Student Life: Season 1, Ep 1

[Music] Welcome to Get to No Glass Go. The podcast that tells you what you need to know about student life at the University of Glass Go from those who know it best. In this series, four undergraduate and postgraduate students will share their glass go journeys. I'm Pash. Hey, I'm Daniel. I'm Chakane. And I'm Victor. Each episode will be sharing our experience and giving you our top tips on everything from student accommodation to fun and options. So you'll know what it should look like to be part of team beauty. Let's get started. [Music] Being a student at University of Glass Go, I'm not even exaggerating. It's a dream come true for real. Like, personally, for me, I find something new every day on campus. Even like, things like socializing or making new friends, going to events, going to society events, clubs, and the unions. It's just a dream come true for real. Do you not think so? I do think so. I feel like a lot of my social life has to do with going to university, society, socials. And anybody is welcome to come in at any time. You don't have to be a part of the society. Like, I've gone to so many pub quizzes and be like, "Hey guys, how are you guys doing?" I'm just new for the experience. But I like being in the society. I'm a part of the Glass Go University charity fashion show this year. And, um. It's like split up into different sections because you have the committee, then you have the models who are walking. And I'm a part of the models and I've enjoyed getting to know everybody. Because it's like your own small little group of people that you know in such a big society. So, and everybody is from all over studying different things and are in different university levels. And so, it's a good mix. You guys know anybody of any age and different nationalities. And it's just a good experience. It's pretty cool how easy it is to join these societies as well. Like, all you need to do is literally follow their socials or like add yourself to the mailing list and you're in the loop. That's it. Also, I was going to say about the unions. Do you guys go to the unions quite a lot? I have been to Q&U. I've been to Q&U several times. Mostly music related. I've been to Tugig there once. There was this Brazilian metal band that played in Glasgow like two years ago. And they're actually a really big band. And like, and yeah, when they came to playing Glasgow, they played at the Q&U. Which was amazing. That is a big deal. It kind of felt like they were playing at, you know, at home, at my home. You came all the way to my house from here. It was a really nice experience to see like a band from my country playing that, you know, kind of within the university. You know, it was a really nice. I've also helped organize a couple of music events at the at the venue at Q&U. And of course, the restaurant there is amazing. Like at the prices as well. Yes. Yeah. A lot of people don't know this, but we have four different unions. No, like the Q&U, the G&U, or our U of G sports. Like there's literally something for everyone. In fact, people are getting the memberships is so useful. For like, for example, the G&U, if you have the G&U membership, I think you get two quit off and dream to the hive. And most of my friends as well, they go to the hive quite often. And they like get the memberships you get, even if you're not going, like it's the free memberships, the mind is well. Yeah, it's all face was the Q&U as well. I think it's about as important to note, like there's so many societies out there that are like. Just so broad. So no matter what your niche interest is, it does not have to be related to your course whatsoever. If you're really an a hill walking, there is a society for that. So like, find and join things that you actually have interest in and meet people without like without with your course. And that's the whole social aspect of it. For me, in my 30s, there's mature students society. So that's also really good. And I find people that is kind of around about your age. Especially as an undergraduate student, obviously there's a bit of an age gap between me and some of my peers. But I still got on with everyone. I've made those friends and they might go out the weekends and go to the hive. And I'm sitting in number two cats. It's like literally, literally crocheting. But I'm sure there's a crochet in society that I've not found yet. So I'm going to look that up. Or isn't a might start one because you can actually be the person that starts your own society. It's so easy to like literally start a society of your own. Not that we don't have every society in the world already. I was going to say also for international students, you can also find people that are from like your country. Such a good way of joining their society. Like how there's the African Caribbean society is one that I'm a part of. So having different people from different parts of Africa and parts of the Caribbean. And then you have different events like the African society ball that happens. Also the collaboration with societies from other universities as well. Every single year the African Caribbean society collapsed with the Strathclaw University's society as well. And then we do the take me out events where it's like a Valentine's Day thing and they host like the speed dating type of stuff. So I like also having that where you have the opportunity to also meet people from other universities who are also part of the interests that you have as well. In fact, I was going to say by the way since you mentioned meeting people from back home. I used to be such a society person back in my first and second year. Obviously now I've kind of like it's died a bit because I'm in my third year and I'm like I've got so much really stuff to do. But like I used to be a part of there were two Indian societies and I was a part of both of their member board committees. And we had such such an amazing event. It was on the body. We the Indian society are getting it. It was so much fun. You guys when I tell you like it's it's just and I love how like they make you feel like home even away from home. That was that was like our motto of the Indian society. And we have events for every Indian festival like you name it and we have something happening like Charlie or Diwali or like literally name it and we have that event. But I was also in fact a part of the theater society the entrepreneurship society just to like it's also it's really important to mention how important these society memberships are for you CV when you graduate. I'm keeping for a job because they literally shine like a star on you CV guys. I got it I recently got to about AstraZeneca and my my recruits telling me how like they found this really attractive in my CV how like my profile is very like holistic. How like I'm not just doing my academics but I'm also like a part of society is doing stuff with charity and things like these like it's one it's it's it's good for your personality and your development and growth obviously. But do it shines so bright on your CVs so like I cannot stress enough on how important it is to join the society or a club. There's another thing as well that I think a lot of people don't really kind of know about is the shouldn't media kind of societies so you've get one that I was part of kind of last year. And plan on continuing is gust which is the Glasgow University shouldn't television so they yes so they actually are the ones that do like live streams of events and they'll help out with like a lot of broadcasting stuff. They have access to like the own studios as well so like television studios and which you can go to you can use all their equipment you can get involved they also do things like they'll do certain nominations so you go up and you're you present an idea for like a short film or a documentary. And then people will vote and then you can be the producer so you'll be a producer for a particular topic and then it's your kind of responsibility to take people and say right this is what I want to make. Let's do that and then you actually produce your own media from being in that so it's really really good experience like I'm not doing film or TV but a joint because it's one of my sort of interests out kind of with university and I thought well this gives me an opportunity. To feel what it's like to be in a proper studio working with the studio equipment and learning from other people that maybe are doing film and TV as a question. So that's what's really good you know I mean like you can although you although you're not studying something if you take a city. you'll learn from your peers like who are taking that course. So it's just it's a really good way of networking and just broadening your knowledge within the things that you enjoy like your whole business stuff and there's also the shouldn't magazine as well you can join up there and be part of that. There's loads of different media things as well that there's a newspaper. And people don't know but these things are big like I know so many people who actually read these are like use these. It's impactful for you. And you can be part of that you know it's just that as a case of signing up and just going along and trying out and this is the beautiful thing about it you can just turn up once try it out feel if it's right for you. If you don't enjoy it that's fine go find another society turn up to that you know just try everything I've joined like a few societies over the four years that have been a union I'm like you know why not see if I really like this obscure thing that I've never done before you turn up either love it you hate it you don't go back again or it's your new favorite. That is so fair I think for me personally it's the idea of independence liberty and taking the initiative to like from like even from organizing events to having like a big function like your fashion show to keep but like it's so much liberty it's hard to believe though because like even thinking about it gives me goosebumps like imagine being a first year 18 old almost high school pass out organizing your own event finding caterers for it finding resources that it literally gives me goosebumps for you. Yeah so many skills that you can develop whilst you're neither out with your course which just all wraps up any kind of life experience that will honestly will help you down the line whether you don't feel at the time and on ten years tell you look back and go I'm so glad I joined this I inland those yeah these skills because they will come into play at one point in your life. Yeah I have to say I have never officially like joined a club or society it's not like I haven't you know part taken and socialising within the university like because I'm a music student I have always you know being you know very connected to you know to music activities in general so from the very my very first month in Glasgow I started volunteering with music in the university so helping them organize events and helping them organize like the lunchtime concerts and that has led to lots of opportunities like of work and but also like to socialise with other musicians and other people who like are interested in this general world of music also like it in my very first like moments in Glasgow I joined the band which was formed by one of my my classmates and my first semester's degree and and that actually has led me to like several really nice experiences like we like last year we we were able to do a tour of Scotland with like two other bands and that was I mean I got to two experience fun fun stuff like that you know I got to do a tour afterwards this band that we toured with that that that it was part of it got this banded you know then we formed a new band you know all music students from from the university and it's been a really fun experience because you know we've been using only you know the university structure you know and like just this week we started recording our first you know singles and we've been using the studio at the university to do that and like likely your first our first concert is going to be at the university at the student concerts series so it's really it's so nice to have this structure you know because if you like you're being you know you're being supported and doing something that's not you know directly linked to tour studies but at the same time it yeah because we're all music students it obviously has to do with what we're doing at the university so it's it's really nice you know that's why I was gonna say it's sometimes it's like so much easier to take your mind off uni because like you can't be studying 24/7 you're gonna burn out so you need like I'm tying off and especially if you like new to the city and you don't know a lot of people clubs and societies are the best place like I cannot stress enough on how important or how useful it is for literally everyone to join a club or a society even like even like going to the Freshers Week is such a crucial step it's been a crucial step in my personal life because like you have all the societies with their information and their content with their websites and their socials and it's literally inviting you to join them what could be better guys how can it get any better from here so is there any anything you want to talk about about student life within kind of a university or Glasgow well I would really recommend people to to have a look at the gym which is you know right by the main campus and like it's so so big it's so huge and has so many you know different resources so you don't have to you know if you're into weightlifting then you of course go you know and you do your thing if you're if you just want to go and use tradmills it you know there's plenty of tradmills for you to use but say if you want to maybe you know try your hand at swim and there's a really nice pool there which I really miss after I moved out of university accommodations I shifted to a gym that that's closer to to the place where I stay so I no longer use the university gym but that's only for a matter of convenience and location plus it has all sorts of different classes like there's yoga and there's like it actually has you know lots of opportunities for you to try out you know different sports that that you would maybe not have tried before in your life so I would definitely recommend people to have a look at that that's what I love about our gym by the way it's it's so different from like a typical gym it's not just like five equipment and a tradmills it's so much more than that like eat from literally as you said from a swimming pool to like dance classes yoga swim but literally whatever you can think of we've got it all I should also mention that the Garskube campus it also has a sports complex in itself so like there's like you know these football pitches you know and few you know you can go there to play tennis and football maybe you rugby as well I'm not sure but yeah so that you know that there's a whole other side to the you know university university philosophy sports at the Garskube campus that people can can also make use that of I would also say utilize going to freshers week doesn't matter what year you're in I missed my first two freshers weeks because I was at home and my travel plans just did not align with the coming in on the first week of university but utilize coming into freshers week and just coming to scope out the different societies also the sports clubs as well another perk with being a part of the sports club is when you have that membership you have to join with a gym membership so you get the perk of being able to access the gym and to do your conditioning and then also joining a sports society and then also the S.R.C. website shows every single society in the university so then you can just scroll down and look at the plethora of different types of societies and pick one and then find out their Instagram handles also from there as well because sometimes you can look at the Instagram and type G you but you don't get every single one so it's also good to access the S.R.C. website and just try and find other people's Instagram. I think that's an app as well that has all the societies and that's where you can join all the societies through the app as well and that makes life so much more easier. What about you Danielle do you have do you have a tip? Yeah well I was just thinking about the S.R.C. app actually so if you go on the university or Glasgow's life app you can click on menu and events and stuff that so that will show you a lot of things that are coming up so the Glasgow life app is actually really good and it has improved a lot since I think it first came out so you've got like all of the upcoming events you can have like the next seven days and support well beans on there as well and then you can find the S.R.C. app through there as well which has the full list of societies and it's just a really good app to have your timetables on there keep you right and yeah like I say the events so yeah definitely get the apps on your phone that's super important and like the S.R.C. again they've got their own app then you've got the university life app and it's just like having all of these things like in the palm of your hand and there's a building finder as well I think a lot of people quite descend about that so if you've got like an event and maybe three one of your societies or something you don't know where it is you're a bit unfamiliar you're just headed at the life app and there's a building finder and it literally will pop up with a repop up to tell you exactly how to get to the room so be like if you go into the front door left through the double doors it literally talks you through how to get there so I know me is quite an anxious person when I'm somewhere new having that literally spelled out for me has been an absolute godsend so yeah highly recommend getting a look. I was going to say the same but it's a life saver for you like it let's you as you go straight, take a left, don't walk too far, take a left and they pick her up and I'm like damn! Yes, we're sure. We hope this episode has been useful. If you're interested in finding out more, you'll find the links you need in the show notes and you can visit glassgo.ac.uk/gettunnelglaschool. Thank you for listening and bye for now!