Abbey Cambridge Alumni Experiences: Chi from Vietnam

Chi joined Abbey College from Vietnam in 2014. She graduated from the Business Management and Economics pathway of our International Foundation Programme in 2016 and joined the University of Bath, where she is now in the final year of an Accounting and Finance Degree. Here she gives some advice for students entering the first year of their degree.

“My name is Chi. I’m currently a final-year Accounting and Finance student at University of Bath. What I’m going to tell you in the rest of my post is about my life experience as a fresher. I want to start with an interesting fact, which I believe most of you already know and that is first-year results are not counted towards your final degree – hurray!. I know the first thing come to your mind may be something like “Yes, I have more free time to watch all the movies and shows on Netflix” as soon as they are released” or “Yes, more free time to play LOL or other trending PC games.

“You may wonder how I can read you mind. The answer is simple and it is because I used to think like that when I first heard it. However, what the university offers to students has changed my mind and I understand why they don’t count first-year results. Moving from A Level to higher education is quite a big jump because you are new to literally everything. It takes time to settle down in a completely different place, to get used to new teaching and learning methods, to make friends and especially to discover yourself. In my opinion, to minimise study as a burden during your ‘’getting-used-to-everything’’ period your first-year results do not affect your final degree.

“I would highly recommend to make the most of your first year by trying to step out of your comfort zone. No one will judge you because you and others are in the same position (i.e. new to everything) and you will never know if the experiences that you have gained will benefit you in the future (such as helping your CV stand out from the crowd). Before I went to university I would never think that one day I will perform in a large theatre hall with over 200 people watching. I did that in my first year, not only as a singer but also as a dancer, and I found that I did a pretty good job – no shame or shyness at all!”

This experience helped me to be more self-confident, self-motivated and better at time management. Aside from this, I made a lot of friends and a few of them have been my best friends since then.”