Olaitan - Things you should know

So you’ve just started at the university and you want to get stuck in. Here are a few things you should know.

Join a sports club. This is one of the most obvious pieces of advice you’ll hear but you will truly understand how important it is once you’ve joined. If you don’t want to be too committed to a sports team or you’re not regularly active, that’s cool. There are loads of ways to get involved. Active students is a program at the University that offers free, yes FREE, no commitment sports sessions. There are loads of various activities from badminton to parkour. We have way too much choice for you to be a couch potato. Once you get settled in a club, it can be the easiest way to make friends and a support system.

Be welcoming to international freshers. For many of those guys, it’s their first time out of their country. So uni might be a massive culture shock. If their English isn’t great, be patient. If you see someone who looks a little quiet in your lectures, have a chat with them. All their friends might be 1000s of km away.

Get to know your lecturers and make your face regular in your school’s building. If you keep building good relationships with your lecturers, you will get the most out of your course. Lecturers teach dozens of other students so it’s worth making yourself known and you will hit the ground running. Be the first at the gate. I’m obviously not asking you to be a square but you might as well get your money's worth(since the university is so expensive).

The best piece of advice I’ve ever received is...

...Start studying one week before your course starts.

Super simple. If you think about it, most learning isn’t done at lectures. It’s usually at the library. Of course, you should go to lectures, they are vital. However, from my experience lectures work better when you already understand the context of what's going on. And there is nothing more uncomfortable and morale destroying than not understanding what’s going on.