EduLinks

TheUniversityBlog a year ago: September 2007

TheUniversityBlog has now been around for over a year. This weekend saw the site through to its First Birthday. Ahh!

For those of you who haven’t been with it from the start, here are a few links from September last year for you to devour:

How To Win Freshers & Influence Students…Ten ways to improve your social clout – Breaking the ice and getting involved. How to start making an impact from the moment you arrive on campus.

Settle in, Enjoy, Make the most of it – Getting in the groove as soon as possible. You’re in for the long haul!

7 tips to top sleep, 3 tips for staying awake – By far the most visited and read post on this website. Students need sleep just as much as anyone. But when you stay up until the early hours of the morning and have a lecture scheduled in just a few hour’s time, you need every moment of sleep to be optimal. Then you need to get yourself up with a spark!

Writing Essays: Don’t Fool Yourself – Think it’s worth leaving your essays until the last minute? Think again. Far from being a good way of operating, you’d actually be in a better position if you started as soon as you were given the assignment.

Happy reading!

Seriously Consider Your Gap Year

Gap years are worthwhile and becoming increasingly common amongst students.

Grant MacDonald-AWAY

The Independent has a gap-year student supplement in today’s paper. If you’re taking a gap year before you hit uni, it’s a good read and full of ideas. Of the more general articles, here are some goodies:

Gap Year: Ultimate Listings Guide – Plenty of inspiration here if you need ideas to help with your planning.
Which Gap Year Type Are You? – This may help you make sense of the direction you’d like to take, especially if you’re career-minded at the moment.
Hot to Make Yourself Stand Out – This is an important read. If you only have time to read one article, make it this one. To make the point, here’s an excerpt that’ll get you thinking:

“I often ask rooms full of A-level students to stand up if they are ‘definitely heading to university’, and then ask those who ‘definitely know what they want to do in life’ to sit down. With most of the room left standing (even after asking those with “serious work experience” to also sit down), you can see the depth of the problem admissions tutors and graduate recruiters have. A room of ‘No goals’ and ‘Have done nothing’.

Remind the students that their decision to chase this empty goal will cost them over £10,000 and the sheepish silence descends.” [How to Make Yourself Stand Out – Independent]

This article is an even more pointed read, given that I have also just read about ‘Taking a Gap Year’ on the Educated Nation blog:

“In the land I am from, saying ‘I’m taking a year off before I start college,’ means one of two things: either you’re a slacker and have no direction and do not wish to succeed in life, or your parents aren’t going to foot the tuition bill and you need a little time to think before you leap into the Student Loan Chasm of Doom.”

So…did you have a plan?

Will you make a plan now?

photo by zombizi

New NUS website – Get Involved!

The vast majority of you are, or will become, members of the National Union of Students. The NUS is a voice for students and your Student Union can represent you as a student on matters far beyond organising events and Union nights.

The NUS website is now totally updated for the new academic year and is there for you. As their promotional link graphic below states, “Get involved!”

I didn’t know how to use the NUS and my Student Union to the max and I certainly didn’t get involved as much as I would have done if I’d known what was going on.

Don’t miss out on what’s available. Help yourself by finding out what’s going on. By helping yourself, I expect you’ll soon be helping others too. Surely it’s a win-win thing…

Use Your Cash Wisely: 10 Major Money Tips

On July 31, financial expert Alvin Hall and Head of Student Accounts at Lloyds TSB, Caroline Brady, answered student’s questions to help them make the most of their money at university.

Inspired by this, I’ve taken some of the most important points within the talk (it’s still available to watch in full), added tips that worked well for me personally, and given my take on how you can use your cash wisely. In total, 10 major money tips below to help you on your frugal student ways: