As a student of the Performing Arts, this place is a gem. I am unable to speak on behalf of the other departments, however, I will say that I have noticed an enormous difference between how the Sports and other departments approach answering the question ‘what do you think of the uni?’ to how the PA students do. the basic difference is the PA students seem more enthusiastic with life here, and here’s a few reasons why:
-The PA lecturers are deeply grounded in the contemporary world of performance and therefore influence us students in a helpful, relevant direction
-The PA lecturers truly value artistic freedom of the individual, so for the first time you complete control in your approach to art
-The PA lecturers make huge efforts to spur development and fresh, new perspectives in our creative and critical process
-You are simply not told you CAN’T do anything, rather you are guided through on your terms to reach a stage where you are happy and more importantly confident in what you’re doing
-Students are encouraged to see a vast variety of performances that the lecturers arrange through their industry links, which help ground the students in a contemporary context.
-The University has a massive reputation for feeding the contemporary Theatre world.
Why not get involved?

Negatives:
-No matter how much effort I seem to put in, I cannot seem to break out of a certain nuance which means I always seem to get the same sort of marks consistently, and I don’t believe I have had a lot of support, HOWEVER nor have I truly taken the time to reflect on this
-SOCIAL LIFE – a grey area here – there is a noisy majority who love the repetition ‘WSIHE’ Wednesday – potentially the most tragic student night in the country. Truly Awful. Same boring pop music week in week out. It’s not a particularly inclusive social scene. Never do they allow students to DJ, despite students having greater knowledge than middle-aged people on what students want from a night out. Some Tech-House, Garage nights would be nice just to break the repetitive structure? I heard there was a Drum and Bass night recently and I heard nothing but gleaming reviews. I amongst many others are deeply dissatisfied with the Student Unions’ lack of a grasp on what our generation wants. In many ways, it’s like Rousseau’s notion of being ‘Forced to be Free’. It’s as if they say ‘this IS fun’. ‘YOU ARE enjoying yourselves.’ seeing as the social scene is such a large part behind why people go to study, I wish they’d open up our voice a bit in regards to things. We are young adults, the week in week out ‘school disco’ type of party is outdated, boring and almost patronizing. If I can go to London (when I have the money) to go to a tech-house event, I do not need the Uni telling me what a ‘safe night out’ is thank you. Hiring a couple of students twice a week would make so much more sense as they don’t need to be paid as much as a ‘normal’ DJ, and we know what we want for ourselves.

Overall:
Fantastic for its fundamental purpose of getting you a degree, just let the students inform you what students want when it comes to social life!

Nearly there.