Hi, welcome to my first EPS blog. I’m Issy Hayden, a current third year undergraduate reading Chemistry at the University of Birmingham. I have been studying and living in Birmingham for over two years now, and I have enjoyed every second of it. However, the decision to decide where and what I wanted to study for 3 years was definitely a difficult one; there were so many factors to consider but I am so glad I chose Chemistry here.
I remember feeling quite daunted at the vast amount of options out there. When I started thinking about university in 2015, I didn’t even know what I wanted to study. I eventually decided on chemistry because it is so diverse and provides such a wide and interesting understanding to some of the most fundamental aspects of our lives – honestly, everything can be summarised by some form of chemical reaction or theory.
Chemistry at UoB can be described as fast-paced and sometimes difficult for sure, yet it is very rewarding, and you learn so many useful skills. When I came to visit the university, I met several lecturers and professors from the school and every single one made me feel welcome – especially in my interview which I was so nervous for, but it ended up being more of a friendly chat.
Of course, I could wow you with statistics on the university, but I’ll leave that to the open days, website, tours and league tables. The point I’m trying to make is that here at Birmingham, you are treated as an individual. It is a time of great change: for some it’s scary moving away from home, or meeting new people, or starting lectures and projects and for others one of the biggest changes might be cooking for the first time. You need to choose a university that understands all this and is supportive in your studies too.
University is not all about studying though! Indeed, I thoroughly recommend you use those next 3 years to take part in lots of different things – it is true what they say, there really is a society for everyone at uni. Personally, I enjoy reading, hanging out with friends and my sister (who is a 2nd year at UoB), going to Fab (the club night at the Guild) and exploring Birmingham in my free time. I also am the Chair and Copy-Editor of SATNAV Magazine (the university’s student science magazine), which mainly involves reading a lot of articles and organising lots of meetings. I got involved with this in my first year of university and it has honestly been amazing (look out for a later blog post on my involvement with EPS societies).
I hope you’ve gained more of an understanding of me and studying at UoB. Look out for my next blog coming soon!
