I joined the University of Bath last year as an undergraduate and I am about to embark on my second year.  The summer has been long and hot and has provided a well-deserved rest from my first year of studying.  As the beginning of the first semester fast approaches, I’m beginning to feel excited about jumping, head first, into student life again, but believe me, I wasn’t feeling quite so confident this time last year.

For most of my adult life I have daydreamed about missed opportunities and deliberated about returning to study, but well-paid jobs and a career in IT always seemed to win hands down.  I left my career behind when I started a family and, in hindsight, it gave me the break I needed in order to re-evaluate my life and take stock. I had the added complication of a degenerative bone condition in my hips which really got in my way too, and after thirteen years when I finally had the old joints replaced, almost immediately after my recovery I enrolled on the Access to HE course at Bath City College.  Going to university was such a long standing goal buried deep in my subconscious that embarking on this new path in life happened almost instinctively and without thought. Before I knew it, I was completing a UCAS application and coming to terms with the possibility of actually doing a degree. But now I was scared.

I felt both excited and daunted by the prospect of being a student and at first relished the idea of being at university; it felt like I was going on a really great holiday. However, that feeling quickly diminished when I left one of my first lectures thinking “I didn’t understand a word she was talking about” and my spirit started to wane. Never fear though, as help is always at hand and I plucked up the courage to talk to my tutor - lesson number one was to always ask for help when you need it.  After a teary conversation and thoughts about giving up even before I had properly started, a lifeline was thrown to me in the form of a fourth year mature student, and I took it. Talking through my anxieties with someone who had been there and done it was all I needed and I realised that maybe my idea of university wasn’t quite the reality. I wasn’t going to be ‘hanging out’ with a home life to run, the school run to do and all the other daily tasks that having a family demanded, so I discovered that I had to make it work for me. Being a student is different for everyone, whether you are in your forties and changing careers or just starting out as an eighteen-year-old.

I felt uneasy about being a mature student. I thought I didn’t fit in and stood out with a beacon on my head flashing ‘old person’, but the reality is that your age and background really don’t matter and everyone experiences the same anxieties, nerves and daunting feelings about their new environment. As it happens, the younger students enjoy my company and I theirs. We have a good laugh and, whilst they provide me with much-needed entertainment, our friendships our based on mutual respect and understanding, because fundamentally, we are all in the same boat regardless of our backgrounds. Making friends with both young and mature students has been at the heart of my success this year, because sharing and talking through experiences has boosted my confidence in what started out as quite an alien environment.  Being extremely organised and disciplined and having a very understanding partner has also enabled me to have an amazing first year at Bath. Around every corner is a new experience or hurdle to overcome, but with the right tools and remembering lesson number one, they are not only surmountable, but really enjoyable too.  After those initial couple of weeks, I have never looked back.