Abbey College, Ramsey

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.”

‘After graduating from Abbey Cambridge, I went to Imperial College London to study EIE (electronic and information engineering). Now I have just finished my second year there.

Life at Imperial is very intensive but worthwhile. My degree focuses on information processing. We start by learning the essence of communication and computing in the first two years, then specialise in areas such as machine learning, digital system design, and communications.

The part I love the most about my life here are projects. In the first two years, I have designed PCB from a schematic, written Verilog for FPGA, and built complex projects such as C Compiler. All of these projects were fascinating, and experiencing them will really makes me stand out from other graduates.

My life at Abbey College definitely helped me get here. The college has excellent teachers who help you to get the grade you need. They also understand how to present yourself to the university and to make yourself an attractive candidate.

Apart from their efforts to help you excel in academic studies, they also have activities designed to help to broaden your knowledge and vision. This helps you to really decide what you are interested in, not just which industry gets paid more, or where your parents want you to go.

For examples, I took part in the Engineering Education Scheme at the college. Before this I was thinking of becoming an engineer, as I enjoyed solving problems, but I was not really sure where to get started. After the scheme, it became clear that the digital system was the area I am really interested in. The scheme really positively influenced me, especially considering how enjoyable I find the digital system, even after spending two years studying it.’

Ben has spent the summer working as Design & Verification Hardware Intern at Cambridge based semiconductor and software design multinational company Arm. He will return to Imperial College London in Autumn 2019 to complete his undergraduate studies.