University College London

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Current UCL students' chat thread!

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Maybe it's the £30 to attend your own graduation, which no other uni charges?
Maybe it's the £30 a ticket for guests, when many unis get a couple of guest tickets for free?
Maybe it's the £45 to rent robes for a couple of hours, when you could buy them online for the same price?

Or maybe it's the fact that despite all the above costs (£135 for a graduate and their parents, before any travel/food/photo expenses), you don't even get your certificate, you just shake someone's hand?

Seriously, you can debate whether attending the graduation is worth all the money, but you can't really debate that UCL are squeezing every last penny out of you while they still can.

Horrifying to hear if you're a 3rd year :s

University College London

London

Reply 2721

UCLGrad

Original post by iAmBrOwNbEaR

Horrifying to hear if you're a 3rd year :s

Yes. There's also:

- Making you wait until September for the ceremony, even thought all other unis manage to have theirs in June/July. Meaning if you wanted to work abroad on a teaching scheme (which all start in July/August), you have to either take a whole gap year or miss the ceremony. And if you're in full time employment, you have to take days off when you've not been there long and your employers might refuse. And if you're an international student, your visa has probably expired and you've long since returned to your home country so you'll have to pay for a tourist visa and flights for you, as well as your friends and family.

- Your ceremony might be at 6.45 in the evening, messing up most people's planned schedule for their graduation day. You can't get the robes until 4pm, and the queues take a long time so you have little
time for mingling before you need to start getting seated for the ceremony. The ceremony doesn't finish until 8.30ish and with the time it takes for everyone to file out the ceremony and do some mingling at the reception, you're looking at 10.30ish. Presumably you're meant to have dinner then (and I would be dying of hunger by then!), which makes catching the last train home a nightmare if you're going back with your family and makes it harder to have a night out after.

- UCL told everyone this year that it was fine to buy their robes online because they matched UCL's requirements. When the ceremonies begin, it turns out that people have been forced to rent on the day after having bought robes online, because UCL had changed the hood style/colour/detail so that the only ones acceptable come from their "preferred" retailer.

Reply 2722

i_hate_teeth

Jeez Louise

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Reply 2723

sundogs

Do you know what, I take it back. Graduation was an absolutely lovely day. Expensive but so nice.

I had a 2.45 ceremony, was great seeing my whole year go up on to the stage one by one and also being surrounded by happy and smiling family and friends.
I even got a hug from the vice-provost on the stage.
The marquee was really hot and the ceremony was a bit long but the reception was lovely and it was lovely having photos taken with everybody and seeing the staff.

(edited 10 years ago)

Reply 2724

Noodlzzz

Having bought all my books in the past I've decided to use the library. When do I know when the book is due back and how and how long for can I renew it for?

Reply 2725

sheeesh

Original post by Noodlzzz

Having bought all my books in the past I've decided to use the library. When do I know when the book is due back and how and how long for can I renew it for?

You can do it all online, I've kept a book for ages and all I had to do was log into my library account every couple of months and renew my loan.

(edited 10 years ago)

Reply 2726

i_hate_teeth

Where on campus can I park a moped?

Reply 2727

Balvation

How often do you go to oxford street

Original post by i_hate_teeth

Living at home is the ****.

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Elaborate

Reply 2728

iAmBrOwNbEaR

Original post by Balvation

How often do you go to oxford street

This.

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Reply 2729

i_hate_teeth

Original post by Balvation

How often do you go to oxford street

Elaborate

Loads of reasons. Not having to pay rent is probably the biggest.

Reply 2730

Noodlzzz

Non-freshers, when do we get student finance?

Reply 2731

DH.

How do I find out my ucl email and where do I log in exactly? I've searched everywhere but can't find where to login ;(

Reply 2732

Ultimate1

Ready and rearing to go for my third year.

Last year was a bit disappointing but I'm ready to make amends.

Actually can't wait for it to start now :biggrin:

Reply 2733

Top Hats

Original post by DH.

How do I find out my ucl email and where do I log in exactly? I've searched everywhere but can't find where to login ;(

Here's how to log in: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/isd/students/mail/live/guide/owa/login

And here's where to log in: http://outlook.com/live.ucl.ac.uk

Reply 2734

Ivanka

OMG. (If you dislike moaning related to years abroad, please skip this post.)

I'm having an enrolment meeting on Monday. I have decided to take four courses this semester, each worth 6 ECTS, making it 24 in total. I haven't chosen more, because I didn't like other options and I'd like to have time to concentrate properly on my YA project.

In one of my classes, we were split into groups. I was grouped with a few people sitting next to me, but I didn't know their names nor their contact infos. Afterwards, I came to the lecturer and asked her for the names of the people in the group. She willingly let me copy the list and then I went through Facebook to see if someone was there. I found one girl, so I sent her a message if she was willing to meet and do the set homework. However, she replied to me she doesn't attend the classes anymore as there were no free places when she enrolled.

This made me panick a bit. No one, even the lecturer, has told me I shouldn't attend the class because it's full. As I haven't enrolled yet, there's a chance I won't even chance to for this subject unless someone opts out. This would mean I would only have 18 ECTS. We were sent an e-mail from UCL explicitly stating we need to have at least 23 each semester.

I don't know if there's chance atm to get rid of this problem. The teaching started more than a month ago and even if catching up wouldn¨t be an issue (the teahcing pace is really slow here), several lecturers have already started monitoring attendance, setting coursework, etc. I don't think that turning up in a class i haven't been in before would do any good.

We actually have a new YA tutor who seems lovely, at least from the impression of her e-mails. I guess I'll see on monday how it goes and then I'll talk to her immediately. I just would like to warn anyone coming to the University of Granada, because it's an enormously disorganised institution and it costs me a lot of nerves.

Reply 2735

foreverlearning

Hey, I'm an applicant and I was wondering if a current student could help me out.

I've got an offer for Civil Engineering but would really like to study Computer Science. So I was wondering if any one here knew whether UCL let you switch once you get in ?

Maybe someone who has switched degrees once they got in ? Do they even let you and if yes, how long would it take ?

Any contributions would be awesome.
Thanks!

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