University of Kent — Local services in Canterbury

I went to Kent between 2014-2018.

The pros: The campus is lovely. I’ve worked in and visited many universities and trust me, the campus and especially the accommodation here is for the most part outstanding and far more comfortable than elsewhere. Good shops on campus and decent travel links wherever you need to go. I didn’t attend a course where I needed labs so I can’t comment on the facilities beyond them being comfortable and with generally good IT. Standard student dining experience but good stationery and book shops and food stalls. If you are struggling with mental health then all this can make a huge difference. The nightlife in Canterbury is decent, not great - better than anywhere in Essex but definitely not like London, Leeds, Manchester, Bristol or Brighton. Pubs are nice. Not a huge food scene but there are some nice gems here and there, e.g. the market by Canterbury West. It is just a nice place to live for a few years especially if you want somewhere peaceful and pretty.

The teaching is pretty good and most staff are empathetic, friendly and helpful. I had one or two seminar leaders I disliked. I felt like I learned a lot overall and like my studies honed my abilities as I had hoped.

The well-being support was very good for me and I had access to free counselling which was invaluable. I felt the university was sympathetic towards me and in the end I graduated with a great grade.

The cons: If you want support for careers, it is there but you can’t expect it to fall into your lap. You have to seek it out and ask the relevant offices and lecturers, who will be happy to give it and signpost you to opportunities. But you could easily graduate without receiving career support and to be honest, you need to have some careers tools in your belt to be a competitive graduate in the UK, especially if you are not from a top tier university. You need to be more proactive than you would be at other universities. I’m not sure if this has changed since I left - they seem to have introduced some measures that will positively impact this but not sure what it’s like on the ground.

Kent has bounced around the league tables over the years. I have fond memories of it so wish it...

I tried to apply here through clearing and it was an absolute disasterr!!!! Wow . Their administrative Staff and the staff that deals with applications and phone calls are so so unorganised, unprofessional and absolutely lazy. I contacted them as soon as possible when I had the chance to so safe to say i was one of the first students to try and apply through clearing with them. You’d think this would mean everything would be done quicker but not at all. The team would not at all speak to each other and they’d be so lazy and unorganisedddd that they wouldn’t update my application with the different stages, they would not pass through my application but they’d tell me they have. I’d have so much problems because they’d tell me one thing that was untrue and not right at all all because they did not speak to each other and did not do their jobs!!!! I’d call up everyday multiple times to ask them what’s going on on UCAS it says you have not passed my application and I called there they said you did not but KENT would say yes they have without even checking !!!! This would go on for freaking weeks making me call up UCAS and KENT everyday until it came out in the end that University Of Kent was not doing their jobs right at all and they were in the wrong. Because of them I could not get an accommodation on time and in the end there were only the most expensive left which I could not afford. Absolute nightmare I am so happy and grateful that I did not end up going to this university because if their administrative team is this disoriented then I don’t want to know how the actual...

Terrible University focused almost entirely on the Arts and getting students drunk. Did my Physics degree there which has a drop-out rate of approximately 1/3 due to the appalling labs which in spite of a massive grant in 2010 that disrupted work for months still had no decent equipment for bachelor student's experiments after.

While working for their Student Union I made it clear when interviewing for the job I need a position for the year or else I would be taking different employment as I needed it to afford rent in town. They had advertised as "Must be available to work all year" so I took the job then after freshers week they let me go. The Union defended this as something that was fine then lied and tried to imply that the "Job Shop" were the ones to blame not them. When I took them to employment tribunal they revealed they were the same legal entity, very shady and lazyly managed.

Finally to top it all off at the end of my degree I found there were gaps in my marks on the system. When I enquired they implied I had got 0 on those assignments or not submitted them, thankfully I kept all my assignments so I showed them to the lecturer and we both showed them to the admin. The admin responded with a shrug and implied there was no way to enter my marks, as a result my degree certification was significantly less than it should have been 2:2 when it should have been a 2:1 at least. Inept lazy admin.

On the up side the Professors (not in Physics Labs) were all good and the disability support was good. Also the Forensics part of my degree was great even the...