New city? New life?

Related tags: General advice, Universities, Blog

When the daunting prospect of starting university becomes reality, you feel liberated as well as suffocated at the same time. So what advice can a second year university student give freshers about those all-important first few weeks?

I spent my first week at university avoiding the god awful cattle markets of "skool discos" and pulling fests like the plague. Preferring more intimately focused evenings where I could actually hear the person next to me speak as opposed to copping a gobful of their ear lobe, or worse their lank, greasy hair, I wondered whether I'd ever meet that group of pals I'd imagined.

I'm now seeing all these freshers about the place, anxious about reading lists, concerned about their course and worried about struggling with the work and I'm thinking: have they all gone mad? Although this approach is admirable, it is completely redundant in the inaugural week, or indeed most of the first term. University, in whichever way you decide to embrace it, is as much about improving yourself as a person, socially, mentally and physically as it is academically. Failing to recognise that early on can have a seriously detrimental effect on you feeling settled and comfortable with your new life. Whether you decide to transcend nature's barriers by becoming a social butterfly or gather a simple group of treasured mates instead, it is important to embrace the new opportunities university provides in abundance.

The new breed of freshers just don't seem to care about any of this. With the piece of paper they'll receive three years down the line the only image they can retain a focus upon; there was no small talk at this year's freshers' fair. There was little conversation even between stall holders and students, for they are all so academically set they have no time to invest on clubs and societies. My attempts at recruiting new writers for the student newspaper were met with a few frankly rude retorts of "I need to settle in first" and "I don't have time".

Their fruitless attempts at settling in therefore stick out an absolute mile. You can spot freshers easily: silently mooching around, feigning interest in sports clubs and specialist societies, when really all they can think about is their books. Some say this is the way that university has become - what with top-up fees and all that. Those who go to uni now are driven towards getting a degree as quickly and cheaply as possible. But it's such a shame. If you're a fresher, pull your head out of those dank pages, whack a smile on your face and get out there. I promise you'll reap the benefits whether you decide to be extreme and assemble a list of friends as long as the M1, or if you choose to take your time and develop the fewer connections you do make further. The first few months of uni can never be replayed so make the most of them whilst you can.

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