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Hi. My name is Paula. I study Politics, French and Spanish,
and I'm in my second year. Settling in was quite easy.
Through Freshers Week, the LSS staff really take care of you. They'll give you a
personal tutor who will give you the guidebook to tell you exactly what you should do,
where you should go, what is it about your course, and your exams and everything.
So I wasn't - at any stage - confused about what I had to do.
The transition wasn't that difficult. You were given a lot of support with
a lot of software - the university has, like, a load of software.
You have a lot of support from your lecturers, from your personal tutor
and the course itself was very varied.
In A levels, you're given a lot of language to do, so you focus a lot on language and grammar
but when you come here, you get to explore politics,
the geography, the history, the culture behind the language and you get to do
a lot of your own independent work, whereas in A level, everything was set out for you
to study for exams.
I enjoy having my classes in the target language because it gives you that deeper immersion
into your studies because, in A levels, you're taught in English and then
you get your course materials in the target language but here, having everything
in the target language just gives you that deeper knowledge into what you're studying
and at first, it's a bit difficult to pick up on but the lectures are absolutely amazing,
they understand that you're coming from
a place where you weren't exactly taught everything in the target language
so they take it slow, they make sure that you understand everything
and even though, yes at first it was a bit difficult to pick up on,
by the end of my first year,. it was easy as pie. The personal tutor system is great.
It allows you one-on-one contact time with a lecturer and since you're a student,
they understand where you're coming from, you're brand new, you don't
necessarily understand everything that's going on. But they're there to help you through the process,
to help you with any of your academic needs, and they're really
generally - like - a good support system for you to have when you enter university.
The best thing about studying here is that you have such a community feel here -
your courses are very, very small so you get to know your lecturers
and everybody else you're studying with on a one-on-one basis,
so you don't feel like a stranger, of course, you don't feel like you're drowning in a mass of students.
You feel, "oh I've come here to learn" but I've also come here to make friends and just feel like a tight-knit group.
And it's great the way that all the lectures understand that, because you get to know the lecturers
more personally than you would at a larger University.
So coming here's just made me feel as if I've entered a second home
rather than ... I've come here to get my degree and just rush out again.