Freshers During COVID-19
After a long break over the summer, Archidabble is back with a new website, a new logo and our new addition… our CAD store!
Once you’ve read this blog post, make sure to also check out our new features on our site. You can still view our content from the previous year under Tutorials, Experiences and Guest Posts! You can even use the search function to jump straight to a blog post of your interest :)
Now, back to today’s post. We have reached out to 3 second year students who, due to COVID-19, experienced their freshers week virtually last year. Since there is still some uncertainty in relation to the pandemic and on-campus interactions, for those of you who may be faced with a similar situation, here is some insight into how these students felt about their experience with a virtual freshers.
Hi, I’m Hannah.
I just finished my first year studying BA Architecture at the University of Westminster. I’m from London so I haven’t come from far to study at Westminster but I do come from a religious Jewish community and have only been to a girls school in previous years. So, it’s been quite a jump coming to university. I took Art, French and Mathematics as my A-levels followed by a gap year, which was cut short because of COVID-19. When I began university, I had zero expectations for freshers, because of the pandemic, and therefore I didn’t even get tickets for freshers events because I assumed most of it would be cancelled. I was also quite nervous coming from a religious community into a university environment and questioned what it would be like. I was worried about being around guys and being the only Jewish person on my course, but it turned out fine. It took me time to meet people because virtual freshers and the online society events were kind of awkward.
When I started university we were introduced to the FANS (Friends of Arriving Students) and tutors on blackboard which is the meeting platform the University of Westminster uses for teaching. I also spent a lot of time familiarising myself with the student hub online and understanding how it all works. Luckily, because I was studying architecture, we would attend face-to-face teaching in university every Friday. Therefore, it was easier to meet people on my course and we would have lunch together after tutorials whilst sticking to the distancing measures taken. We had people to help us catch up with work and to talk to at times where a break was very much needed. In a way, I felt luckier than some of my friends studying other degrees which were completely online because I had made a couple of friends since we were partially able to have on-campus teaching.
I think I found that not having a massive uni social life this past year is not as hard as predicted because I’m from London and I have plenty of other friends around. But I am really hoping that this upcoming year, freshers will be a lot easier (and I will get another chance to party and get to know people). Though at times it would’ve been nice to work with friends in the uni studios and have access to the university fabrication lab, we didn’t and I still passed. Something great that I really appreciated though, was joining the Westminster climate summer demonstrator. I met lots of fantastic people, got to work in the studios, use the labs and it gave me an idea of what I missed out on during the year.
In the end, for me personally, I’ve integrated fine and I’m happy studying my degree.
Hey! I’m Imran Haque, a 20 year-old Architecture BA student, who just finished his first year, and what a year it’s been.
A bit about me: I was born in West England, but grew up for most of my life here in London, where I took my GCSEs in subjects such as Art, Geography, French, and Bengali (amongst others), as well as A-Levels in Art, Mathematics and Physics. I had taken a year out after sixth form, but any plans I had made had been cut short due to the start of the pandemic. I was always very excited to start university, as I would get to meet new people, with new perspectives on life, but also meet more people from my own Islamic background; something that I hadn’t been able to do in the past.
I always knew that my first-year university experience would undoubtedly be unlike any other, but I kept an open mind. I’m a very easy going person, tending to be more extroverted than introverted, and so I used every opportunity I could to join the ‘Blackboard Collaborate' calls set up by the university. The FANS system was so much fun and helped facilitate meeting people; however, one thing I remember thinking to myself was that I would have to consciously put in extra effort to meet and talk online to my peers, but I was up for the challenge! The virtual aspect of university presented its own challenges, such as not being able to give out hand-shakes and high-fives, but also led to really unique and funny memories of their own. For example, I remember when we would all just turn up to a call, and we had the exact same cow background on, and our tutors just stared blankly into the camera.
When it came to societies, I think that’s what I was looking forward to the most about university, because it would give me the opportunity to meet people who were interested in the exact same things as me. So I joined three or four of them, and tried to attend as many events as they held, and though the first 20-30 minutes of each of these calls were beyond awkward, by the end of the event we would all become really good friends; so just persevere! I guess in previous years you would have met the president and other committee members at the fair, but for us, we could only meet them online, which I guess was new for everyone. Despite all of this, as I’m studying architecture, we were part of the priority groups to get back on site, and so when we would be on-campus, we would make a deliberate effort to go out to eat lunch together, and just try and learn more about each other.
All in all, my first year experience was weird, but if you want, make that little extra effort to meet new people by attending online events, and if you can get past the first few minutes of cringe silences, then you are well on your way to making connections within the university, just like in any other year.
Hello fellow Archidabblers, my name’s Faye Marielle and I'm about to start my second year in BA Architecture at Westminster University, as a student who’s grown up in London. Before attending University I took Fine Art, Geography and Business Studies for GCSEs - whereas for my A-Levels I studied Fine Art, Economics and English Literature. A few things about me is that I’m a Catholic Filipina (shout out to all my Kabayans joining architecture this year), an avid bullet journaler and a melomanic - you could catch me listening to pop, k-pop to rnb or even classical music.
Attending a new setting was both nerve wracking and exciting, especially since COVID-19 was still a concern. Reason being, I didn’t anticipate Westminster to possibly create a COVID-19 friendly freshers because face-to-face interactions are so important, but I do have to argue that Westminster delivered well with regards to this matter. The whole week of freshers was an introduction to the course with each day covering a different aspect of what we’ll expect for the year.
Monday: “Day 1 of Arrivals Week”
We were all welcomed with an introductory lecture hosted by my ‘course leader’ who explained what would happen during the rest of the week, essential equipment such as the Artway Kit that you all are expected to purchase and the structure of a normal teaching week. This talk also included what days we would be onsite which was only Fridays, catering towards the COVID-19 concerns while also giving a somewhat normal university experience, which I greatly appreciated as the year progressed. Within this lecture we also got assigned to our FANS (university students from the previous years) so that in the afternoon we could spend time getting to know the course from their perspective.
Tuesday: “Introductory Lecture of the Course”
The course leader presented the course in depth, which was broken down into 3 stages, the first being a course overview. This part covered topics like, ‘what to expect to learn for each module’, ‘what day we’d learn these modules’ and ‘who would be teaching us’. The second section had us meet the module leaders. Every single module tutor briefly introduced themselves and gave us more insight of what we’d learn from our history of architecture, technical studies and sketchbook studies modules. For the last part, we met the design studio tutors which was made up of every single design studio tutor introducing themselves in order of which studio they were from.
Other than that, our course leader explicitly talked about the importance of attendance and passing each module at a minimum of 40 credits, otherwise it would be difficult to either understand or catch up on any missed work.
Wednesday: “Campus Talk with a FAN”
On this day it was just a casual talk with our assigned FAN in the morning, where I met Elif initially who gave us a virtual tour of the campus including what amenities we can access and where our campus is located. Other than that my FAN also listed her essential equipment list for the course which wasn't included in the Artway Kit and if you’re going into architecture as a first year I’d highly recommend you asking a previous student before you what they used because it’ll honestly make your life easier going through the year. As the campus talk was concluding Elif also took this moment to promote ‘Archidabble’ and on behalf of the group we were all very thankful to have a platform that was a student led architecture blog. Since this session was with a FAN, I’d say this was the first time I got the opportunity to openly socialise, as each FAN held a certain ice breaker so that the first year students could get to know each other a little better even through a screen. My group agreed on “pictionary” and I’ll have to admit - even as an introvert I valued how we got to interact with one another as this was one of the rare opportunities to speak to anyone on the course.
Thursday: “Drop in session for Q&A with Year Leader”
This session was optional but was packed with a lot of information covering various items, with input from other studio tutors and the FANS. Questions concerning the students ranged from access to the library, the best laptops for the course, what books to read, and the COVID-19 regulations on campus such as, to always wear a mask or who to contact if you have been tested positive.
Friday: “Introduction to your Design Studio Group”
For the final day of freshers week, all students joined their design studio tutor replicating the length of a normal studio day. I was assigned in Group E with Richa and Neil as my studio tutors. The task we did was to introduce ourselves on a map through a visual narrative from images or drawings consisting of our area, hobbies, where we travelled, etc. As a result, at the end of the studio day everyone would present themselves to the studio. I would admit that the silence was deafening at first since we had only met each other then and there and for a few minutes it sounded just like crickets but thankfully I was put into a social group where everyone started turning on their mics so that we could converse and become friends. Unlike other people in my course I was also lucky to be assigned to the same group as my best friend from secondary school so I settled in quite well as I knew a familiar face. Other than that, I’d also give credit to Imran for being his extrovert self as he had a welcoming personality who could engage with anyone.
I always knew that I wouldn’t just be focused on architecture, as I found out that the university held society events, so I joined the Filipino and Korean Culture Society. Unfortunately I didn’t get to attend the societies at the beginning of the year but, from the events I’ve joined, it was so great interacting with other people who had the same interests as we could all relate on a meaningful level, thus reassuring me that it was possible to expand my friendship group. For instance, the event I joined for KSOC was a game night where I also met Linda and Sude and the nerves were completely gone as soon as we started our game of Mafia. For being in such an intense course it was definitely relaxing to forget work for a little while and banter with new people. However, in the studio some disconnection was present at the beginning since we were all forced to turn our cameras on (bearing in mind I haven’t met anyone before), yet as soon as the studio day was moved from Blackboard to Microsoft Teams it just made my university experience even more memorable. For instance, on Microsoft Teams all the students and I would show up to class with funny backgrounds anticipating the reactions from our studio tutors.
To summarise, freshers week in an online environment was just as fulfilling and I felt ready to start the course, and thankfully being an architecture student also had some “privileges” as the tutors would work hard to ensure it was safe to visit campus on our onsite days going forward. This really helped tackle any social awkwardness in my studio group as we all anticipated to see each other and make a real effort to spend lunch together.
In terms of advice, I encourage all first year students to engage with their peers or even join societies because it’s inevitable that you’ll need a break or two, so you’ll really appreciate having to enjoy yourself amongst new friends. I’d also like to mention that if you have any concerns, continue to talk to your FANS. They were a great point of contact for me in terms of the standard of work expected, the struggles of the course and what equipment to get. Elif, who was my FAN, would still reach out to my FANS group from time to time and it felt I had another person to rely on if I had any queries. Therefore, just enjoy freshers week as much as you can and don’t be afraid to start conversations.
First up, we would like to thank our 3 guests for sharing their experiences on going through freshers week online. As much as we hope all of you will be back on campus, you still might be faced with a virtual welcome week which is what these guys were restricted to last year.
Make sure to check out these fellow architecture students via their instagram pages; @tsipporah.hannah, @yaboiimzy and @mariellelily
Feel free to also spend some extra time navigating through the new website and checking out our new addition, our very own CAD block store!
Until then, see you on Monday for our weekly Instagram content and next Friday for a new blog post :)
