My experience as an international student at Leeds Beckett

The Trip

It was a great morning, we had checked into a hotel the previous night to make it easier to get to the airport for our 11pm fight. The breakfast was awesome, they served jollof rice! Now this food is one of our ‘national treasures’ in Nigeria, it even gets us into 'Twitter wars’ with our brothers in Ghana. Something about whose jollof rice tastes better. Well, I haven’t gotten into any of these debates, all I know is that Nigerian jollof rice is the bomb! I was glad I got to eat it just before I left for the UK.

The flight to London was smooth and lasted about seven hours. We later boarded a one hour connecting flight to Manchester.

Hello Leeds

I arrived in Leeds on a Friday morning after a one hour road trip from Manchester. I went straight to the Airbnb I booked from Nigeria. A nice two bedroom apartment in Beeston. This place was so nice I hoped the owners would decide to rent it out so I could live there during my studies and have my accommodation sorted. It was quite cold on the first day though and I was uncomfortable. I wondered if this would be the norm. Will I always be cold even when I am indoors in Leeds? Well thankfully this was not the case. I soon realized that there was a heating system which kept the house warm. Great! I spent the weekend indoors looking forward to my first outing in Leeds. The reason I was here…. the trip to school.

Welcome to Leeds Beckett University (LBU)

My first trip to LBU was to the Headingley campus. I went there to do the compulsory check-in for international students. I took a bus, something I had been looking forward to because I had heard so many nice things about bus rides in Leeds.

I loved the campus. I was excited to finally see the purple signposts at the different buildings after weeks of viewing them online. LBU sure knows how to pick a colour. The purple logos are one of my favourite things about the school. It’s beautiful and stands out.

The check-in was smooth. I was glad to meet some of the global ambassadors, they were even nicer in person.

My first class was by 12 noon on a Wednesday at the City campus. The lecturer had sent a couple of mails and pre-reads ahead of the class, which made me look forward to it. The lecture was great, straight to the point and the lecturer had a great sense of humour. The next lecture was equally good. I was particularly excited to see a lecturer of African descent, I didn’t expect that, at least not on the first day. This meant to me that LBU welcomes diversity and made me feel at home.

Assessment week

In the UK there is more emphasis on independent study, this is quite different from what I was used to back in Nigeria. At LBU you are required to do a lot of independent research on topics taught in order to increase your understanding of the subject and boost your confidence. Another difference was the nature of the assessments. Back home, we typically write tests and exams which could be multiple choice or theory type questions. For my program at LBU, my assessments involved writing academic essays which required me to think and write critically on the chosen topics. Thankfully, LBU has a lot of resources to help students and I started by going through some materials in the skills for learning website. Modules on critical thinking, writing literature reviews and referencing were very helpful.

Another thing that helped was reaching out to the lecturers and course mates to clarify some things around the assignments. The lecturers were very welcoming and always willing to provide clarity on the expectations. I recall attending an online meeting scheduled by one of the lecturers a few weeks to the submission deadline for his assignment. I gained more clarity and got some vital tips that helped me make a submission I was proud of.

The much ‘dreaded’ deadline week came and I was able to submit all four assignments before the deadline.  What a relief this was, it was no easy task! It was quite difficult combining studying with accommodation search and taking care of a toddler and infant.  

It took a while getting family accommodation in Leeds as student accommodation is regularly aimed at students without children. The game changer for me was the day one of the agents at Leeds Beckett recommended specific locations in Leeds where I was likely to get a place for families. Places like Headingley, Beeston and Pudsey were top on her list. This helped me narrow my search and I was eventually able to secure a good place in time for the start of winter season. Phew!

My journey as an international student at LBU has been very interesting so far. I have no doubt that I chose the right university, and I will recommend it to anyone. It is still early days and there is already so much to unpack. There is still a lot to look forward to and many more memories to make and experiences to share.