Did anyone else have a rubbish time at university?

[Magda16]

Just that really, I'm interested to know. Universities have been in the news a lot recently obviously, and lots of people talking about the 'student experience'. It's got me thinking back to my own student experience, in the late 1990s/early 2000s.
I went to a very prestigious university, from a state school in the Midlands. Had an absolutely miserable time, and was bullied. I've always felt like a bit of a failure over it really, I mean, who doesn't have a great time at university? So I was wondering, anyone else there who hated it?!

Just to be clear my parents didn't give me a penny for uni.
And I never stole from them, which was abundantly clear to the police.

Looking back, I think I spent the whole of my time at university in a mild, but near-constant state of anxiety. First in family to go to university, and the secondary school I went to, most pupils left at 16 and it had quite low expectations from pupils. I went from feeling pretty good about myself academically, to feeling a bit rubbish when compared to the other students at uni who went to grammar/private schools.

I had also been quite sheltered growing up, so to suddenly be living in halls with a bunch of other 18/19 year olds was quite a shock. I did make friends, and I'm still in sporadic contact with perhaps 5 or 6 of them, but never really found my "tribe".

Twenty years on, I still sometimes have anxiety dreams about university, where I have made it to the end of the academic year, but have somehow forgotten to attend all lectures and seminars for an entire module, but still have to sit the exam and write essays in order to pass the degree.

I had a fairly crappy time in my undergrad because I just didn’t fit in and the hours required for my course were horrific.

I did an arts course that was full of very cool London arty types which I didn’t fit in with.

My halls were grotty and very far away from campus. I went to an ex-poly that was very good with high entry requirements for some subjects and quite low requirements for others. I was very academic and probably would have fitted in better somewhere else.

When we presented work to tutors if something wasn’t good enough they’d ask whether we’d slept the night before. If you had slept they’d tell you you should have stayed up and worked instead.

I hated it and I wish I hadn't gone. I don't use my degree and I certainly didn't make life long friends. I only went because my siblings had all gone and I wanted to get away from home.

I wish I could go back and do it again - I think I was too uptight and expected too much. I'm lucky enough to have come away from the experience with one life-long friend, but the rest definitely doesn't count as 'the best years of my life.'

Sadly, within the first few weeks of the first term, a new acquaintance took their own life. It put our student house under a cloud, meaning going out and getting smashed suddenly seemed inappropriate. Another housemate was dealing with depression, another had recently come out as gay, another was still a virgin and struggling with crippling social anxiety. Honestly what a bunch! All nice people just cripes, I just wanted to get drunk and eat cheesy chips.

I also made the mistake of having a boyfriend 'back home' which held me back in so many ways. The relationship ended on the last few weeks of my final year, making it even more frustrating that I didn't pack it in earlier.

My course was OK but I think I knew it wasn't really my true passion. I scraped a 2:1 and now work in a completely different industry altogther.

I did have some good nights out. And a few flings that will stay with me. But otherwise - my late 20s have been the real best bits so far.

I didn't have an amazing time. It was ok, nothing bad happened but it was pretty boring and I didn't find any close friends. I don't have any friends at all left from my uni years - there were a couple I kept in contact with the first year or two after graduation but that fizzled out. I do read on here a lot about how incredible uni is, life-long friends, the best time of life and so on, but that wasn't the case for me. I found it quite boring, unless you wanted to get absolutely shit-faced every night socialising was limited and in many ways it was very much a continuation of school- lots of cliques and a bit of a popularity contest (at least where I went). I did go on to do post graduate qualifications which I loved and lived abroad for a couple of years after graduating which I would definitely class as being a brilliant few years of my life - I made some life-long friends then and look back on all that fondly. I don't really think about uni at all.

I did a bit. Stayed at home because my local uni was one of only two in the country doing the course I wanted and I was cripplingly shy/anxious, had bene badly bullied at school and just didn't feel ready to move away. I made two really lovely friends at the start and they both dropped out at Christmas. I did make friends on my course but it was a very niche joint honours course and there were only five of us, and the others all hung out mostly with their friends from halls, so I didn't get the student experience at all and just worked my arse off for three years. One of them is still a close friend though. I didn't find my tribe until I started my PhD and moved out of home.

My experience was OK....although TBH if i'd left home and got a reasonable job at that age I think that would have been just as good. The education I got was excellent and has helped me launch a reasonably rewarding (albeit not especially lucrative career) although I wouldn't consider it a great experience.

Weirdly, I was very ready for the studying part at 18 and did very well, but when I started a PhD at the age of 22 I felt like it happened a couple of years too early.

Yes I struggled socially and went to uni very far from home so was isolated.

I had a terrible time - made no friends, bored and lonely, mental breakdown in final year.

Looking back, it was more to do with me and not the uni itself, although I don't think it was the right one to go to. I went locally but lived in halls, which was the worst of both worlds.

The pastoral support and duty of care is taken much more seriously now in these days of 'student as customer' and the NSS. Twenty years ago, academic institutions were exactly that and they didn't really see student wellbeing as their responsibility.

I had some good times though initially mixed with the wrong crowd , I made some good friends in the end but was the only one not to do a year abroad so my final year was very lonely . I’m not in contact with any of those friends though 25 years later other than a couple as FB friends . The best years of my life have definitely been later

I quite enjoyed first year but in 2nd year I had a mental breakdown and the final years were a nightmare. Zero pastoral support but it was the mid 90s so not that unusual

I absolutely hated it. Dropped out after a year and now I don’t regret it at all. I came home in a right state anxious I’d let myself and my entire family down a and really quite depressed but I’ve worked hard up from the bottom of my industry and now I have a pretty good job and I’m happy. Its taken time to get there but I’m really proud of myself. I guess uni just isn’t for everyone but there are other options x

To throw in an opposite view, me... I loved it, great course, made life long friends, taught me independence. If I could, I'd do it all over again.

Only thing I regret is that now, 30 years later, is when I get super stressed at work, I have dreams that it's exam time and I've forgotten to go to any lectures.

Yes I hated it. Felt stressed about failing all the time (passed my degree with a 2.1 that was close to a first so I don't know why I thought I would fail each year??) to the point I had extremely bad anxiety and depression. Struggled to make friends. Not in touch with a single person now from uni!

@Ihaveoflate I'm glad pastoral support is much better now.

Thank you for mentioning that on this thread, it's important for people to be aware.

Hated my first year. I didn't realise it at the time, but I was increasingly depressed and had hideously low levels of self-esteem, and mental health support was close to nil (this was in the early 00s).

I went from a northern town to a prestigious RG university that still has issues with this kind of thing - I arrived and immediately went WTF at all the clones wearing pashminas, pearls and had braying over-confident voices. I should have gone to the open day during the application stage but my mum couldn't afford the cost of my journey and overnight stay at the time.

However I got in with a friend group I knew from school, and decided to stay on and do a postgrad course - thank god I did because I ended up loving it (even though it took 3 years to get to that stage!). I needed time to build up my confidence, which was really lacking due to my background and home life.

Yes me! Firstly I did NOT want to go which didn't really help but my dad made me. I was very homesick and didn't leave my room for a few weeks.

Then I got together with a guy from home who was at another university. Decide he was "the one" so dropped out of my uni and went to his for the second year. Again, father most displeased.

Took a long time to settle at the new uni as decided I had made a massive mistake - it was a worse uni, and the relationship with the guy from home, inevitably, didn't last.

Third year I went abroad as I did languages so when I returned for my final year I knew no one.

However in my fourth year I decided that this was my last shot at uni and I'd better make the most if it. I joined a sports team, made a lot of mates, got a first, and sort of got the point of it all by the time I graduated.

I used to work in the alumni office at a university and it always struck me how warmly people would speak of their student days, always "the best time of my life". It made me realise how much I ballsed it all up.

I hated it and realised that as soon as I got there. I didn’t get into halls and ended up lodging with a middle aged lady about a mile away from the Campus and three miles away from the halls. Not ideal for a shy person. By the time the course started everyone had made friends from halls and I didn’t fit it anywhere. I was extremely lonely and homesick.
I thought I should give it a year to see how things went, which in hindsight was the wrong thing to do. I left after the year and still regard it, 30 years later, as the worst year of my life.
Even if I had done the degree it wouldn’t have been used in my career which followed.

I had absolutely awful time. I got into my first choice, prestige Russell Group uni for a course that I was absolutely passionate about. But I was a foreigner far away from my family, just turned 18 and had to work as my parents were poor and couldn't support me. It was simply too much. I quickly developed anxiety and depression, working and studying proved to be too difficult, and didn't make any serious friends. I graduated with a 3rd and couldn't even use it. If I could go back in time, I would probably wait few years, maybe save up or do evening study. I feel this pressure to go straight to uni at the age of 18 is too much for some people.

@TastyTicklemore

Honest, I've never really thought much on this outside the deepest recesses of my brain. Just this thread and reading so many of us with bad experiences has really hit me.

I am starting to wonder just how common this might be. And whether unis today know this and are trying to address it? Or care?

IME it is pretty well known, and all universities will have measures in place that try to make life more bearable for students who are struggling, and strategies to help them cope better or seek help if they're not coping.

It is a really difficult issue, though.

I've been in teaching and pastoral positions at university and I definitely cared about my students; I think most of us did. But we're not trained counsellors or mental health specialists, and sometimes we're almost pushed into those roles.

I do think there is much better support now than there was when I was at university.

I do think there is much better support now than there was when I was at university.

I am really pleased to hear that.

I suspect the internet has also helped a lot. One of the common things to many of these stories is how little people knew what to expect. 'Back in the day' you only really had the prospectus and what other people who had been to uni could tell you, to go on.

If you were the first of your family to go (as many have mentioned here), you basically were blind to what was to come or how uni worked.

I am sure greater access to information, greater ways to ask for that information plus a focus on helping new students understand wtf is happening when they arrive all help a great deal.

You're definitely not alone OP. I hated where I was living, very rarely went out socially and am not in touch with anyone from that time. I needed to do the course though, it was teacher training. I'm kind of proud of myself for surviving that miserable time though.

So much of this resonates with me, it's not something I ever talk about though as it still feels like everyone I know had an amazing time and it's my fault I didn't. I went to Oxbridge in the late 90s, from a state school to an almost exclusively private school college (no way I could have known but absolutely not a good choice). I'd been bullied at school for being very academic and was convinced this was my chance to meet lifelong friends - only to find myself treated not particularly badly but ignored and laughed at because I didn't fit in. I can still remember pretending not to have heard when one girl asked another if I was going to be invited to join a drinking society "oh no darling, it's not for poor people or Northerners!". I loved my subject but the teaching and guidance was poor and I really struggled and lost all self esteem. I ended up in an EA relationship with a fellow student that took me years to get past. Pastoral support was in name only, one of the only real friends I made had a mental health breakdown and was treated with complete callousness by the college. I know people who have had real positive experiences of Oxbridge (my husband who I met long after we had both left) is one, I still find it really sad when I think about mine.
Many years later I retrained as a healthcare professional which meant going as a mature student to a completely different university. I lived out so didn't have much of the typical student experience, but the teaching and academic support were amazing, it completely restored my confidence in my ability to study.
I wouldn't discourage my children from going to university, but I would really encourage them to wait, think a lot about what they want, not judge on perceived reputation and not feel afraid to complain if they're not getting the teaching and support they need.