What should I be asking at Open Days?
Open days are really useful ways to get a feel for a university, the geography department and the place where you will be living for three years. However just looking around is not enough to gain a detailed picture of the course on offer and what type of student experience a university can offer.
The best thing to do is to ask lots of questions, no matter how simple they may seem. An old chinese proverb goes; he who asks remains a fool for five minutes, he who doesn't ask remains a fool forever. Most importantly you need to target the course and the way it is taught, so most question suggestions on here focus on that, however there are other things to ask that are useful too
Does a student on this geography course have tutorials? How big are tutorial group sizes? How freguently are they? Who takes the tutorials?
Good tutorial sessions are probably the best way to begin understanding a course. Having close contact with a successful academic is a key to success at uni. Therefore questioning is vital to ensure you get this.
The first three questions are fairly obvious, but the fourth is often missed. Many universities claim to run tutorials, however unfortunately these are sometimes taken by members of the faculty who are not yet expert tutors and in some cases do not see themselves as tutors as they are primarily employed by the university as research staff. Therefore tutorials they run may not be of the same quality as those orchestrated by a professor of the subject being discussed. A follow-up question could also be asking how the tutorials fit into the courses being offered. A tutorial system that links up intimately with the modular system is most desirable.
How is first year examined? How quickly can I expect submitted work to be marked?
Knowing how you are going to be examined is important because everyone thrives under different conditions. Choosing a course that examines in a way that you feel comfortable with quite important to your chances of success.
Often students bemoan the fact that essay and coursework submitted is not marked quickly enough. A student will struggle to improve writing if they do not receive feedback for work before beginning the next piece. Therefore if a department has a committment to a reasonable time frame for work feedback, it should be further considered.
The best thing to do is to ask lots of questions, no matter how simple they may seem. An old chinese proverb goes; he who asks remains a fool for five minutes, he who doesn't ask remains a fool forever. Most importantly you need to target the course and the way it is taught, so most question suggestions on here focus on that, however there are other things to ask that are useful too
Does a student on this geography course have tutorials? How big are tutorial group sizes? How freguently are they? Who takes the tutorials?
Good tutorial sessions are probably the best way to begin understanding a course. Having close contact with a successful academic is a key to success at uni. Therefore questioning is vital to ensure you get this.
The first three questions are fairly obvious, but the fourth is often missed. Many universities claim to run tutorials, however unfortunately these are sometimes taken by members of the faculty who are not yet expert tutors and in some cases do not see themselves as tutors as they are primarily employed by the university as research staff. Therefore tutorials they run may not be of the same quality as those orchestrated by a professor of the subject being discussed. A follow-up question could also be asking how the tutorials fit into the courses being offered. A tutorial system that links up intimately with the modular system is most desirable.
How is first year examined? How quickly can I expect submitted work to be marked?
Knowing how you are going to be examined is important because everyone thrives under different conditions. Choosing a course that examines in a way that you feel comfortable with quite important to your chances of success.
Often students bemoan the fact that essay and coursework submitted is not marked quickly enough. A student will struggle to improve writing if they do not receive feedback for work before beginning the next piece. Therefore if a department has a committment to a reasonable time frame for work feedback, it should be further considered.