The Student Room Group

A Week in the Life: Cambridge edition

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My first-year history typical week:

Thursday: Up at 7am for a novice rowing outing. Do this, head back to room for 9am. Doss around on TSR or reading things I don't have to. Buttery lunch at 1pm, then go over to the Seeley history library to get a couple of books out. Buttery dinner at 7pm, then college bar, theatre, TSR in room, random pub, staircase chats, library common room or whatever until 2am.

Friday: Up at midday. Go to library via buttery lunch. Read a bit more. Buttery dinner at 7pm, then sound engineering until 2:30-3am in Clare Cellars.

Saturday: Up at midday-ish, a bit of rowing, some reading, general dossing. Saturday night in college, round with friends, whatever. Bed at 2 as usual.

Sunday: Up god knows when, bit of food and mooching, Clare Cellars for a jazz night from 4pm until about 2am.

Monday: Up at 9am. To library to read frantically for essay. Quick buttery lunch, back to library. Start planning and organising notes in college library; leave at 2am. Bed.

Tuesday: Up at 9am. Write essay all day in the UL, with lunch break, until 4pm hand-in. Celebrate by dossing, going on TSR, whatever.

Wednesday: FREEDOM. Washing, shopping, useful stuff like that. Supervision at 2pm or whatever.

(Life has got somewhat different since then! Ah, the balmy first-year days when I had time to actually DO stuff....)
Reply 21

Could one be added for the comp sci course maybe ?


I'm also a compsci, but don't drink, which makes my account a wee bit different to Lewi's :wink:

(My NatSci subject is geology by the by)

So, I will do one for you, but when I'm a bit more awake : ) I couldn't vouch for its coherence right now...
Deedle
I'm also a compsci, but don't drink, which makes my account a wee bit different to Lewi's :wink:

(My NatSci subject is geology by the by)

So, I will do one for you, but when I'm a bit more awake : ) I couldn't vouch for its coherence right now...

:smile: thanks, much appreciated !
Reply 23
Final Year MML student... (Lent Term too, so when it got pretty hardcore)

Monday - stagger to library (still hungover from vodka revs) do some reading or hurriedly finish the essay due in the previous evening. Redraft a translation and email both by 12pm. grab lunch and do some admin/JCR stuff. Go to faculty/uni library and get books for next essay and do some reading. Go to supervision at 6, come back, grab some dinner and hit the library till ten, followed by a dvd with friends or just general chillout.

Tuesday - Up early, go to the gym (maybe). 10am lecture, followed by coffee. Unless I have a supervision scheduled in, spend all day reading for essays and doing more JCR stuff. Make a trip to Sainsburys too.

Wednesday - Library by 9ish again, more reading and translation work. spend afternoon lunching and planning outfit for that night's swap. Go to a translation class in the afternoon, stay at faculty till 6, come back and get ready. Go to formal/swap, then out to Cindies. End up in bed via the tv room at about half 2.

Thursday - stagger to library/lecture at ten on some weeks. stagger to coffee shop afterwards. to debrief about previous evening. Read some more, and start planning and writing next essay. Go to afternoon lecture. Panic that translation hasn't been done, spend evening doing that. Finish with hot chocolate whilst regaling friends with tales of previous night's antics.

Friday - usually at the faculty, finishing translation and essay. Maybe have another supervision for a particular paper. Veg out in tv room for a bit, maybe go for dinner/cook with a friend, or go to the ADC, if we're feeling cultured. I might have coxed/coached that morning (as a favour)

Saturday - work pretty much all day, with breaks for gym/shopping/more JCR position stuff. might end up at the cinema that evening, depends.

Sunday - same as a saturday, except JCR meeting in the afternoon (one hour long) and work stops at 6....for another swap. Leave Vodka Revs at about 2am, panicking that essay for monday still isn't finished.....

Granted, this wasn't every week, but my Michaelmas term shaped up like that. Motto: you can still go out and do lots of other stuff in your final year....

Also, when I say work, I mean a few hours of concentrated reading and note-taking, broken up by hourly email/fb checks and chatting in the computer suite.
My timetable in my final year studying English:

Up at 10.30am, start work at 11. Lunch 1-2, then more work til 5.30/6pm. 'Work' almost always means reading for the next essay in my room, typing the essay up, or library browsing for the next essay. I have one supervision a week for the essay and one for practical criticism, which is discussion of unseen passages.

I finish work by 6, then spend the evening with my friends or boyfriend. If it's Tuesday, Thursday or Sunday I'll have Trinity Hall chapel choir from 4-7ish, then usually free formal hall after Sunday evensongs.

Sunday is my day off, without exception.

I basically did about 3 hours of proper work for 6 days a week, and still managed to graduate with a 2.1!
Athena
You can put it in this thread, and I'll format it for the wiki (or GE/RK will) :smile:

Has it gone into the wiki yet, or is it still waiting to be got round to? :smile:
Reply 26
This year I did all my work between 12am and 7am on Wednesday and Thursday mornings. I also have two four hour labs a week, and three supervisions on thursday.

My timetable rocks.
Reply 27
so...what kind of % of lectures do people go to? be honest!
Reply 28
A particularly bad week during exam term this year (I only had prelims this year, so had a normal term, only sans lectures). History 1st year.

Day 1. Finish essay at 6am. Get some sleep. Get up at 11am for a 12pm supervision. Finish supervision at 1pm, get some food, sleep all afternoon. Shuffle down to the JCR at 5pm to watch some telly, dinner at 6pm till 7pm, hit the bar for cheap alcohol, go out and get battered.
Day 2. Get up at 12pm, food, play some sport, watch telly, have dinner, watch movie in the JCR.
Day 3. Get up at 12pm, food, sport, telly, go on a swap, cindies, battered.
Day 4. Start feeling guilty, but hungover so not that eager, same routine without the night out, start vaguely doing work-related stuff. Get books, print off articles, maybe read one, maybe 1-2 hours work, including plenty of procrastination.
Day 5. Properly need to work now, do half the reading - about 8-10 hours of work.
Day 6. Get up before 12pm for once - coursework class, 2 hours. Do the other half of the reading, ready to plan/write on day 7 for 7am deadline on day 8.
Day 7. Spend most of day 7 doing **** all, find very random uninteresting things on the internet, make them interesting, spend 6 hours looking at them, spend a total of 5 hours sat in the buttery chatting, somehow manage to get to 9pm with only one of the three sections of the essay planned. Panic. Start writing and plan as you go, start hitting the red bull, hate yourself at 4am, vow never to do it again, feel beyond tired, finish essay, go to the computer room, hate the fact the sun is shining, print off work and hand it in. Head back to bed, find that you're so wired it takes over an hour to fall asleep even though you feel terrible. Fall asleep at about 7am. Supervision at 12.

Not a typical week, but something that happened a couple of times in Easter term at the point I suffered from a complete lack of motivation (that damned 5th week). Spending all of the Easter holiday revising had taken its toll. That said, a normal week tends to involve a few days off and then working solid on the essay, just not the all-nighter at the end.
Reply 29
Cantab
hate the fact the sun is shining, print off work and hand it in. Head back to bed, find that you're so wired it takes over an hour to fall asleep even though you feel terrible. Fall asleep at about 7am.


lol this happened to me a few times too - horrible feeling init
Reply 30
trance addict
:smile: thanks, much appreciated !

For future reference, here's a brief schedule for IA Computer Science, taking Physics and Mathematics B as the Natsci options.

Monday, Wednesday, Friday:

8:00AM - Roll out of bed, consider eating breakfast, drink coffee instead.
8:45AM - Meet at the cycle sheds, ride to Lensfield Road for Physics Lectures.
9:55AM - Rush out, cycle to New Museum site for compsci lectures.
10:55AM - Mess around in the computer room for an hour
12:00AM - Second round of compeci lectures.
1:00PM - Cycle back to college, grab lunch, do work, whatever

Every other friday, Physics practical from 2-6PM

If it's friday, or any other day we feel the need, go buy a crate and start party.

Tues, Thurs:
9:00AM - Maths lectures in town.
10:00AM - Cycle back to college, laze around, do washing, whatever.

Every other Thursday, Hardware practical 2-5PM. Non-hardware Thursdays, assessed exercise 'ticking' session ~3PM.

Sat:
8:00AM Cry, because you have to go to a lecture.
9:00AM Maths Lecture
10AM Cycle back to college and go back to sleep.
12PM Wake up for the weekly Brunch, which makes it all worthwhile.

Sun:
Sleep until 12PM, unless it's exam term, when you cry because your DoS gives revision supervisions from 9-12AM.

There's also about 4 hours of supervisions/week dotted around the week, along with the work required for them and other necessary things, such as pub crawls and Guitar Hero.
Reply 31
Vazzyb
so...what kind of % of lectures do people go to? be honest!


First year I think I managed about 25-30%.

This year it was about 15%, and bar 3 lectures, they were all in the first term.

I have a problem with the concept of 'mornings' :p:
Reply 32
lol .... i was thinking more like 75% but .... 30% ok lol :s-smilie: - i suppose you do have saturday lectures!? wait ur an engineer lol hmm
Reply 33
Vazzyb
so...what kind of % of lectures do people go to? be honest!

A single maths lecture since christmas (3/week), 1/3 of my chem lectures if that (3/week), and I'd say about 2 of my compsci ones each week (6/week).
So thats approximately 3 lectures a week out of 12.
Reply 34
good grief you people are amazing - i was sure that it wud be hard to miss lectures for "proper sciences" - since they're so understanding based..(unlike medicine where you just read the textbook) - is that not true?
Reply 35
Vazzyb
good grief you people are amazing - i was sure that it wud be hard to miss lectures for "proper sciences" - since they're so understanding based..(unlike medicine where you just read the textbook) - is that not true?

Well I got a 2.ii, mainly cause I was awful at chemistry. My compsci and maths results didn't seem to have any harm done by not going to the lectures.
I did, however, try to do all the supervision work and go to all my supervisions.
I'm not the best person to ask for advice on how to work though - I spent the whole year either playing sport, drunk, or both simultaneously.
Reply 36
lol :biggrin:
Reply 37
Vazzyb
good grief you people are amazing - i was sure that it wud be hard to miss lectures for "proper sciences" - since they're so understanding based..(unlike medicine where you just read the textbook) - is that not true?
If it makes you feel better I went to essentially all my lectures. I did well and I don't think I would have done as well if I didn't go to them all. But some people are fine with not going to lectures.

I'd say the only essential thing is doing the supervision work. As long as there's enough of that to test your understanding of the examinable material then if you can do it you're probably fine (this is more true of earlier and mathsier natsci subjects than later or more descriptive ones).
Reply 38
basically - you make life a lot easier for yourself if you go to lectures. I missed loads this year, and spent at least double the amount of time I would have spent in lectures finding notes, copying up notes from lectures I had missed, etc... for some biological options you can get away with it - there are no notes to take down. i wrote some essays in exams this year based on knowledge i had assimilated simply by reading through a wad of lecture notes four times the week before the exam, desperately trying to understand. it sort of worked. but for things like chemistry, it becomes a huge pain in the arse if you miss lectures and really want to know the stuff. i wish last year i could have just got up and gone - things, I hope, will change now...
Reply 39
I went to progressively less as the years went on; first year I went to the vast majority, second year a few less, and third year somewhere between half and two thirds (though the half of Mich I missed there was a good reason for). In my final year I only got away with it because there were handouts for every lecture and most of these were comprehensive and didn't need much addition. Plus I fall asleep in lectures anyway, so even the ones I went to I didn't write many notes. I am not a shining example of how to get a good degree, cos I didn't.

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