So long, farewell

This is my last post. It’s kind of crazy how three years have flown by, and somehow, I’ve graduated? How did that happen?

I may have graduated, but it’s not really goodbye for me as I’m staying at Warwick to do a Masters. Still, it feels as if it’s the end of an era – and honestly, I’ve been struggling with what to write for this final blog post.

I suppose I could write about the things I’ve learnt from going to uni, how uni has changed me as a person, and what I am thankful for. I could also write about where I’m going to go from here. I could even write about my experience as a student blogger. Maybe I’ll do a bit of everything. Classic me, avoiding making decisions.

Campus life

I think that a big part of uni learning to be an adult, without being bombarded by adult pressures with the force of a bag of bricks the moment we leave school.

Going to a campus university has been lovely. In first year, when I lived on campus, I felt like I was cocooned in a safe bubble where I could fumble around with the grace of a newborn fawn in the ways of independent living. In the following years, I may have lived off-campus but I hadn’t realised how much time I still spent on campus until the pandemic hit. It’s made me appreciate even more how precious the campus is.

In first year, I absolutely loved watching movies in the student cinema late at night (seriously, this is a gem – incoming first years need to take note). I loved being able to walk around campus and attend random events whenever they popped up. And the Arts Centre! Probably one of my favourites places on campus.

Unfortunately, I had plans to space out my involvement in societies over the years of my degree, which was obviously shredded to pieces when the pandemic hit. It’s left me with regrets as I feel like I didn’t participate in societies as much as I wanted to; I feel like I should have gotten more involved in first year when I was on campus.

I think one of the biggest lessons I learnt because the pandemic disrupted campus life is that if you want to do something, try to do it sooner rather than later. Seize the opportunity when it presents itself, as we can never guarantee that it will come back again. And I think being on campus – and, well, at uni in general – gives us so many amazing opportunities.

I’ll admit that a large motivator for carrying on to do a Masters it is that I’m really, really looking forward to getting back into campus life next year!

The degree

Of course, the degree itself is the backbone of university life. I’ve written another post about studying CS, but I would just like to say that while studying any degree is never a bed of roses – there will inevitably be some parts of the degree that aren’t as enjoyable, just as there will be parts that are really fascinating – it really has been a great experience.

Blogging

Yes, I’m writing a blog post about writing blog posts. How delightfully meta.

I had the amazing opportunity to start blogging since my first year, and so I leave behind a trail of posts that I wrote throughout my degree. Some of it was to do with uni life in general, and some of it was specific to Computer Science.

Firstly, to whoever is reading this, thank you for bothering to read this. It’s been an absolute joy to write about my experiences at uni and to also read some of the amazing posts that the other bloggers have written.

To any prospective or current students out there, I would really recommend blogging. Whether it is as a student blogger for your department or personal blogging, I think that it’s such a great opportunity to capture your thoughts, muse on something that’s caught your attention, and/or be an outlet for creativity. I’m not a diary writer – in fact, I wasn’t the sort of person to write blogs either before starting uni – but to be able to look back at the things you wrote and the pictures you took is the closest thing to a time a machine.

(When I look back at my posts, I marvel at the amount of energy I had in first year and I also question my slight obsession with Disney and cats).

The future

I’m not a seer, and the pandemic definitely threw a spanner in the works when it came to planning for the future. And as someone who is a planner, that hurts. It hurts a lot. But I’ve tried to learn from this, and I think it’s made me more resilient as a person.

I do have some plans, though. My Masters will be in Urban Analytics and Visualisation (also at Warwick) – I want to make a real difference to people’s lives, and I feel that I can draw upon what I learnt from CS to solve urban challenges. I’m a big fan of interdisciplinary learning/working, and I think that Warwick’s especially good for that.

Beyond my Masters, I’m not entirely sure. I would like to apply for a PhD, but I’ll also be applying for jobs and grad schemes because we can’t really plan everything that far ahead, can we? And anyway, there are a number of options open as a result of doing CS. The future is a bit murky, but it is bright, and as graduates, we can only hope for the best.

Oh, and I plan to keep blogging!

So, this is goodbye. Even if I wasn’t doing a Masters, goodbye doesn’t mean leaving the Warwick community. I know that I will be in touch will the many amazing people I met throughout the past three years, and I also suspect that I’ll be running into other Warwick students and alumni in the future.

Have a lovely summer! 🙂