Although an eye-opening experience from a variety of perspectives, going to university remains a primarily academic endeavour: it means you are pursuing further education in a field in which you intend to work once you finish your degree. The whole ordeal you’ve gone through during your mandatory education and high school (sixth form/college) will carry on for three to four years, but is studying really the same in university as it is in high school? Not at all. In fact, you’re in for a giant academic leap and this post is here to help you adapt smoothly to this new way of studying.
I’ve been a hard-working and fairly successful student throughout my entire academic journey, but the shift from sixth form to university felt difficult for me, too, and became a ginormous sources of stress for my entire first semester spent at uni. Despite being aware of what the change would mean (for example, focus falling on independent study), I struggled to adapt and understand what was required of me; having been too shy to ask questions or engage in conversations, I didn’t ask questions either (don’t follow my example here, kids!!). Luckily, my grades didn’t show it since I managed to pick up the pace just in time for upcoming deadlines, but that did little to ease the feeling of frutration I’ve harboured for months, just because I didn’t seem to perform as well as everybody else.
I would be so happy to know that I improved the academic experience of university a bit for you, so this next post in the University Survival Kit series will focus on what studying at university means, how you can prepare for it in advance and what you should keep in mind once you take the bull by the horns.
Again, a little disclaimer right before we start: I wrote this from the perspective of an international student in the United Kingdom, that means that I am referring strictly to the British university system but some of its characteristics do apply to higher education in other countries, as well.
I’m kicking off by touching on how many and what kind of classes you are supposed to go to at university. Usually, university has rather non-mandatory classes compared to sixth form and college, but depending on the course and the modules (subjects) that you’re taking, your number of hours might vary. For my course, I am expected to take about three to four modules a semester, so that usually means six to seven sessions a week, cumulating fifteen hours at most. Some people might spend less time, some people might spend more, but based on what I already know from my friends, this should be the average. Fifteen hours a week is half of the time we used to spend in classes in sixth form or college, so after what we’ve been through with those, it shouldn’t be too hard! Don’t jump to conclusions just yet: those four hours a week you spend in a class for a specific subject makes up 11% of the effort hours you should be putting into that module. 75% of what you’re doing at university for each module should be independent study, so on your own, in your own time, at home or at the library or wherever else you fancy.
First trick out of the hat to survive university: read, read, read.
(source: personal archive)
In this case, you might already be wondering: is it worth going to classes? I believe so, and here’s why. Classes provide you with a first-hand, complex introduction to whatever you’ll have to explore or write about in your coursework or exam papers: you can catch up with the lectures after the sessions, read more about it or study with your peers who have gone to the classes, but it will never compare with hearing about it yourself, then and there. Even if you’re not good at auditory learning, you don’t lose anything by attending. Another way I like going about it is that I am getting my money’s worth if I do go: I pay for the session, so I might as well use it as productively as possible. For classes scheduled at 9 in the morning, it does feel grim to wake up to go but at the same time, I know that if I’m sleeping in, my morning will be completely ruined. Finally, although universities are fairly good at updating students about possible changes with the structure or the assessment of their modules, people are bad at looking at their e-mails so these things might be talked about in classes and you might want to go and find out.
Now, what kind of classes should you expect to go to? They usually fall into two distinct categories, again, with differences from place to place and from course to course. Lectures are sessions held in large auditorium halls, where everybody on your course is present and the lecturer delivers a presentation on a specific topic within your module. It usually does not involve interactive learning and it’s rather meant to introduce people to a topic that they would later expand on in a seminar or explore further in their coursework. Lectures are mostly about the teacher presenting the information to you and you trying to understand and memorise it to the best of your ability. Seminars (or workshops or labs) usually follow up the lectures by engaging smaller groups of students (depending on the capacity of your course, they could be five or ten or thirty) in educational activities, discussions and debates around the topic from the lecture, or introducing the guidelines for further assessment within the module. Both lectures and seminars can last one to two hours each.
Maybe the biggest struggle of lectures for me is taking all the notes that I need.
(source: personal archive)
Moving on to assessment, there are different ways you can get grades for each of the subjects you’re taking. You might have to submit written coursework that can be a critical essay, a report, a self-reflective essay, a portfolio – this list is non-exhaustive. Written coursework should respect guidelines decided upon and approved by your faculty and should be submitted by a certain deadline, and you’re usually introduced to all of this information at the start of the module. You can also take exams which are usually scheduled for a separate exam season, and they might or might not cover the entire syllabus of that subject. You could also be doing presentations with a randomly selected team of other students from your course. Now again, there are so many ways you can be assessed and they usually depend on the actual content of the module, too.
This is just the tip of the iceberg for all the things that there are to know about studying at university, but the rest of it is for you to discover in your own time. Instead, I’d like to give you a few tips and tricks that will help you keep your academic performance in check and adapt as efficiently as possible to the big changes that going to university brings. I’ve learned most of these by trial and error myself, so you’ll definitely want to keep on reading.
Focus on individual studying. This is the main thing that is expected of you as a student, so it’s certainly the thing you want to focus the most on. Going to classes will feel useless if you don’t expand on the content on your own, if you don’t take and retake, read and reread your notes, if you don’t do your recommended reading. Now it’s your time to try and identify the studying style and methods that work best for you, and use them to achieve the results that you desire. Make studying a daily habit. Remember that it’s you who has and must get that degree, not anybody else.
Read as much as possible. Again, this might not be perfectly applicable to all courses, but if there is recommended material for you to look at after you finish with the core texts, do yourself a favour and give it some time. Read as many titles as possible, read the textbook chapters and the articles that accompany your lectures, read in your free time. If you have the chance to get your hands on an early reading list for the subjects you’re going to take in autumn, start on it now. The more you read, the wider of an understanding you have on the things that you will later write about, and hopefully get good grades on.
A priority for me during the school year and the summer break alike is to stay organised.
(source: personal archive)
Get organised. Maybe thorough organisation is not your thing and I completely understand that: I’m fairly aware that not everybody wants a neat planner and to-do lists structured down to the minute as much as I do. But, it is essential that you develop your time management and prioritisation skills to make the most out of your experience at university. Knowing how to organise your time, use it wisely, put together a plan or a to-do list will spare you the stress and enhance your academic performance. If you’re unconvinced, at least you can agree that it’s so much better than jumping into writing your essay with no plan or order you want to follow.
Start work early. You will get tired of hearing this by the end of your degree, but that is probably the most important lessons I’ve ever learned. The earlier you start doing your work, the merrier. Not only will you do a better job, but you will also feel more in control of your endeavours and performance and not as stressed about meeting a deadline. Starting early will allow you to organise your work throughout a larger period of time and maintain a balance between working for different modules, or working for university and other things you might be doing with your time. Please, please, please avoid writing your coursework three days before the deadline. You’ll thank me later.
That’s pretty much all I wanted to cover in today’s post, but if there are any questions you have about studying at university or just university in general, don’t hesitate to let me know! I’m more than happy to carry on the discussion in the comments section or over social media. Five posts part of this series will be coming soon, so look forward to those for more university-related information and advice!
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University Survival Kit – Posts:
August 13th – Organising Your Move-In at Uni
August 20th – Adapting to a New Way of Studying
August 27th – Adulting: Finances, Jobs, Living Alone & With Others
September 3rd – Managing Your Social Life at University
September 10th – Improving Your Skills & Experience at University
September 17th – Dealing with Culture Shock in an Academic Environment
September 24th – Little Funny Bits I Learned at University
Photo sources: personal archive.