UNIVERSITY MY LIFE AND HOW IT WAS DISTORTED BY IT !
So the story starts with me at the end of my last year of school, full of enthusiasm and optimism I was told that the best thing to do for your career, is to go experience life and get a degree at university.
I was 18 years old when I started to apply for positions at university, after some weeks had past I was given a position to study a BSc Hons at a university that looked amazing.
Now lets skip all the fun of drinking living away from home, and cut to the hard truths I faced along my 4 year study.
You will most likely end up hating the study you have chosen! As for some people academia is something that they cant grasp.
You will make some friends for a lifetime, now this is something that is always said to people when they leave for university, and in many cases its true! You do make some amazing friends at university! But in many cases this is not the case, many students end up becoming more and more depressed inside their rooms being bored.
Money! Now in the UK the guidelines are set that if your parents or guardians earn more than a certain amount each year. The more they earn combined, the less maintenance loan you receive, and this is what caused me the most problems, I come from a split family and i was living with my mother and my step farther at the time. Cutting all the details, my parents earned a comfortable amount of money, BUT what the student finance groups in the UK do not grasp is the commitments that families have towards the amount they earn! In my case, my family don't end up earning a lot of money due to the expenditure, mortgage, loans exc. Now this left me with a basic amount of loan that was given to me by the university, with this i struggled with paying my rent, and in many cases going hungry for days on end because I couldn't afford food to even live. let alone study! This happened for 4 years... at the end of the course I found myself completely depressed with the outlook on life, the ability to have a degree in something you thought you loved, and a harsh realization that it means nothing on your resume. while people who did not go to university, had the ability to work their way up in the chosen career paths. as you feel like you have just been robbed of the most important years of your life.. for what, to say that you can remember some information that a teacher has given you. or that you can write a report on a specific question... This is not the experience that allows you to get your dream job.
In most cases, people leave university with over £40k+ debt, and struggle to get jobs because, they have no experience in chosen fields related to the study.
Now this is where the story stops for my time at university. Yes I did enjoy some aspects of it, and yes I have made some friends along the way.. but at the end of the day I am sat here applying for over 200 jobs a month, living with my parents, with no income, trying to find a way passed applying for job seekers allowance.
With no real indication on why I have wasted 4 years and tens of thousands of pounds on an education I can't use.
So to anyone wanting to go to university, here are the tips I give to you!
Always be prepared to lose friends
Save as much money as you can
Enjoy the little things in life
Be proud of yourself
Look after yourself
Do your best. Never Leave Assessments Till The Last Second!
Written by Sabian Hibbs
