Congrats 2020. You broke me.

Hi,

I'm really sorry to hear about what you're going through. 2020 has indeed been a rather unfortunate year for most of us so far.

I think in terms of work and school, I'm in the same boat as you are! I'm currently finishing up my degree and looking at grad jobs offering a tier 2 visa. I'm doing a rather unpopular course which has pretty much zero prospects back home, and quite challenging to find success in here as well!

I had done a placement year last year with a company - who I was hoping would take me back on. They do want to, but it turns out the visa rules require them to pay much much more than what they can at most which means it might be a deal breaker. And of course, with most other jobs it's an instant NO because of the visa situation. To top it all off, the pandemic has pretty much taken away even the few job applns that I was started to find some progress with.

I feel the same about assessments and university - just lost all motivation to do assessments after all this has cropped up around Feb/March.

Well, all I can say is keep at it and don't give up. We don't know what's gonna come our way. Feel free to message me if/when needed.

P.S: I know that this doesn't really provide you with a solution - because to be honest, I'm quite clueless as well! I've always found it better hearing from someone else in similar situations and hence am posting this.

All the best!

Finally someone who does the same as me. I find myself constantly on the student room or twitter reading posts about people in similar situations.

International student on Tier 4 visa. I've worked a few years before resigning to do a Masters full time in the UK, so "mature student" I guess.
Here I am under my parents' roof in my home country (the norm here for the unmarried ones), listening to so much going on around the house (under quarantine) and feeling like an utter failure in life.
People who know me in real life can probably easily recognize me from the contents of this post. And the scary thing is I can't bring myself to even give a damn anymore.

Life: I lost someone at the start of 2020 (not COVID-19 related). I still miss them.
Decided to return to my home country during Easter to spend time with my parents. Left before lockdown announced. Lockdown was announced and I guess I'm stuck here for the near future. (I don't regret coming back one bit but being stuck here where I have a lot less freedom to do things objectively doesn't help with my situation).
I'm still single and on Tinder. Matched with a guy sometime in early March whom I actually enjoyed chatting with. Then the entire COVID-19 hit and between everything going on in our respective lives we broke it off. (I fully understand even our communication went on there's a thousand and one reasons it might not work out. But at least at that point in time I was having fun.)

Work: I've been getting reassurances from the school (in general and career services) that they've been talking to employers and claimed employers have not slowed down with graduate recruitment.
But personally? I've received too many calls/emails to my applications since 13th March telling me the company's freezing hiring or will not consider me because of my visa status. There's this handful that did not respond to my follow-up email. Can't call because no one is in office. My rational mind is telling me to give up on those already.
(Part of the reason is probably also because I did not apply to the Big 6 because I know I won't be able to survive the ACCA pathway. Lack of interest. And those are the ones most generous with Tier 2 visas).
BTW I've had companies/recruiters call me back after my applications to check my visa status. So I highly doubt there's major issues with my CV/Cover Letter. I had also consulted my school's career services who commented they were good.
I have already-obtained points under ACII qualifications, and was hoping to further them during dissertation period. That might now be impossible if I were physically outside the UK during that period.

School: One can say assignments/assessments themselves are the least of my worries at the moment. In the sense that the school can be very forgiving compared to the job market/UKVI, and I've been reasonably conscientious with my assignments pre-March 2020.But the disappointment that what was planned to be a whole year abroad was cut buy more than half is so very real. And e-lessons simply cannot make up for loss of all the networking opportunities presented by school activities that were suppose to happen after Easter break.
I will not get another opportunity like this.
And it's so hard to concentrate on revision/assignments when I feel like crying every now and then.

It just feels so hopeless. Like I have no idea when in life did I make so many wrong turns that now I can't see a future. The looming economic gloom certainly doesn't help.
I don't know how am I going to dig myself out of this pit. Maybe I can't. I don't know.