What is studying in Edinburgh like?

I was wondering what studying at the university of Edinburgh is like since I don't know anyone who has gone. If anyone has any advice or info about finding cheap accommodation, social life or just general things you think is important to know before attending please lmk

Reply 1

rwnsl

I'm a first year law student at UoE currently, I'll try to give some advice but bear in mind studying law/vet/med can be slightly different to other courses!

Socially, there are a bunch of different societies. I know there are lots of 'diversity' societies (I say this meaning societies for a particular marginalised group e.g. JSoc for Jewish students, the various chinese/Asian societies, PrideSoc, etc.), as well as a bunch of different sports (both BUCS and casual!) and general hobby-based societies! There was loads on during freshers so you had the chance to try out lots :smile:

As it is a city uni you do really have to put yourself out there to meet people as accommodations are rather spread out (and many non-uni run student accommodations that are run by partners like Unite Students and CRM Students actually have students from the other Edinburgh unis I believe!) but equally there are lots of great places to meet people either during freshers or in societies!

Honestly, very few UoE halls are 'cheap' compared to other unis. Milnes Court is one of the cheapest accommodations at I believe around 4.5k a year for 2023/24 which I would consider quite cheap, but it really depends on your priorities! e.g. if you want an en-suite, most of the en-suite accommodations have a similar price of £6700 a year. The contracts do also only go until the end of May so bear that in mind when considering the difference in monthly costs. (though private accommodations will obviously differ here). The university has the costs of all accommodations listed on it's website, but I'd also keep in mind not to truly inconvenience yourself in terms of getting to uni just for costs! If you're going to be on a campus other than central campus/ECA (e.g. Kings Campus or the vet school, so generally your STEM subjects) I'd definitely try your best to find somewhere in good proximity to those campuses as you will definitely regret a longer commute if you have lots of 9ams!!

Workload wise I do find we have quite a high workload (I generally spend about 4-7h per week reading outside of contact hours per course depending on the credits attached to the course - I'm currently taking 4 courses per semester), but I also know my friends in other degrees (non-law/vet/med) find the workload a lot less. But regardless, it is a top uni and there is a high standard of work expected! I'm personally currently procrastinating writing my 10 page paper :biggrin:

but really, it is what you make of it and while the reading isn't mandatory, we've certainly always been recommended to do it. And like I say, I do think certain courses will generally have more reading/outside of class work than others.

In terms of contact hours, this does somewhat depend on your course but I find most people I know average around 20h contact hours per week. For me this is 2-3 lectures weekly per course, and 2-4 tutorials weekly overall (some of my courses only have fortnightly tutorials). Comparatively my friends studying foreign languages have just 1 lecture for their language, then 3 tutorials (split into oral/literature/grammar). I don't know anyone well enough in any of the STEM courses to comment too much on how their contact hours are split unfortunately, but I'd imagine contact hours overall are similar across all schools. You can also somewhat tailor your schedule to fit your preferences too; lectures are obviously set (though are mostly recorded so it's not a massive loss if you absolutely can't attend), but you can request to change your tutorial times. For instance, I do sports so can't go to tutorials on Wednesdays or Friday afternoons, so I've set up my schedule so all my tutorials fall on Mon/Tues/Thurs. I also had some massive gaps in my timetable, so moved my tutorials into those gaps where I could!

The city itself is lovely - I grew up here so I think it is lost on me a little bit, but it is truly a beautiful city. Definitely very touristy especially around main campus and the law school, but still lovely! The actual university buildings are often not quite as pretty as many were built in the 1960s-1970s, but it's still a very nice atmosphere!