Second Year of University!

I cannot believe i'm at the end of second year! It feels like only yesterday that I was writing about my experiences at the end of first year. This has definitely been a better year for me. In terms of the uni side of things 1st year and 2nd year have been fairly equally enjoyable for me. I would say that I only enjoyed 2nd year more because I got to choose the modules that I wanted to do. Therefore, they were a lot more focused and I enjoyed this a lot more. However, although not a lot has changed education wise, outside of my university work has changed quite a lot this year.


Part Time Work and Work Experience

I was always quite scared about combining part time study with university. I couldn't imagine being able to juggle both. However, I am pleasantly surprised about how much of a difference it made to me. Particularly during breaks between semesters. Just after I started 2nd year I got a Christmas temp job at Lakeland. It was really nice to do something other than uni work and gave me a chance to socialise a bit more.

In second semester I spent a day a week doing work experience with the careers centre at my uni. This worked towards part of one of my modules, but it also gave me an insight into a career that I was thinking about. I really enjoyed learning more about what the careers service offer students and I really liked the work that I was doing. It really helped to confirm to me that this is definitely something that I would like to do in the future.

A couple of weeks ago I got my first permanent part time job. I am really enjoying it and it giving me something to focus on during the summer. As much as it is great to have such a long amount of time off during the summer, it can also be quite lonely not going into uni everyday. I find that it is giving me a lot more structure during the summer as I am generally working about 3-4 days a week. It is a great way of meeting people as well and means that interact with humans other than my parents!

Socialising

If you know me at all you will know that I find socialising really difficult. I'm never going to be one of those people who is constantly doing things with friends. However I think that I am getting slightly better at it. Generally I'm doing about one thing a month, which may not sound a lot, but when I was during school and sixth form it was surprising if I did something every six months with my friends. So I hope to keep this up during the holidays and into third year.

Modules

During first semester I loved my adaptations module. It was all about different books that had been adapted into film and analysing how effective that was. It was different to any literature module I have done before and I was quite nervous about whether I would be able to pick up the film studies aspect of it. I really enjoyed it and I was glad that I chose to do it.

In second semester I really enjoyed the module conflicting words. It was about a range of different war literature and how war is represented through fiction. Again I was quite nervous about whether I would enjoy it, but it was definitely my favourite module at university so far. The assessment was a 3,500 word portfolio. I have never worked so hard on a piece so much before and I was really glad when my mark came through with a first.

How It Compares To First Year

I think one of the reasons I have enjoyed second year so much is that I feel so much more settled than I did in first year. This has to be one of the biggest differences and has definitely made me feel so much more content.

Due to the fact that you are allowed to choose your modules in second year, the groups were a lot smaller, particularly in lectures. I was quite surprised to go from a huge lecture theatre of about 150 people to a small seminar room with about 40 people max.

What Would I Do Differently?

I definitely intend to go to more tutorials in third year. It will help me to know that I am on the right lines when it comes to assignments. Also I will be able to discuss feedback to assignments which will help me to know where I need to improve.

Thanks For Stopping By! :)