JUSTGEORGEJ B.A.

Greetings Readers!

After a little break, I am back and I am now a graduate! Yes, I have officially graduated from Bishop Grosseteste University with an Upper Second Class Degree in Drama in the Community. This chapter of my life is over! Let’s have a catch-up!

So, the past week has been fairly crazy, to say the least. It has been a rollercoaster of emotions; little sleep; alcohol; illness; memories and so much more. I have pretty much been busy from Wednesday through till Friday.

On Wednesday, I was in town getting a few extra bits for graduation and going to get my haircut at a Barber’s in town – which was exciting as I have never been to one before. I had my hair, eyebrows, and beard styled and cut. The guy who did it did an amazing job and I could not thank him enough, he made me look extremely smart for my graduation!

Wednesday was also the day that allowed me to see my friends graduate and have other friends come down to see me graduate. We ended up just chilling, listening to music and preparing for Thursday. It was a nerve-racking, yet, lovely day.

Anyway, then it was Thursday. Graduation day!

So, the picture above is me walking out of Lincoln Cathedral after graduation! Yeah, that’s right. I graduated. With an Upper Second Class honours to say the least.

Thursday was a stressful day and there was an AWFUL lot of build up to it… as you will know from the previous posts that have been added to this site. Anyway, all of that built up till this day. I think the most spectacular part of this day is the fact I got to graduate in Lincoln Cathedral. Like, that’s amazing. One of the most historic places in Lincoln and I received my degree from within that building. Other universities graduate in auditoriums or theatres or lecture halls or places like that but this is how my university does it and it was simply incredible! INCREDIBLE.

As you can see from the pictures, myself and another of my fellow students were the first ones to walk out of the Cathedral following the graduation ceremony. It was crazy! Suddenly we were at the front and everyone was applauding us and that was it… BGU was over and we had graduated. It was a surreal feeling, to say the least.

Anyway, from here, the day carried on and it was full of celebrations and Prosecco and pictures and food and dancing and yeah, it was genuinely one of the best days of my entire life – however, I am extremely sad that it has come to an end and I’ve sort of fell into a rut now the entire thing is over. I’m fairly lost and I do not know how to feel about it.

Also, you may be questioned where ‘illness’ comes into the list at the beginning. Well, my anxiety, mixed with a general cold and more (e.g. alcohol and late nights) meant that throughout this last week and my graduation, I felt like absolute crap physically! However, I got through it and generally was EXTREMELY happy and ignored how crap I felt!

So, all in all, that is my graduation. There is probably an awful lot I could say, however, I am still in a bit of shell shock and I do not really know what more to say at this moment, I’m sure it’ll come up in later posts that’ll follow this one, so, for now, we can just celebrate in the fact I have graduated!

When The Going Get’s Tough…

Good Evening Readers,

A massive thank you for all the support I had yesterday with the previous article, if you have not already read it, you can find it here. Tonight, it is going to get a little personal and extremely truthful in regards to university. Buckle up Freshers (or students), truth bomb coming at you!

The title of this article as you will have already read is ‘When The Going Gets Tough…’, now, many of you will already know the end to that saying, but for now, we shall save it. What do I mean by this?

Simply, university is going to get tough. Whether at the beginning, in the middle or at the end. University will be tough for you. You are going to experience that time that 99.9% of students go through. The stress, the tears, the defeat, the hopelessness, the pure exhaustion of doing what you are doing. It is going to hit you. Guess what? That’s okay. It is natural.

Now, throughout my time of writing my student blog I have often touched upon the idea that the media portrays student life and university life as a complete facade to what it actually is. It is either at two ends of the spectrum – glorifying student life as they study towards their achievements or the other end of the spectrum, e.g. drugs and the scandal around them and student drinking. However, there is no in between, the truth is not presented. That being that student life is bloody hard. It is hurdles and challenges and sometimes, not succeeding in jumping or facing them. It’s being completely exhausted and having breakdowns over deadlines and word counts. It’s having to work basically full-time and balance studying just so you can eat. It’s stressing you out that much that you actually make yourself ill. It’s having late nights and early mornings equalling in very little sleep just to catch up on work and make it to lectures. It’s having breakdowns to your lecturers about life because you are just struggling to juggle it all. It is constantly worrying about money and how you are going to afford rent. It is facing high school drama that should have ended by now but never did. It’s having to attempt to remain in a social circle and keep your friends and even dipping your toe in the relationship pool and doing all of this whilst trying not to fall apart because you desperately want that degree. It is the physical embodiment of ‘the good, the bad and the ugly.’

I do not make it sound glamorous or welcoming at all, do I? Okay, let me rectify that with the point of this article.

Despite all of this, it is these times where the memories are created and when you realise what university is all about. Yes, at the end of the day, university is always going to be about your degree, but, it’s about how you experience this degree. During all those moments that I mentioned above, that is when you come together as students. Those late nights in the library where you are having a breakdown are the moments your friends bring you a McDonalds, those times when you can’t afford food, those are the moments when friends lend you money or cook for you. When you are ill, your friends nurse you. When you’re having a breakdown, your friends give you a break. When you feel like you’re drifting when your friends, they pull you back in. Being students is a unity. As cliche as that sounds. You stick together.

Because you know when the going gets tough…

The tough get going.

Remember this Freshers, when you down in the dumps and feel like you want to drop out, stick at it. These are where the memories of university are made. You are being tested, keep pushing.

student worries: independence

Good Afternoon Prospective Students (and students),

Whilst struggling to conceive an idea of what I could write about today, I did something I do rarely. This was going back and looking at my old work. Therefore, I dived into the pages of my blog and went back to the ‘beginning’ and remembered I was very passionate about doing a collection of articles called ‘student worries’ and therefore, I thought I’d do one that I’d never done before! Therefore, I welcome you to ‘student worries: independence’!

Through my time on ‘The Student Roon’ in the early part of 2016 and previous and then my time on Campus since the beginning of this year… and my entire three years at university, independence is something that is two-fold. 45% of students are dying for it, 45% are terrified of it and 10% are both. It is fair to say that when we are starting university, putting the studying aspect aside for a moment, it is all about independence.

Personally, I believe you have more independence when moving out of home and actually living in halls/student housing. Purely because, I feel, if you stay at home – you are stuck between two worlds. A world of routine you have always known and then a world of study and socialism that you have never experienced before and I believe to truly immerse yourself in the independence of being a student, you have to move on. This is not to say that students living at home are not independent because they can be, but, I just believe there is a huge amount of growth to be said for moving out of your family home, paying your own way and supporting yourself. Each to their own though.

Anyway, independence! The idea of being independent as a student is accumulated with several reasons. It is the idea, as said above, that you are paying your own way and supporting yourself. You have taken the step of moving away from home and doing your own cooking; cleaning; shopping and more. Also, learning to be alone away from your family and friends that you have grown up with and loved. Now, to some people, it does not affect them and they are just ready to move out and begin living ‘their’ life, but for some people, it is quite heavy and there is nothing wrong with this.

Independence; The Scary Side

Let us, for a moment, focus on being scared of having independence.

From what I have experienced in my three years, being scared of having independence is again, two-fold. So, firstly, you can be scared of independence because you have led an extremely sheltered existence and never really learned to ‘stand on your own two feet’ metaphorically speaking. This means that you have led a very ‘laid back’ lifestyle whilst living at home and had a lot done for you, or, purely decided not to actively learn the skills you need to survive in life. This means, you have very limited knowledge of cooking, cleaning is commonly known as ‘hide all the junk under the bed’ and shopping is something only your parents do. If you are one of those people, going to university and living in halls is going to be a shock. Like jumping in an ice-cold river.

My advice for you people. Despite the fact this sounds like a harsh dig at you, it is not. It is trying to get you to open your eyes early so you do not have a meltdown when you first get to university. My advice is this; take control of your life and learn the skills you need to learn. There a student cookbooks out there that guide you through even the most complex of recipes and they are very easy to follow. Take pride in cleaning your space – it is really rewarding knowing that you have cleaned up! And finally, GO SHOPPING. Even if it is just joining your parents, go out shopping. Understand how much you are going to be spending on a certain time period, learn how to bargain and where to shop. It is not as easy as you think. Just, PREPARE. As they say, fail to prepare, prepare to fail and that applies to every aspect of university.

Secondly, you are scared of independence purely because it is a massive change. These are the people that are perfectly competent in looking after themselves and being able to cook, clean and shop – however – they are about to break out of a routine they have known for a long time and submerge into a way of living that they have never really experienced before. ‘Flying the nest’ is actually a lot more stressful than it looks. You are looking forward to being away from family and friends and being able to ‘do you’ when you want, but, you do not really know how you are going to deal with it or how you are going to adapt, but again, is perfectly fine.

My advice for you people. As bad as it sounds, you just have to take the plunge and get there. There is no real ‘trial run’ you can do before you go to prepare yourself. You can get everything prepared and know the skills, but to truly know how you’ll fair once you are there, you just have to take the plunge and do it. I will not lie to you, it is not for everyone. Some people cannot handle it and end up moving back up and commuting and again, that is okay. Some people just are not ready for that. However, the majority pick it up straight away or as we students like to call it, you learn how to ‘scrape on by’.

Independence; Being Ready For It

Now, this is the one I relate to the most and purely because it was me when I started university.

These people are the ones that are just ready and again, arguably, they are two-fold. With the amount of ‘two-folds’ that go into independence, it’s got to be like 16 folds by now! Anywho, these people are two-fold. Like previous; they are either unprepared and ready for whatever comes their way with an ‘I’ll learn as I go along’ attitude or they are like the latter ones where they have all the skills they need and are ready to face whatever comes their way. Equally, both fine. However, going in with this attitude can be slightly dangerous. You may be thinking, ‘why is it dangerous?’, well, if you go in with this attitude (and there is nothing wrong with confidence) you can be a bit oblivious to the things you may not be prepared for and at the end of the day, it is always better to be prepared, as they say ‘expect the unexpected’… however, if you expect the unexpected, does that not make the unexpected, expected? Wow, trippy.

ANYDOODLE, MY ADVICE FOR YOU PEOPLE IS… do you, just be prepared a little. Be confident, as confident as you want too because I was. I was ready to move out, I had lived out my time at home, I had the skills and I was ready to move onto the next chapter of my life and when I got there, there were a few hiccups at the beginning but, it is a learning curve – as it is for everyone. Enjoy it!

And for now, that is student worries: independence!

I hope you were able to take even a small something away from this post!

 

GS 2017 – 07/07/2017

Greetings Readers,

How are we all? I trust we are well! Again, I let my writing slip again in the last week across my blogs and it has purely been down to the fact that I have been so busy! However, all will be explained in this entry!

Here we go! So, recently most of my articles have been about my upcoming graduation. Which is no surprise, it’s a big deal for me! It’s going to be the end of one big chapter of my life and one hell of a celebration!

In regards to my graduation, you’ll know that everything was pretty much in place and ready and waiting to go. Now, all my tickets and everything have arrived which is FANTASTIC and also, finally, I have my graduation suit!

It’s this lovely grey suit here! It was even cheaper than I was anitipating and the best part? I actually paid for it myself! That may not sound like a big deal to a lot of you but my parents have always supported me a lot and this time, this was something I purchased myself. After a lot of time working with my parents to earn the money, I did it! I earned enough to afford to buy my suit!

That is the final piece, everything is now ready for graduation! I’ve just got to graduate now! Which is fairly terrifying! And exciting… but, we’ve covered this before.

Anyway, that should hopefully explain why I haven’t posted much in the last week. I have been travelling here, there and everywhere and working a lot in order to save up money and then, any down time that I have had, I’ve just slept as I’ve been so exhausted!

Now I have a lot more free time, apart from my usual job, therefore, I’ll be able to post more over the next coming days and weeks! Watch this space!

 

GS 2017 – 03/07/2017

Good Evening Readers,

I trust that we are all well? I am currently working until 1 am and whilst doing so, I am watching Indian Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark, what a classic film! Anyway, I have some exciting news to share with you all.

So, normally I start these posts with explaining that I am not really doing much with my graduate summer, whilst that is still true in some respects, I now have exciting news. Over the next couple of weeks, I will be publishing a book! A while back I wrote a book and have it ‘published’, by this I mean I had it officially printed, however, it was only one copy of it. I never thought much of it after that, well, I’ve discovered that Amazon allows you to publish and distribute your own personal book, therefore, this is what I will be doing!

I am going to spend the next week or two going over the old PDF of my book and editing it and getting it up to a standard that will be ready for publication, then it will go on Amazon and officially go on sale! Therefore, if anybody would like to read my poetry from the past couple of years, and you’ll be able to have a read of it and see what kind of stuff I write! I’ll keep you all updated on that!

On another note, I have been painting the student house for the past couple of days and now I am home for a week! It’s nice to be back, unlimited food, big TV, comfy bed and my family of course… it’s a lovely life! Also, today, I switched rooms back in my student house today… it took a couple of hours but I am now in the attic rooms and I am very cozy up there… even have my own little office! Therefore, working and what not will be a lot easier as I will not have the distraction of my TV/Xbox.

Well, that is all I have to update you on at the moment, until next time!

GS 2017 – 02/07/2017

Hello, Users!

I must apologise as in the last week, I have let my schedule slip a tiny bit. I believe I posted one on Monday but neglected the rest of the week unless you are on Campus Society where I posted an exclusive ‘MA Life’ article – it was short and sweet, as I am sure this one will be!

As usual, I do not have anything to update you on… wow, I’m boring at the minute. Anywho! On the ‘exclusive Campus Society’ article, I mentioned how my graduation was fastly coming around, it is THIS month. On the 20th of this month, I will graduate from Bishop Grosseteste University with an Upper Second Class degree in Drama in the Community. I am terrified.

You may be questioning; why are you terrified for your own graduation? To be honest, I suppose there are a few reasons as to why I am terrified.

1. As I have mentioned repeatedly over the past few weeks, this is three years of my life coming to an end. An entire chapter just ends right here! After three years of studying, making friends and experiences… it’s all drawing to an end. When I started three years, the end of university seemed like a lifetime away and I could only imagine the end of it and everything that came with that… but now, here we are!
2. As discussed in my previous articles, I suffer from anxiety. This usually means, from past experiences, I do not do well with sitting in large crowds for long periods of time… especially knowing I am having to stand in front of a lot of people. I am a drama student and this is what triggers me… silly, right?
3. Also… what if I like, trip up on stage or something? Knowing me, that is something that will more than likely happen. I will be walking SO carefully onto that stage, but, I shall keep you updated!

With graduation coming up, I still haven’t bought my suit yet… but I am doing so this week! I first have to go home and work with my parents for a few days to earn a little extra money and then I shall be buying my graduation suit, happy days!

More recently, however, I have been painting my student house! Now, some of you students out there may be thinking, what the hell? Why are you painting your own student house? Is that no the landlord’s job? 1. Because I want too, 2. technically yes. Basically, because I am living in the same house for another year and have already taken great pride in keeping the garden tidy and planting flowers, I wanted to take care of the house. Over the years, there is just general wear and tear of the house, e.g. scuffs on the walls and cracks etc – therefore, I offered my services to the landlord and luckily, he provided me with everything I needed! In turn, I had a very busy day yesterday and manage to get 90% of the house painted, just some more to do tonight.

As I have mentioned previously in other articles, if you are respectful of your student house and your landlord, they will look out for you. It’s surprising how ignorant some students are and how much they do not care about the house in which they live. Oh well! Some people do respect their houses and that’s the important thing! If not, your landlord will just bill you at the end.

As for today, that is all I have to update you on!

GS 2017 – 26/06/2017

Good Evening Readers,

Again, as usual in these recent updates, I do not have a lot to tell you as my graduate summer – at the moment – is not that exciting. However, I do have exciting news!

Today, I received my final marks back from university and now know what I am graduating with…

I am very happy to announce that I will be graduating from Bishop Grosseteste University with an Upper Second Class degree in BA (Hons) Drama in the Community.

E.g. I graduated with a 2:1!

This is also good news because it means after three years of hard work, breakdowns, tears and more, I have achieved the classification I need in order to go onto study my Master’s!

Literally, the relief and excitement that came over me today when I received my grades were unbelievable. Relief; this is because I can finally relax knowing that I have safely got the grades to get into the University of Lincoln and the fact that my hard work has actually paid off. Excitement; this has the same reasons as before really but also down to the fact that I can actually graduate with my friends next month!

Therefore, with all of that in mind, it is time to get back to working with my parents to earn some money to buy my graduation suit! Also today, I booked in for my hair/beard to be cut at a ‘fancy pants’ place in Lincoln, all in order to be ready for graduation!

Until next time!

GS 2017 – 25/06/2017

Happy Sunday Readers!

This article should have been posted on Friday, unfortunately, I have been a little busy and unable to find the time to actually post to my blog. Therefore, you have a Friday entry on Sunday! Today, I am working a 9 am to 5 pm shift over on Campus Society, therefore, I have a day of moderation and blogging ahead of me!

As I previously mentioned, I have been pretty busy the past couple of days getting caught up with various things going on in my life, therefore, I have not been able to keep to my schedule. However, I am back! This time, with probably only a small article in the form of a story time!

STORY TIME!

This story time takes place only a few hours ago from the start of this article.

Our story begins around 2 am. I had JUST fallen asleep when I hear my FaceTime ringing. I reach over and see that it is my friend who is sleeping in our front room for the night – convinced she wanted to update me on a game we were playing, I ignored him. Only to see a bombardment of Facebook Messages explaining how there was something in our kitchen. Convinced it was probably a robbery and/or murderer, I decided to stay in the comfort of my bed.

After more messages, I discovered that is was actually a mouse. A BLOODY MOUSE. Now, go back a few days when myself and my friends were sitting in our living room with our living room doors open. We are sitting there and we see a mouse just run across our garden, it keeps doing it. Obviously trying to get somewhere. Anyway, after a few hours of watching it attempt to go somewhere, we ignore it and that is that. Therefore, that has definitely been a mouse around. Until last night when we realise this mouse has made itself a little home… and is taking liberties by eating our food. I mean, do you pay rent or pay for shopping little mouse? No. No, you do not.

Well, there was not much that could be done at 2 am. THEN, there was this morning. I woke up and the little mousey-idiot had been eating the bananas – again. So, we chucked it away. I made breakfast and what not and went to carry on with work. I was out of the kitchen maybe an hour and a half, I came back, ANOTHER BANANA EATEN. In that time, like seriously? When, how? Therefore, I now have my iPad set up in the kitchen and I am FaceTiming my iPhone so I can see when he appears and where from. Unfortunately, the mouse has to die and it is only a matter of time before he does. This calls for mouse traps!

Unfortunately, all of this is a waiting game and failing all of this, it’s calling the landlord tomorrow and letting him know of the goings on!

Well, there you go, my graduate summer now features a mouse as well, apparently called ‘Gertie’. Until next time!

GS 2017 – 19/06/2017

Good Evening Readers,

Here we are, another article! What has been going on in my life? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Oh! Wait! I binge watched all of Rick and Morty. That is the extent of what I can class as being productive at the moment. Yay for me!

I think the begin this article, first and foremost, we should address the weather. That’s the most typically British thing to do, right? I mean, we only get a few good days of summer a year and it is fair to say, this is some of the warmest weather we have faced this year. When I say that what I mean is, WHY IS IT SO DAMN HOT?! If I am being honest with you, I prefer the cold weather. At least when it is cold you can control your temperature. When you are hot, you are just hot! It’s so annoying.

Anyway, enough of that, just know that I will probably be trekking to the South Pole tonight to sleep, or failing that, sleeping in my freezer.

Today, I believe I shall talk about a little poll I ran over on Campus Society. Now, as most of my readers know, I have written a few articles entitled ‘Student Worries’ where I have explored a variety of worries that prospective students face when starting university. Well, even those that are already at university. A lot of them can be debunked as common misconceptions that have been created through media coverage and stories, social media content and stories that have been passed through the grape vine.

In this poll, I put forward the following question with the following options;

“What are you most worried about starting university?

• Finances
• Starting Your Course
• Food Shopping
• Living Independently
• Making Friends
• The Work Load
• Joining Societies
• Night Life ETC.
• Other”

The following are the number of votes they received each;

Finances (47); Starting Your Course (14); Food Shopping (10); Living Independently (13); Making Friends (54); The Work Load (13); Joining Societies (6); Night Life ETC. (5); Other (1).

As you can see there are two clear ‘winners’ that are far ahead of the others, those being ‘Finances’ and ‘Making Friends’. Ironically, through my past three years of blog writing, these are ALWAYS the most common. This has led me to write many articles on these topics in order to try and encourage students to not stress about these things quite so much before they start university; doing so can really make the start of university a daunting experience.

Finances

Do not get me wrong, finances can be extremely daunting whilst at university. For the majority of students, they will apply for Student Finance and get a varied amount depending on their parent’s income (do not even get me started on that). Now, this amount they receive from SF can barely even cover some students rent/ability to live and that is scary. For other students, it doesn’t cover their accommodation at all! Some students have to borrow from friends/family if they are so lucky. Others are able to get bursaries. Others have to dip into their savings. Then there are others that have to work in order to allow them to live. Now, this point goes off into various other branches about working during university, the stress of that and the balance of work/social/uni and it goes on and on, something I have covered many a time! But for now, we’ll focus on just the idea of finances.

Whatever situation you are in, if you want to go to university, you are going to have to live with it. One thing that is not worth your time is worrying about the debt you are going to be in. Unfortunately, we live in a society now where being a student means having an acceptance towards the debt you are going to be, that’s just that. There is nothing you can do about that. (Unless you are insanely right or win the lottery!). Therefore, try not to let it bother you too much. Accept the money you are going to get and accept that it is something you are going to be paying back for an awfully long time and probably never going to fully pay off anyway. Once you have accepted that, you can move on with your life.

If you need a job, get a job and something manageable. If you don’t, manage to budget your money. (To be honest, do that either way!). Budgeting is important. Also, know that you are not alone. Every student is in the same boat and finances is something that 99% of us do poorly… so, do not worry. To be honest, I am not the best at giving advice about it. I usually ignore it until I HAVE to worry about it. Best way! (It’s not!).

If you need help, reach out to your university. There are many, many routes that you can take in order to get extra money and get help whilst at university!

Making Friends

Again, this is another EXTREMELY common worry when starting university. It is mostly common for it to be a 50/50 split. Half are not worried about making friends at university, the other half is. At the end of the day, it depends on who you are as a person – all those weird and wonderful things that make you, you. No matter whether you are an extreme extrovert or a deeply rooted introvert, there is ALWAYS going to be somebody like you are university and you will come across them. You will bond over past experiences, likes and dislikes, hobbies and so on. (Hopefully your course as well!). There are friends to be made all over whilst at university.

One thing I will say is this. Do NOT worry if you do not make friends in your course. There are some people that do not and that is fine. There is plenty of other opportunities. During Freshers week especially. During Freshers week the universities usually put on a parade of different events and activities to take part in and you should give all of them ago if you can. Just get out there and meet friends. Join socities, go to taster sessions and so on! Now, I do understand that for an extrovert that is fairly easy, for an introvert, not so much. However, introverts, get out! Give it ago! Make friends with your flatmates and go out for a coffee or for a meal or to a taster session… the list is endless.

All I can promise is this… it will naturally happen. It will all just fall into place, so let it happen. (Just do not forget to put in at least a little effort!).

Good luck propsective students, until next time!

GS 2017 – 16/06/2017 (This, That & Everything)

Hello Readers,

How are we all? I trust we are all. Today’s article is going to be a mixture of everything; as the title suggests, ‘This, That & Everything’. As university and college come to an end, the exam stress begins to disappear and summer begins to take shape, I thought I’d address a mixture of areas. Let’s get started!

• A Well Deserved Break

As previously stated, university, college and more is coming to an end for a lot of students. That means all that hard work has now (hopefully) paid off and you can begin to enjoy your summer… again, hopefully.

This little area is to remind you that you should have a well-deserved break! You have been working hard for a VERY long time so now, do not feel guilty about taking some time off. This is what I did when I finished university, I felt SUPER guilty about not doing anything but I am telling you, if it is possible, take a week to yourself! Stay in bed, watch films, binge watch TV, have some relaxing days out, go out to eat, go out drinking – do whatever you need to do to unwind and relax. You owe it to yourself to let your body and mind have a break.

• Fail to Prepare, Prepare to Fail

Yes, it is a very cheesy line but it is very true. Now, I apply this quote to a variety of situations – therefore, it depends on what situation you are in. If you’re going from college to university, ensure you start preparing. Make sure your Student Finance is sorted out in plenty of time, as well as your accommodation! Ensure you have started to plan out weekly budgets and you have started to look for jobs if you need one. Make a list of everything that you need to buy and buy in plenty of time!

If you’re already at university, ensure you start preparing for your next academic year. Spend some time getting copies off books or spend some time in the library and start reading and trying to make a head start on the work you shall be doing. Also, if you’re already in university, make sure you have everything sorted for your student house (because if you have not already got one, you are cutting it fine, to be prepared – look around Christmas time). Ensure contracts and money are in order if there is anything you need to buy for the house or clarify with the landlord and so on. BE PREPARED.

• Landlords and Communication

This leads on from the previous, and one I pride myself in especially. At this point, I have lived in two student houses and had a good line of communication with both of my landlords. Why is this important you ask? Well, if you are respectful of your landlord and willing to talk to them, this can even benefit both you and the landlord. For example, in the first student house, by being close with my landlord, he provided us with two new sofas and also allowed us to have rabbits, as well as fitting mirrors in the bathrooms for us. At the same time, in return, I offered my services of doing minor repairs and so on.

In this student house, I am again close with the landlord. He let us fit an outdoor light in the garden, as well as fitting a blind for us in a hallway and teaching me how to bleed radiators and fix the boiler. In return, I am offering my services over summer repainting the house free of charge. I take pride in my student house and I show this by caring for the garden and making sure it’s presentable. By showing the landlord you can about the house, keep it in good condition and are not afraid to help out and talk to them, they will respect you a lot more! This is something I can not repeat enough!

• Money, Money, Money

Obviously, as a lot of students suffer, we know that Student Finance does not allow some students to afford rent, let alone live. Therefore, students suffer. In turn, students have to ask family for money (if this is viable) or work! All I say is, in the student cities, jobs are all around – but not easy to come by, ironically. Therefore, ensure you search for jobs in plenty of time! Apply, apply, apply!

However, I will say this. It is important you know your timetable for the year whilst at university. Find out when you will be in lectures and make sure you dedicate time to individual study, once you do this, you will know the kind of hours you can apply for. Do not get me wrong, some people manage a full-time job whilst at university, some people can only manage part-time, it depends on you! Just do not stretch yourself thin! Know what you can handle!

• Enjoy Your Summer!

Finally, enjoy your summer! This sort of links with the first point about having that well-deserved break but this addresses all of summer. Summer, all in all, is about having a good break (even if you are working) therefore, make sure you enjoy it! Spend time with family and friends, if you can go on holiday – go! Go out, explore and just make some memories! Once university hits, as much fun as it can seem, it will be stressful and though you’ll make memories, you won’t have time to go on breaks away and such (some people do – but that is not the point). Just ENJOY YOUR SUMMER! As much as possible! Have a great time and just live a little and return to university (or start) refreshed!

That is it for today, these are some of my little tips that I wanted to share with you!

Have a great summer readers, whatever you do!