I've just finished my first year of university; I'm not even sure it counts 12/05/20

I submitted my last assignment for year 1 at KCL today. It signifies the end of not only my first but last year at the university, and I’m not even sure it counts. 

I understand that being able to attend a university is an undeniable sign of privilege. A fact that has made itself even more conspicuous to me, since spending my days in lecture theatres, amidst Burberry clad sons of bankers and daughters of lawyers whom, although smart enough to get in to KCL, still seem yet to grasp the concept of the harmfulness of smoking. Their Marlboros balanced precariously on their lips before seminars, in between “insightful” remarks about Nietzsche. This to me seems to be at the very least an upsetting example of a paradox, but I can’t afford designer labels or a pack of cigarettes, so I suppose I’ll never really get the chance to ask them their opinion on this. 

I’m not sure whether the experiential feeling of suffocation comes from the stifling sense of self entitlement as the crowds flood along The Strand, or indeed it is just the second hand smoke filtering into my lungs. Either way, perhaps this is why, since the Covid-19 pandemic has meant leaving university prematurely and moving back home with my parents to complete my exams online (mixed feelings about all of the above), I have for the first time all year, felt an ability to breathe again. Even with the inevitably of the several online exam induced breakdowns I’ve had. 

It seems incredibly spoilt to complain about the current situation robbing us of the true authentic university experience when there are people all over the world literally dying from Corona Virus, but that doesn’t stop it from being unfair.  I was there for 5 months and not once did I find myself laughing candidly on a freshly mown field somewhere, surrounded by a group of equally carefree friends from university, like literally all of the brochures led me to believe I would be. 

Of course I’m aware of the enormous amount of privilege I possess in being able to attend university in the first place. The number of people who would give their right arm to be in my position with the same accesses to higher education and financial aid etc is, I’m sure, numerous. But to be quite honest, I feel like my limited experience of KCL has somehow managed to incorporate all of the worst parts of university life: the grim shared kitchen, the getting lost in a strange new building, the homesickness of being away from your family, and the fresher’s weekly sports nights. The latter of which are somehow both optional and compulsory, so that every Wednesday night ends the same way: sprinting for the last tube with some stranger’s snakebite spilled down you. All the while seeming to have retained a disappointing level of sobriety.  Week after week after week. This all without having reaped any of the rewards, in the form of engaging course content or exciting student life. 

The unexpected shortening of my first year of university brought with it both a sense of relief that I didn’t have to physically attend KCL anymore, as well as a sort of anti-climactic consternation at what this would mean for the rest of my university career. Obviously for different people its shit in different ways. For my brother it means he doesn’t get the Cambridge University graduation he’d been working towards for 3 years, and for those in the final year of A-Levels it creates all sorts of doubt around whether its worth applying to university this year or whether it’s better to wait. For myself and other people already part way through year 1 of university, it kind of means that we’ve missed out on the full university experience just as it was really beginning. The pandemic came at a time which meant we were finally cementing lasting friendships,  now more difficult to maintain across the globe. So basically, a bit shit all round. 

 That being said, the sense of relief I felt was probably a reminder that silver linings can be found in all of this. Truthfully, I think whilst I was attending KCL, I was so incredibly disillusioned by the whole London university experience that although I was physically sitting and making notes in all of my lectures, mentally I probably haven’t really been there since November.

 Although I loved the experience of living in London, tube-hopping round the capital and and embracing its culture and lifestyle, really it was only a small consolation for the feeling of dissatisfaction that KCL offered me. In a university where hating the institution itself seems to be a personality trait of its students, I’m still baffled at the level of prestige it holds given that everyone seems to be so bloody miserable. I hate that I hate it, but at least I’m not trying to sabotage my university student experience to look cool, or undermine my own privilege by trying to look poor despite my parents’ above average salaries. KCL in its essence therefore seems to be a place either for the sickeningly rich, or bursary poor, with very little in between. 

For me, of course never taking the easy route, Covid-19 has meant further complications for my plans to transfer universities in September. I’m currently not sure when or even whether I’ll be moving out (again) to a new city, or of the impact that’ll have on my overall student experience. I’m gonna take a wild stab in the dark and suggest it doesn’t promise the most enriching results of my decision to transfer. Still, we never know. For now, I’m happy to be with my family, exam free and healthy. 

We’ll start again when we start again, and see what can possibly go wrong this time.