have a total of 360 hours of academic activities in that semester.
Grading System
The evaluation of academic performance is generally expressed by grades from zero (0) to ten (10). To be approved in a course, the student must get a grade equal or greater than five (5) and attend 75% of classes.
There are also a few pass/fail classes. If the student successfully completes them, he/she receives the credits but not a specific grade.
The approaches to verify the student learning process (test, exercises, reposts, projects, course attendance, etc.) are established by the instructor responsible for the course, with the approval of the academic program coordinator.
The regular student performance in the whole program is measured by the Cumulative Grade Average (CR).
Cumulative Grade Average (CR)
The student performance in the whole program is measured by the Cumulative Grade Average (CR), which varies from zero (0) to one (1), and is calculated by the formula:
Ni = grade corresponding to the i-th course taken among the ‘n’ courses taken by the student in this University.
Ci = number of credits corresponding to the i-th course.
Note (1): Regular and exchange students at Unicamp are graded equally. However, exchange students may have a limited number of credit hours that they may take per semester. You may find more information here.
Note (2): All information presented here has been translated and adapted from DAC’s Regimento Geral de Graduação.
Note (3): Unicamp is not responsible for the recognition of credits in foreign institutions.
ECTS (European Credit Transfer System) equivalency
There is no official equivalency between Credits at Unicamp and ECTS. One suggestion is that the student finds out the official number of hours for each ECTS credit at the University abroad and then compares it to the number of hours for each credit at Unicamp. As mentioned above, at Unicamp, each credit equals 15 semester hours of academic activity (lectures, labs, tutorials, etc).
Credit System
At Unicamp, each credit equals 15 semester hours of academic activity (lectures, labs, tutorials, etc). So:
A 4-credit course = 60 hours of academic activity per semester
A student taking 9 credits will have a total of 135 hours of academic activities in that semester.
Grading System
The academic performance of graduate students at the University of Campinas (UNICAMP) is expressed by a letter grade, which has a corresponding value in a 0-4 scale. To be approved in a course, the student must obtain a grade greater than or equal to C and attend more than 75% of classes.
The equivalence between the letter grade and the 0-4 scale is the following:
|
Letter |
0-4 scale |
Description |
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A
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4 |
Excellent |
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B
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3 |
Good |
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C |
2 |
Average |
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D |
1 |
Insufficient, failure |
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E |
0 |
Withdrawal or less than 75% attendance |
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S |
0 |
Sufficient or approved* |
*There are no grades attributed to certain courses. Successful students receive an “S” and have all the credits counted towards completion of the degree.
The approaches to verify the student learning process (test, exercises, reposts, projects, course attendance, etc.) are established by the instructor responsible for the course, with the approval of the academic program coordinator.
Cumulative Grade Average (CR)
The student’s performance in the whole program is measured by the Cumulative Grade Average (CR), which varies from zero (0.0) to four (4.0), and is calculated by the formula below, rounded to one decimal place:
Where C is the number of credits of each course and v is the grade in the 0-4 scale. Courses with a “pass”, i.e, with “S”, do not count towards the CR.
All information presented here has been translated and adapted from DAC’s Regimento Geral de Pós-Graduação.
Health insurance is mandatory for all international students and a copy of this document must be delivered to the DAC via the system. The health insurance plan must cover medical expenses and repatriation from the day the student leaves the country of origin. The choice of a specific travel insurance or another is the visitor’s responsibility. If the foreign student arrives in Brazil without health insurance previously taken out, he/she will have to take out insurance with a local agency.
A Student or Mercosur Visa is required to enroll at Unicamp, and can be obtained from the consular division of the Brazilian Embassy or Consulate in the student’s country of origin. A visa must be requested early enough to allow time for bureaucratic procedures, which can be quite lengthy.
Although it is possible to change visa status while in Brazil, this is not recommended, since this procedure is very time consuming. We strongly advise you to enter Brazil with a Student or Mercosur Visa.
Once you get to Brazil, you will need to register with the Federal Police (PF). For further information about regularization procedures in the country, access Legalizing your entry and stay in Brazil
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For further information regarding visas, please access Academic Office’s websiteor write to Talk to DAC.
We recommend that when applying for a visa at the Brazilian Embassy or Consulate in your country of origin, you also request the issuance of the document called CPF. This is an individual document needed in operations such as opening bank accounts and registering in some public and private services, and for sure at some point it will be asked of you during your stay in Brazil.
Unicamp does not have a student residence and does not provide accommodation for students. However, we can help you find accommodation at the International Office. For that matter, just send an e-mail to lucineia@reitoria.unicamp.br. We cannot, however, be held responsible for any agreements or contracts signed by the student, since this is between you and the person responsible for the vacancy.
The main campus of Unicamp is located in the district of Barão Geraldo, 5 miles away from downtown Campinas. Although there are buses which travel this route (whose fares can be checked here), we strongly recommend that you look for housing near the University in Barão Geraldo.
We recommend that, as soon as you start planning your trip to Brazil, the student starts researching housing options. A good tip would be to rent temporary accommodation for a few days to better research and define a permanent property only after your arrival, as it is not recommended to close a contract without personally visiting the local.
Remember to consider the amount you will spend on displacement in your monthly expenses to assess whether the rental of space has a good cost/benefit ratio. We do not recommend depositing amounts in advance.
Pay Attention: Each Faculty or Institute has autonomy to define whether or not to offer Summer and/or Winter Vacation classes. Therefore, the student must always check the DAC website and the course secretary for the offer of such periods.
The Brazilian currency is the REAL (R$) and bill nominations use 2, 5, 10, 20, 50, 100 and 200.
Coins come in 5, 10, 25, 50 cents and 1 real. We suggest that you bring some cash with you because change offices are not available everywhere and rates are higher at airports.
To open an account in Brazil you will need to provide an address and a CPF. Cards can be activated at the ATM’S.
We strongly recommend students with scholarships to bring R$3.000 to cover the expenses until the scholarship is paid.