Second round of freshers tips

Don’t stick around the same people, there is lots of time to get to know everyone, try and meet as many people as you can in the first week. You may grow out of the first people you meet or they may grow out of you!

Try not to pay for clubs at the sports and activities fair, you may not enjoy them, try giving it a go first, or wait a day or so before handing over your money.

Don’t be tricked by anything that isn’t really free at the Fresher’s Fair, make sure you only grab what is truly free and doesn’t require signing up to some mailing list etc.

Try and go to as many events and activities as you can in Fresher’s Week, it doesn’t matter if it is tiring.

When you move in leave your door open while you unpack – in fact keep it open all the time you are awake in your room, even if you’re doing a bit of work, it’s always nice to appear friendly to your neighbours.

Don’t get so drunk you throw up all the time, try out more than just nightclub activities, as you get into your 2^nd and 3^rd years you will be less able to go out at night and outdoor activities and interests will become more appealing.

Talk to as many random people as you can, as you queue for things etc.

Try not to moan about things, people like optimists!

Don’t hide away in your room, its unlikely people will find you there.

Try avoiding any friends from home for the first week or so, it will be harder to make new friends if you are always going for the friends you know.

Take along some DVDs you know are popular and some music to play in your room.

Decorate your room with posters and other homely artefacts; usually there will be a poster fair at your union.

Don’t be scared to do things or go to clubs alone.

Once you gain your Student Card, make sure it is welded into your wallet, don’t go anywhere without it! (Seriously!)

Use protection if you find yourself having some Fresher’s Week sex.

Keep yourself looking clean and smart throughout Fresher’  week, shower, brush your teeth etc daily!

Even more tips

This is more for the social side. It's fresher's pretty much all over the country so I thought I'd give you guys a few tips for surviving the madness.


Get acquainted with your university and campus beforehand (take a trip up there with your parents or friends) especially if you are living on campus, get to know the halls and area of the uni so you'll feel more confident.


Try to find out whether anyone at all you know is going to your university. If you can't call or text them all why not just put 'anyone going 2 UCL?' as your MSN, Myspace or Facebook screen name? This will be sure to grab any one going's attention and then if you find someone you know should be there then hurray! You'll be less nervous.


Have money, passport photos, passport and mobile with you- this way you won't be in trouble if you should need any information whilst filling out forms. Make sure you don't leave home anything important, like your ID card, driver license, cellphone or anything else you feel you'll need.


Get to know as many people as you can. Don't stick to one person, broaden out! But that doesn't mean that you shouldn't make real connections with people; just don't narrow your choice of friends down too early on.


Don't only make friends with people on your course or a similar course because you may find your new best friend or new partner studying something completely different to you.


Sign up to any clubs that slightly interest you, and don't worry you are not expected to follow through on all of those plans just have them there as a back up, you may pick 3 clubs to join and only join one- that's just fine.


Avoid getting drunk or swearing excessively or being too easy/flirtatious around people this can be quite off putting and really you won't regret it in the long run. Remember first impressions count, so don't make yours a lousy one.


Enjoy freshers week. There are also some good sides in it: there is no real education involved, and it is purely implemented to let students familiarize themselves with their surroundings and build friendships before the official term!

Not really a life tip...

I love this video. It may be old, but it's a damn classic.

Revision for exams

It's too early for this but I thought I'd throw it out there. Revision.
Revision, revision, revision. The worst part about uni is studying for exams.

There's a few things you can do that will help with this.

Multiple choice exams - Google Anki spaced repetition, nuff' said.

Short essay answer exams - Few things which will interlink. First, start off buy drawing a spider diagram/brain storm/whatever you call it. List off the main talking points of your answer then break off into sub sections of those main points. Now memorise them. Most uni's will allow you to view past papers, and most of the time, they're pretty much the same. My place has an A paper and a B paper and each year they make new ones by mixing the questions. Anyway, once you've memorised those points, write it out again, this time in list form.

Once you've done that, do it again. Repetition is key here. Now, write out what your answer would be to one of the question's from your exam. Memorise it. Do it again and again and again. Memorise everything you've written down. Re-write it over and over. For added effect, record yourself reading out the essay answer you've written and listen to it over and over. Listen to it while you sleep. Listen to it all the time before you have that exam.

During the exam, draw out your spider diagram on a blank sheet. On the question paper, write down your list. Now, at anytime during the exam if you forget something, refer back to the two and you should be OK.

Not to blow my own trumpet, but I got 80's and 90's in my exams last year.

Few more tips for students

Bake shit - From experience, buying pizza's, from anywhere, can be expensive. From a Tesco Express you can get 3 for £5. At one point they bumped it up to £6, but then dropped it after realising how much of a fucking rip off that was. If you go to a big Tescos, they normally do like a 12 inch pizza for £1. Plain cheese however.

But for £5, you can buy all your own ingredients and make your own pizza's. A friend of mine done that all of last year and made some tasty looking stuff. And with the dough left over, made cheesy garlic balls. After buying all the stuff you need and want for your own pizza's, you can get about 4 9inch pizza's. They'll probably be more healthy then that Tesco crap anyway.

Cakes are always a good way to go when you want to treat yourself. You can normally get a mix for £1 in certain place's. I think it's a Betty Croker mix, don't quote me on that. But the end result is a nice mix of chocolate sponge, and if you have it, a nice layer of choc spread. Seriously, buying cheap chocolate bars, or spreads, can be a great way of adding more chocolatey goodness to your cake

Night's out - Ok, biggest part of uni right? Also the best way to blow all your money. Sure, freshers, go crazy, it what you money is there for, but after that is when you need to start watching you bank balance.

Obviously, as everyone should know, pre-drinks is a great money saver. And obviously, you go to the bars and clubs that have student nights on (If you're lucky, that's one every night of the week). But, don't forget to look out for deals. See those guy's and gal's handing out flyers for their club? Actually take one and look at it. Normally they offer a free drink or shot and saving your self a couple of quid each night will add up over the months. Let's say you get one free drink and a drink in said club costs £2.50. With that £2.50 you can buy 2 pints of milk, a loaf of bread and an energy drink for the morning after. Seems like a good bit of saving there.

Normally picking up a leaflet in a bar or club can get you at least one free drink. And if your uni is good, you should get some free stuff off clubs and cafe's in your fresher pack.

Good Tips for Students

Free stuff. You need it, you want it and it's easy to come by.

Studentbeans.com -  This should be the first place you go. Vouchers, samples and deals on meals and movies make this a great place to start getting your free stuff from. You can also get free weekend gym memberships on occasions if you're curious about certain places.

Writing/E-mailing companies - If you buy a pack of doritios every now and again or a bag of M&M's, a bottle of Robinsons juice etc, keep the wrapping/label. I bought a bottle of Robinsons Fruit & Barely which had 'bits' floating around in it. Now, I'm the type of person that cannot drink any form of liquid if there are bits floating around. I e-mailed robinsons, told them what was wrong with my product, gave them the product information (on the label) and they sent me 3 £1 vouchers for Fruit & Barely. Now, Tesco's will do a £1 deal on 1 litre bottles of this stuff, so that 1 bottle I threw away turned into 3 free ones.

This will work with other places too. If you have a genuine complaint, keep the wrapping/label, e-mail or write to the company directly and they should refund you with another product or a fair bit more.

Money saving. Essential and vital to a student.

Seriously, just because you got your student loan and grant, don't think you can go crazy. It may work for your first year but of you go into your overdraft and don't pay it back by working during the summer (Like so many students do) then second year will be a struggle. Be cheap. That should be your motto. Buy Tesco value. See that Helmans Mayo? Tesco do it cheaper. See that can of Red Bull? Tesco do it cheaper. This will apply in most places (ASDA, Lidls, Aldi's etc)

I shit you not, the amount you can save by NOT buying brand stuff is amazing and most of the time the taste isn't all that different.

The market is your friend - Go to your local with a bunch of house/flat mates and buy a shit load of meat. Now freeze it all. Normally you can pick up 10 steaks for £5 near the end of the day when they need to sell their stock. Buy lots of chicken breast aswell. It's healthy and will fill you up. Get some rice with that and you'll feel like you've eaten a 5 course meal.

Make stuff in batches - I bought 1kg of mince meat from a wholesalers for £4.50, cooked it all up, chucked in 2 jars of bolognese sauce and got 5 meals out of it. 5 meals for £5.50. Just freeze up all of it and microblast it when you're hungry. That stuff will taste just as good from frozen.

Cook for everyone - If you live with other people, you should all come to an agreement that you'll take turns cooking dinner every night. It may not be feasible for everyone in your house/flat depending on if they finish late with lectures or have an evening job, but if there's enough of you, you may only have to cook dinner once a week. Thats 6 free meals, and it works out for everyone. Just think if you make up a big batch of Spag Bol for £5, you could thin that out with enough spaghetti to feed 7 or 8 people. That's £5 you've spent to have dinner every night of the week. Sound's pretty good right?