A little about my experience
Going to university can be quite daunting as it can be quite a big leap, whether it’s living by yourself or going to a place that you’ve never been to before. At first I thought I would be very uneasy about university life, thankfully, my university has an app that tells all the students about what kind of events are ongoing.
I still remember I was sitting in my accommodation room, looking at this app to find events. There were many events and fresher’s faire was one of the events listed on the app. Of course, all universities normally have a student union where students can get info on such events taking place. The fresher’s fair mostly consisted of me going to a giant green field where different societies had stalls which people could go to in order to find more information and possibly sign up.
I do think it’s very important to research beforehand how far away the stores are and what kind of transport is available. As well as where the washers and reception are. These are key places to allow one to plan their journey. We have a Tesco’s near campus and it’s usually around a twenty-minute walk which doesn’t seem much until you factor in twenty minutes return trip, taking almost an hour to shop. Thus I usually shop on the weekend or on days where I have a large gap between my lectures. Of course, this varies from different universities and the accommodation you live in.
The main different with university is that lectures take place at set times but offer more freedom. A typical day for me would consist of having a morning lecture, then a one-hour window gap, followed by another hour of lectures from a different module. On different days I would get three one hour lectures (spaced out) but I do know people who have had four or so lectures in the same day. It may seem like there is a lot of time but most of it is spent making notes or recapping the material. I’d usually be making notes until evening where I would microwave something to eat, relax for a while then go to bed.
Some advice for people going to university: I definitely think it’s very effective to make a list of your preferred accommodation and the time it takes to go to lectures and shops, perhaps even the train station if you think you might use it. Sometimes after my lectures I’d feel demotivated to make notes but it definitely is very worth it! We had a very wordy module: internet technologies, making notes was difficult because there would be so much content. Nearer the end of the year, I would do past exam papers from the university repository and making notes really helped me recall things easier.
Angela C – 22/06/22