Campus for my studies is in a difficult location and you are dependent on the facilities available if you need to buy anything.
The nearest supermarket is about 20-30 minute walk.
Navigating campus can be difficult initially as signposting isn't always clear.
However, campus is peaceful, surrounded by green areas. The library is very good. Parking facilities available for students free of charge, plenty of places to get hot drinks/food/snacks.
Staff that I have had interactions with have been supportive and helpful.
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As a one-year postgraduate student at the university, there are plenty of things that could be improved.
The actual teaching is fairly good - it's obvious that a lot of reading, revision and work will be expected, but generally speaking, lecturers are engaging, friendly and the workshops are more like group challenges, rather than the bog-standard lectures most universities offer.
I would perhaps like to see more of a pre-workshop lecture take place, as sometimes the prep work can be incredibly overwhelming, and it really makes a difference when a lecturer takes 45 minutes or so, just to go over the weeks tasks and outcomes for the unit.
The administration on the other hand, are absolutely shocking. I requested to change course pathway, and by the time they got round to emailing me back about it, it had fallen over the liability fee date. I ended up paying £200 more, for a course that I was moving to in order to save money in the first place. Emails go unnoticed for weeks at a time, constantly chasing up where my course change is up to. I'm weeks away from exams, and still no confirmation to suggest that my transfer has been successful. This is despite having completely paid off the course fees + the extra that they wanted, but failed to explain clearly to me what they were for.
The exam admin system is pretty poor, too. We were weeks late in receiving our mock exam results back, for no good reason (our lecturers ended up having to take time out of the lesson to individually provide us with the grade and feedback, so we weren't waiting even longer).
At the start of the course last year, we were told we'd be given the chance to work on some volunteering projects in several different legal areas, such as the phone advice clinic and school consent projects. We signed up for this, and heard absolutely nothing about it since.
If you want to do the SQE pathway with the MA, they advise that they can offer 4 weeks QWE towards qualifying. What they don't tell you is it's unpaid, and full time. Great if you're a student with family to support you, but for those like myself who work alongside studying, it really pushes the narrative that only certain students take precedent for opportunities like those. The email I got when I asked why this was, was because ''it's unpaid, because you don't need to pay to do it''.... you don't need to pay to start any job, though? What sort of reason is that?
The facilities are decent. My campus in particularly is relatively small, but being in the city centre, it's really convenient and the internal library is open until late and on weekends, which is a huge help. I don't really know much about the SU, other than the occasional email I receive about it. It doesn't seem as much of a big deal at the university compared to larger, one-campus uni's.
Overall, I just feel the university is lacking in admin support in order to make things more sufficient for students. The fact I personally, and everyone else in my class, are paying at least £12,000 to study there is not really acceptable when we're left waiting for responses to enquires, exam results, as well as our actual exam coursework instructions being released late.
Probably wouldn't recommend, unless perhaps you were part-time and didn't need to spend so much time there each week.
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