Foundation Year

For those who have done a foundation year in Uni, what advice would you give ?

How much free time did you have and what were your timetables like ? Were you able to get a job ? Anything you would recommend doing / change again ?
How did you make friends and how did you cope being older than everyone in 1st year ?
Your advice would be really appreciated and helpful.

Thank you.

(edited 1 year ago)

Reply 1

Chronoscope

Volunteer Section Leader

21

Original post by xiron

For those who have done a foundation year in Uni, what advice would you give ?

How much free time did you have and what were your timetables like ? Were you able to get a job ? Anything you would recommend doing / change again ?
How did you make friends and how did you cope being older than everyone in 1st year ?
If you did a foundation year for Computer Science, you advice would be really appreciated and helpful.

Thank you.

Hi!
I did a foundation year at Reading (was in a different subject to computer science though) :smile:

I found mine to be quite intense and now I've finished the first year of my actual degree I think my foundation year was tougher and more work (probably because I really wanted to get onto the actual degree).
I'm 23 and going into 2nd year now - the cohort for my subject is pretty varied and some people are older than me and some have come straight from sixth form or have come back to studying after taking a year out.

Regarding friends you can find your people in several ways e.g. halls of residence, neighbouring flats, societies, seminars (you don't really get a chance to talk to people in lectures).

I think if covid hadn't happened when I was doing my foundation year I would have managed to fit in a job alright :yes:

you would have to manage your time quite well though as there seemed to have been more assessments.

Reply 2

xiron

OP

10

Original post by Chronoscope

Hi!
I did a foundation year at Reading (was in a different subject to computer science though) :smile:

I found mine to be quite intense and now I've finished the first year of my actual degree I think my foundation year was tougher and more work (probably because I really wanted to get onto the actual degree).
I'm 23 and going into 2nd year now - the cohort for my subject is pretty varied and some people are older than me and some have come straight from sixth form or have come back to studying after taking a year out.

Regarding friends you can find your people in several ways e.g. halls of residence, neighbouring flats, societies, seminars (you don't really get a chance to talk to people in lectures).

I think if covid hadn't happened when I was doing my foundation year I would have managed to fit in a job alright :yes:

you would have to manage your time quite well though as there seemed to have been more assessments.

Did those who did a foundation year with you all get into 1st year ?
Did you get a big assessment / exam at the end of the year that determined whether or not you got into 1st year ?

Also how much free time did you get ? Was you entire week filled with classes or was it just 3 days max ?

Reply 3

harryw02

9

Original post by xiron

Did those who did a foundation year with you all get into 1st year ?
Did you get a big assessment / exam at the end of the year that determined whether or not you got into 1st year ?

Also how much free time did you get ? Was you entire week filled with classes or was it just 3 days max ?

I did the foundation year at Manchester, we had exams in January and during May/June. Different subjects required different grades, for example engineering required an average of 60% and physics required an average of 75%. I had lectures/tutorials on most days however there was only one or two days a week where I was in university for most of the day, most other days I only had one lecture or tutorial. I had about 16 contact hours a week. Most people I knew passed the year, others who missed the grade requirements were offered the chance to progress to alternative subjects that had lower grade requirements, some people were offered the chance to resit the year. It's quite easy to make friends as you will have tutorials/ lectures with the same people every day so you naturally get to know people who you sit near etc. My advice would be not to underestimate the foundation year, most of the people that fail are the ones that think they can take it easy as they may be familiar with some/all of the content. I wouldn't worry about being older than everyone in 1st year as there are lots of people that take gap years before going to university.

Foundation Year

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