All the British first-years have been arriving today, which has had all of us international/visiting students very excited. I'm pretty sure I've met all the new kids who have moved into our flat, and there are still 2 empty rooms which should be filled by this evening.
It's funny to see them all move in and think back to when we arrived at Middlebury for the first time, because the experiences are very different. In general these students are given a lot more independence, and also a lot more responsibility, both in terms of university life and academics. First of all, there's not really a scheduled orientation program apart from "Freshers' Week," a week of nightly dance parties and social events that takes place during the first few days of classes. There's also no meal plan on campus, meaning that many new students (myself included) are having to cook for themselves for the first time. Actually it wasn't really until I was buying food for myself at the Tesco (little budget grocery store) a few blocks off campus that it hit me that I'm really away from home, with no one to look after me, and that I have to figure out this whole "sustenance" thing on my own. Luckily I've got a nice kitchen and even nicer friends and flatmates, and we've talked about having big group dinners and stuff, so that should take away some stress and add some fun.
Not that cooking is even that big of a deal when compared to our academic life here. As far as I understand it, students at British universities are held more or less accountable for their own education -- much moreso than at Middlebury, where it can sometimes feel like a more rigorous version of high school, what with the long class hours and borderline excessive amounts of written homework. Classes here at UEA (at least in the Faculty of Arts and Humanities) typically meet for between two and four hours a week, for an average total of 10 hours a week. The limited time spent in class in conjunction with the minimal amount of assigned homework means that students have a lot of unscheduled time, and that what they do with that time is up to them. Ideally professors would like us to be studying independently -- doing further research, reading the optional course materials, generally just keeping up with the class.
I'm really looking forward to seeing how this independent, self-responsible model of student life plays out, both for me and my British classmates. I have a feeling that, because the British students have been preparing for a British university for most of their lives, they'll be ready to live up to the responsibility. I think I can handle it too, though, and I actually think I'll also really enjoy it. Well obviously not having as much homework will be a huge plus, but I also like the idea of getting as much out of the experience as I put in. I don't really think Middlebury's system is ineffective, but it's easy to drown in seemingly insurmountable amounts of reading and writing and lose sight of the fact that I'm at school to learn, not to scrape by in my classes by doing only as much as is required of me and then collapsing from the effort. UEA and British universities in general seem to put a lot of responsibility in the hands of the students, and they erase everything that they deem unnecessary to the student's learning (the stuff that turns into busy-work at other institutions...). Anyway, I think that being given that responsibility will be a huge inspiration to work hard and get the most out of my time here.
It's funny to see them all move in and think back to when we arrived at Middlebury for the first time, because the experiences are very different. In general these students are given a lot more independence, and also a lot more responsibility, both in terms of university life and academics. First of all, there's not really a scheduled orientation program apart from "Freshers' Week," a week of nightly dance parties and social events that takes place during the first few days of classes. There's also no meal plan on campus, meaning that many new students (myself included) are having to cook for themselves for the first time. Actually it wasn't really until I was buying food for myself at the Tesco (little budget grocery store) a few blocks off campus that it hit me that I'm really away from home, with no one to look after me, and that I have to figure out this whole "sustenance" thing on my own. Luckily I've got a nice kitchen and even nicer friends and flatmates, and we've talked about having big group dinners and stuff, so that should take away some stress and add some fun.
Not that cooking is even that big of a deal when compared to our academic life here. As far as I understand it, students at British universities are held more or less accountable for their own education -- much moreso than at Middlebury, where it can sometimes feel like a more rigorous version of high school, what with the long class hours and borderline excessive amounts of written homework. Classes here at UEA (at least in the Faculty of Arts and Humanities) typically meet for between two and four hours a week, for an average total of 10 hours a week. The limited time spent in class in conjunction with the minimal amount of assigned homework means that students have a lot of unscheduled time, and that what they do with that time is up to them. Ideally professors would like us to be studying independently -- doing further research, reading the optional course materials, generally just keeping up with the class.
I'm really looking forward to seeing how this independent, self-responsible model of student life plays out, both for me and my British classmates. I have a feeling that, because the British students have been preparing for a British university for most of their lives, they'll be ready to live up to the responsibility. I think I can handle it too, though, and I actually think I'll also really enjoy it. Well obviously not having as much homework will be a huge plus, but I also like the idea of getting as much out of the experience as I put in. I don't really think Middlebury's system is ineffective, but it's easy to drown in seemingly insurmountable amounts of reading and writing and lose sight of the fact that I'm at school to learn, not to scrape by in my classes by doing only as much as is required of me and then collapsing from the effort. UEA and British universities in general seem to put a lot of responsibility in the hands of the students, and they erase everything that they deem unnecessary to the student's learning (the stuff that turns into busy-work at other institutions...). Anyway, I think that being given that responsibility will be a huge inspiration to work hard and get the most out of my time here.
1 comment:
My words of wisdom: do not live on Walker's crisps alone, even if you want to.
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