The Student Room Group

Staying in your university city over the summer?

Here's the deal. I'm skint, and because I dedicate term time to working on my course, I've decided to work over the summer. I go to university in Manchester which means there are at least fifty times as many job opportunities here than there are back at home (Lincolnshire, out in the sticks), plus I have a house with a 52 week contract which starts on July 1st for which I am expected to pay the rent (my dad would require me to pay rent if I stayed at home for longer than a month over the summer - it's a sort of family rule, as I'm over 18 now).

All this is good, but I've only got 1 or 2 friends staying in Manc over the summer. Has anyone else done or is doing anything similar? Definitely need to earn money, but when I'm not working I'd like to be able to get out of the house! Any experiences of staying in your uni city/town/whatever over the summer holidays would be appreciated. Cheers.
Reply 1
Stay, but try and find some social stuff for 'normal people' to do. Make some friends with people in the city...

Adult education, sports clubs, language lessons, are all good ways of staving off boredom.
Stay and you may be surprised how many other people end up doing the same. I found I bumped into quite a few people I knew when I was here over the summer last year despite thinking I was all alone - lots of people pop back for a week here or there, or come back to find work. Also, you're highly likely to meet people in whatever job you do, whether it's bar work or an office, and hopefully you'll end up with some new friends you'll continue to socialise with even after term starts again. :smile:
Reply 3
If i were you i'd stay in Manc. Perhaps you could try and get a job at the uni so you'd meet other students who were about? At york (where i am) they hire lots of student porters over the summer vacation to help with the conferences etc. and the pay is quite good. Have you looked into that kinda thing in your city?
I'm staying at my uni town over the summer, working on dissertation and other stuff, together with working.

Basically, I've become involved in rowing with a town club so I know non-uni people through that.

If you're working you'll make friends there, won't you? You'll have people to see outside of work from that, so you probably won't feel too alone.
Reply 5
Loads of people will be there over summer, you'd be surprised.
Reply 6
I'm in the same position. at UoM but i can't go back home to my mum as after the first day i'd have had enough. it'd probably be rent free but i couldn't stand it for all the tea in china! :p:

not been working either so i really need to get a job and have been thinking of staying up here despite wanting to be down south for the summer. been looking into renting uni halls.
Reply 7
I'm staying in Edinburgh over the summer for more work opportunities (hopefully), staying away from my parents, and going to the Fringe. However, I think quite a lot of my friends are going to be there over the summer - that didn't really affect my decision though.
I'm sure there will be lots of other people staying for some/all of the summer for various reasons, and as others have said, you can make friends with the people you work with.