Year 12s: what will be the first way you research your future options? >>

GYG 2018/19: I got into University! Now what?!

Welcome!

Now that people are starting to make their GYG and freshers blogs for the new year, I'd thought I'd hop back onto the bandwagon myself! If you'd like to catch up with how my A Levels went (including my pretty chaotic Year 12 story), check out my GYG from last year here! :nyan:

So I've been deliberating a lot over whether to start a new GYG or a freshers blog, but I considered my main aim for this year, which is to try my absolute best academically, avoiding as much procrastination as I can (unlike last year lol). So, I'm back here for another year, and I can just include all the freshers type things on here anyway :yes:

I feel like there's a lack of representation of university students in the GYG forum, so I'm hoping this will help people still at school learn more about what it's like being a university student from an academic perspective :smile:

I also kind of want to prove to myself that I can maintain a GYG blog throughout the year and that I don't have to abandon it completely :lol:

as my past experience would say otherwise… (Also, if I update it regularly, then maybe you lovely people won't have to scan through my ridiculously long essays, trying to catch up on all the stuff I've missed, like exhibit A lol)

Now for the juicy info!

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University

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GCSEs

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A Levels

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Goals For This Year

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Important Posts

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Important Dates

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Tag List
If you'd like to be added/removed, please tell me! :heart:

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@bluebear25618

I'm going to tag the lovely people from my last GYG's tag list, just this once! :tongue:

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(edited 4 years ago)

Scroll to see replies

Reply 1

Harriso1

Well done! Your GCSE's are pretty insane as well.

Reply 2

04MR17

Volunteer Section Leader

2nd year direct entry?! Snazzy. :yes:

Please gimme the tags please. All the tags. :gah:

Reply 3

Realitysreflexx

Oh no, wait does second year count in scotland?

I enjoyed chilling in first year and wouldnt trade it for the world, first semester i was so lost lol. But i guess in such a technical field you wont really need to learn much essay writing...

Reply 4

niamhdoesmaths

Tag me please!! So excited to follow this :biggrin:

~~and beg you for help when I’m struggling with my own degree~~ ahem :colondollar:

Reply 5

gcsemusicsucks

Original post by Harriso1

Well done! Your GCSE's are pretty insane as well.

Thank you!! Ahahah they are, 2 years later and still in disbelief about them to be honest :colondollar:

Original post by 04MR17

2nd year direct entry?! Snazzy. :yes:

Please gimme the tags please. All the tags. :gah:

Hehe yup, but only because A Level Further Maths turns out to be a similar level to the first year of a Scottish maths degree :colondollar:

And done!

Original post by Realitysreflexx

From what I believe, only honours years count in Scotland (at least for St Andrews anyway), so 3rd and 4th year, meaning I still get a year to settle in before things start to matter. I can imagine it would be extremely hard to adjust to university when taking an essay based subject! :redface:

I'm planning on taking a couple of music modules, one being an essay based module, so we'll see how I cope :lol:

Reply 6

gcsemusicsucks

Original post by Protostar

Tag me please!! So excited to follow this :biggrin:

~~and beg you for help when I’m struggling with my own degree~~ ahem :colondollar:

Eee done!

And ahahah oh dear looks like we'll both be struggling together in that case :colondollar:

Me please! :woo:

Please tag me ☺️

i definitely want to be tagged!

really excited to see how you get on :hugs:

Reply 10

gcsemusicsucks

Original post by furryface12

Me please! :woo:

Original post by ilikemango

Please tag me ☺️

Original post by clouddbubbles

i definitely want to be tagged!

really excited to see how you get on :hugs:

Yaaay done! :heart:

Reply 11

gcsemusicsucks

Uni Preparation #1

So these past few days, I've been wrapped up in university admin, trying to sort out plane tickets for Christmas, packing lists, student portal and email logins, accommodation, and module choices! I'll summarise a few of the things here:

Accommodation
So at St Andrews, when you apply for halls accommodation, you put the types of accommodation offered in order of preference. I put single standard catered (not en-suite but catered) at the top of my list and I was so happy when I received it! I got placed in McIntosh Hall (which was the standard catered hall I least wanted to get lol my accommodation luck is awful) but I'm still so grateful that I got a single room because single standard catered is pretty oversubscribed! After researching about McIntosh Hall for quite a bit (just for my peace of mind tbh), I found out that on one side of the top floors, you get really nice views overlooking the beach (West Sands) and golf course. Of course, just after I found this out, I found out my room number, and it looks like I'm on the ground floor on the opposite side (seriously, my accommodation luck is just :lol:

)! People have been saying that the ground floor has previously been the site where various drunks manage to vomit a few times since it's the most accessible… I'll just have to bring ear plugs and a face mask LOL

Choosing Modules
On the student portal, you select modules of at least 120 credits (for 2nd year at least). I ended up selecting 7 maths modules and 2 music modules, which totalled to 145 credits, so I'm planning on talking to my advisor during Freshers week about whether I could just drop 1 maths module and do 130 credits instead… we'll see :s-smilie:

If you're interested in which modules I chose:

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I think that's everything I have to tell you for now! :biggrin:

Thanks for reading! :heart:

Tags

Please tell me if you'd like to be added/removed :smile:

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(edited 5 years ago)

Reply 12

04MR17

Volunteer Section Leader

Personally I would drop Vector Calculus.

Abstract Algebra I'm jealous of. :teeth:

Reply 13

gcsemusicsucks

Original post by 04MR17

Personally I would drop Vector Calculus.

Abstract Algebra I'm jealous of. :teeth:

I've heard so many people say how hard Vector Calculus is and that's definitely put me off, and literally most of the applications are physics and engineering related which I both have zero interest in :lol: