What Students Say
Likes
- Durham comes under very few universities which comes under collegiate system, where all colleges are based upon different cultures and historic events. Basically these colleges are accommodations which students choose according to their preference. All colleges host formal dinners events, balls in their own traditions.
- Matriculation event, one of the best event which takes place in the Durham cathedral, which is one of the oldest cathedral in UK. In this event, one of the student who is the representative for all other students is asked to sign against their batch year and all the students are officially announced as students of Durham University.
- About the academic part of the university, there’s a reason Durham University ranks so high. University has many societies like finance society, marketing society, law society, etc, for students to take part im different events and also where companies come to tell about organisations, work culture and also we can connect with them on LinkedIn and network with a lot of people. DUFS(Durham University Finance Society) is considered as UK’s one of the biggest finance club. Where students also help us enhance our resume, they guide us through applications, interview processes while applying for a job or an internship. Also, we are taken for many industry visits, they arrange guest speakers for us who are founders, directors of big companies. Like we had an interaction with Houlihan Lokey’s managing director and then we were also taken at Nissan’s factory where we literally saw a car built from nothing to the whole car getting taking a test drive which was an amazing experience.
Dislikes
- As a pure jain vegetarian person, it is difficult for me to see non vegetarian food getting cooked. And as I have taken an ensuite(room with only personal washroom) room, my kitchen is sharing with 4 other flatmates(3 Chinese, 1 Bangladeshi) so I am trying to blend in with them. So those who are pure vegetarian and if can afford to rent a studio room should go for that or else be prepared to cook vegetarian food besides other cooking non-vegetarian food.
- Other problem that I face is that as the transport in UK is expensive like they charge £1.5 a day bus pass for the whole Durham which is quite expensive so we usually all prefer to walk only. The business school is like 25-30 mins walk from my college, so the main problem is not walking that is quite the nice as we’re doing something healthy regularly. The main problem is the uphill and downhill part. The whole city is uphill and downhill which makes it quite difficult to walk.
- Another problem that I faced was that as my admission was in September intake, I came on 25th September, that time it was rainy. But later on during late Octobers and the whole winter, it starts to get dark at 4 p.m. and you see sunrise quite less, like once or twice in a week. Which sometimes gets a little depressing kind of. Many students even eat Vitamin-D pills due to lack of sunlight.
Course Curriculum
10
- My course management was particularly medium difficulty level course and that was because some of the concepts I had already studied in my undergraduate studies, as NMIMS’s course module is very advanced. For other students many things were quite new. My course was more theoretical and we had some practical experiences like factory visits and guest speakers.
- Positive aspects include comprehending knowledge from real-life experiences, like guest speakers telling about how they built their company, how they are running it. That was an amazing way to understand business and learning about its pros and cons, where as negative aspects could be all the theoretical learning as personally I don’t like reading and learning and as my course was management so I had to.
- It depends upon the subject, like the core subject for all management students that include general management, management and supply chain and management and international business have 5 core subjects out of which 4 in term 1 and 1 in term 2 and then we need to choose 3 electives according to our course so the electives class have less students compared to core subjects.
- In my course there are many Indian students, around 25-50 students in all management courses (general, supply chain, IB, marketing and finance).
Admission Experience
-
I had applied for the following universities:
Bayes Business School for Msc. in Real estate- rejected
Durham University for Msc. in Management- accepted
Queen Mary University of London for Msc. in Management- conditional acceptance (3 cgpa)
Cardiff University for Msc. in Management- accepted
Brunel University for Msc. in Management- accepted
University of York for Msc. in Management- accepted - I think the main reason for my rejection was my less CGPA because my CGPA was 2.6/4 which is not at all good. However, their ranking is very low(356), but their acceptance rate is 14% which made it competitive for me.
- From all the colleges that I had applied, Durham University was best ranked(QS ranking 89 in the world and top 5 universities in UK) and part of Russel group, which was one of the most important criteria.
- So my counsellor was IDP, they were very helpful. In my first meeting, my counsellor , she sat with me for at least 2-3 hours. We discussed my course, my preferences, and then according to my grades and resume, we shortlisted universities. Then I wrote my whole Statement Of Purpose in around a day or two maximum and gave it to her, she made some changes and finalised it. She submitted all applications for me and everything was done smoothly. Only Durham University was the only university where I had to pay application fees, rest all the applications were for free. After which I received mails with the rejection and acceptance one by one.
- For the course which I had applied, I only had to give IELTS for some specific universities only(mainly QMUL and DU). Rest all didn’t require IELTS as my english 12th boards marks were more than 80 out of 100. And IELTS score required were more than 6.5 in all specific exams and overall too.
- Well there weren’t exactly any challenges included except for rejection which I regret due to my own less CGPA issue. Except for which Durham University had taken a lot of time to give me acceptance which was very difficult for me to pass the time.
- I applied for September 2024 intake as I completed my bachelors in may 2024 and did not wish to take drop so I was planning it since my 2nd year.
- So I gave my IELTS exam in 1st week of December and then was waiting for the score till mid December, after I received my score. I met my counsellor at IDP. She saw my grades, IELTS score, resume and then we shortlisted universities in that same meeting only. Then I wrote my SOP in 1-2 days and also collected my LORs from my teachers at my undergraduate university and then my counsellor applied at all universities on behalf of me. Then in 4-6 weeks till jan end or feb first week, I had received all of my acceptances and 1 rejection.
Class Schedule
10
- I had only 1 lecture per day and my subjects were distributed as 5 in the 1st term and 3 in the 2nd term, whereas most students had 4 in each term. So I had lectures from Tuesday to Friday and I had 2 lectures on Friday. My timings were 9-11 or 11-1 or all days except on Friday I had 9-11 and 2-4.
Faculty
6
- Faculty to student ratio again depends upon the subject, like core subjects have students strength to 100-150 whereas electives have student strength to 50-80 students. Less the students, more interaction is possible with the teacher, whereas all teachers here give us chance to clear our doubts, if any and are present to us all the time through e-mail. Also we can book an appointment with them through mailing them.
- Teaching methodology and the study material provided to us are very good, they provide us with the in depth knowledge and also the experiences provided to us gives us a huge advantage to learn more about our chosen field.
- I do not know of any case, if there is any regarding the part time job but teachers do write us recommendations when we apply for any full time job.
- I admire my consulting faculty the most because of the experience she has in the field of consulting. Also she wrote a book on consulting which is our module reference. Her way of teaching is also amazing, she’s polite, always helps us with the doubts and her classes are always interactive.
Campus Life
10
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* So the college has number of campuses like
1. Teaching and Learning centre building
2. Waterside building
3. Old Business school
4. Law school
5. Chemistry building
6. Elvet building
7. Mountjoy building
* As Durham University is spread across the county, we have all facilities like sports, library, medical services but they’re all spread throughout the county. We have one of the best libraries in UK, we have one of the best sports facilities centre.
Part Time Jobs
- On-campus jobs include library assistants, campus ambassadors, and administrative assistants. Hourly wages are typically £11-12. As these are the minimum wages to be paid.
- On a student visa, we are usually allowed to work 20 hours a week during academic time and 40 hours per week during our vacations.
- It’s really difficult for us to land on campus part time jobs. Firstly, there is less awareness regarding on campus jobs and those aware apply for it very early and some of them get the job.
- If it is a daytime job, student usually get minimum wages that is, £11-12 per hour whereas, if it’s a night shift we can get paid upto £15-17 per hour. * Opportunities in Durham are very less, in my knowledge there are only 15-20 indian masters students who have secured a part time out of which many of them work at subway and dominos where I don’t intend to apply as I’m a vegetarian person.
- Well, we are asked to apply for job through Indeed, but indeed is one of the most useless app.
- As people rarely get jobs through indeed. To secure a job, students should either roam around the city with their resumes, apply on company’s website, email their resumes or apply through LinkedIn. The process is easy, you need to share your resume and if they think of you as a good fir for the job, they will consider you.
Placement
6
- What I’ve heard or read at the website 95% students secure the job within the 6 months of completing their course.
- Students earn around £45000 per year after their post-graduation.
- Students mainly apply for jobs before completing their course, through different ways like job fairs, networking, keeping an eye on company’s website for open positions and through Linkedin.
- Major companies include KPMG, EY, PWC for consulting roles in my program. Amazon, Sainsbury for supply chain management roles.
Accommodation
Off Campus
8
- I found my accommodation through university only, my accommodation is university accommodation not a private one so college had sent a full brochure of different colleges and we had to apply give our preference for top 3 colleges and out which they were supposed to allocate us 1 of their choice.
- I pay £740 for my ensuite room which includes a bed with mattress and my own personal washroom and a sharing kitchen among 5 flatmates.
- Only challenge that I faced was choosing college at the right location from my university and I found a right college as one of my university building is nearby but the central durham(marketplace) and another building is a little far with uphill and downhill but the people here are really nice and its a safe area as there are many good residential houses in this area making it secure and nuisance free.
- My recommendation for future students would be to check distance from your college building and marketplace as those would be the places you wish to stay nearby to. Also choosing university accommodation would be a better option rather than a private as you might have to pay a little extra amount but you have some many students to connect with, all events to celebrate.
- So Durham has all university buildings spread all over the city, so the old business school is around 10 mins by walk whereas new business school is around 25 mins of walk and I have lectures at both business schools. At Durham isn’t any specific place where major Indians stay, all the colleges and private residencies are have 10-15 minimum of Indians staying.
Exams
- For UK master's programs, you mainly have to appear for the IELTS exam only. MBA or engineering programmes require GRE or GMAT exams.
- Documents that we needed to apply for the colleges include
1. LOR
2. SOP
3. CV
4. 10th and 12th Boards mark sheets
5. IELTS Score
6. Undergraduate mark sheets
And after we receive a conditional acceptance, we need to submit the last semester mark sheet and degree to make the offer from the university unconditional. - None of my shortlisted colleges did not include any kind of interview.
Events
8
- We had an amazing halloween party, then we celebrated Christmas together at Christmas ball organised at a huge scale.
- So sports events take place every Sunday, we have inter college tournaments going on for the whole term. Students also organise pop quiz every alternate weekend for different genres to make it interactive for students. Other extracurricular include monthly potluck event where all students bring a dish and then we all share and eat together.
Fees
- The tuition fee I’m paying is £31,500. My living fee, which includes only my rent, is £9250 for 50 weeks.
- I paid £2000 in the beginning as my advanced tuition fee and £400 advance rent to confirm my seat and my accommodation. I have to pay both tuition and living expenses in 3 installments. 1st we have already paid in December, next in February, and last in May.
- In my monthly expense, I pay £740 rent(which is paid in 3 instalments to the university, not monthly). I do not have particularly any transportation cost as Durham is a small county so we mainly prefer to walk and other living expenses include groceries, other events like Bollywood parties, techno parties or our own house parties that all sums upto around £200-300. Out of which groceries are necessities which cost upto £150-200. Rest are extra cost like occasional shopping, parties, events, etc.
Scholarship
- I didn’t receive any scholarship.
- Some of my friends who are studying LLM (Masters in Law) receive £5000 scholarship due to work experience.
- I’m not sure how many students receive scholarships but on an average students receive £5000-7000 scholarship amount. It all basically depends on your grades, work experience and the course which you are applying to.
