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The overall ranking is decided by students from this institution rating them in a 2026 Whatuni review. This forms the basis of the Whatuni Student Choice Awards (WUSCAs for short).
4.04.03.81333 Student reviews
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The inclusion of diversity makes the University of Sunderland the best in my opinion. Second to that are also the lecturers, facilities and the teaching methods that the university uses. The methods in which students are taught are insightful and useful. Sunderland also helps with the future of the students in terms of helping them get jobs once finished with studying. The range of numerous courses are also what make Sunderland an interesting place to study. However, navigations of the university's website could be improved as sometimes searching for a few things can get confusing and some things can not always be found on the website. Furthermore, facilities for some faculties could be improved. All in all Sunderland is a great place for studies.
Great course- even better than I expected The nightlife could be improved and more freshers events to meet other first years
Poor student life. Little/ no student events/ social activities. Activities on offer by the students union are of no interest to students. Many students just visit the university for lectures then go straight home (mainly to Newcastle) as there is more on offer there. University could easily put events on that interest students, this would make students enjoy their time more as a big part of university is socialising. As well as this, there are little/no events in the city of Sunderland, meaning students visit surrounding cities.
I have been overwhelmed by the amount of support offered to me since joining university. This has included financial support, well-being support, academic support, 1:1 tutorials with my personal tutor as well as peer support. The university is well equipped and the learning content and extra curricular activities are thought provoking and have allowed me to develop my critical thinking skills
18-24 years
Because you get to make friends and flow with everyone and you get to adjust to the environment and I feel it can be improved if we start making more events and we can also improve it by having a counselling study about student life and experience
Everyone is supportive and you feel like you belong
Sunderland university offers a wide range of programmes and courses, which I personally found to help me further explore possible interests and to help find the right fit for the future. Along side this, i appreciated the extensive variety of integrated foundation years available, as this can make university education more accessible to a wider range of students with greater flexibility. I also like how there is a lot of general diversity throughout the whole university and the emphasis of inclusion - including the amount of mental health resources/support available. I do, however, wish there was an improvement to the trips planned with the student union. For example, providing trips to nicer places such as London etc.
I absolutely love the facilities available for my course. Since it's a relatively new university, the laboratories and any facilities used for our labs, practicals and lectures are brand new allowing us to get a real life experience. I have no complaint about the facilities which are constantly getting developed further every year. Regarding the student life, the city is extremely affordable and even though quite small, it is located near several historic, busy cities which can be reached by bus or train in less than 2 hours and allow us to have frequent getaways whenever we want some fun and rest. I guess the disadvantage of a small city like Sunderlan is that there's limited things you can enjoy with your friends there, but, again there's places as close as a 30-minute ride where you can go to entertain yourself. And for an undergraduate it is a great experience of living independently in a city that's not chaotic but not too small at the same time, allowing for gradual adaptation. The pricing in rents, accommodation, groceries, and essential products is fairly good; everything really affordable. The university also offers numerous flexible student jobs and opportunities on campus both short and long term, so taken altogether I have managed to not only spend less money monthly but also save loads for my future plans. When it comes to student support personally I have no complaints over the support I have received. The student union seems to be responsive in the majority of our requests, and the biosciences team have always supported us and worked together with us when we have felt that sudden alterations in our course following COVID were unfair to us, and they pushed our requests further hoping they will get reassessed. I have also received great support from wellbeing services, from the teachers themselves that are genuinely caring about us and do not mind explaining the same things over and over till we understand. The teachers specifically have always guided us, for the most part, and prepared us for assessments, exams, anything really, by doing additional workshops to help us perform better. Lastly, the Sunderland futures team is always there even after a year following our graduation to help with CV writing, internships, and career advice. I guess My only complaint would be my personal tutor being less present on my final year, lately hence the 4/5. Regarding transport from and to the campuses and around the city, the university has arrangements with certain buses that we can get for free just by showing our campus card to prove our student status. These literally take us all around the city, campuses and accommodation for free, giving a great help daily with financial costs for students as there is no need to pay additionally for metro and other transport. Moreover, the student union also provides its own minibus which takes students to and from the accommodation sites and campuses during the day. This has been extremely helpful for me as I need transport daily, and I have saved tons of money. For the most part, my experience has been extremely positive and I would definitely recommend the university. Only little things such as a personal tutor getting extremely busy and less present for a period of time, or confusion/miscommunication between teachers (although extremely rare) during the recent strikes might have deorganised temporarily a day or 2 on my timetable. But that's okay considering all the benefits I have gained. The place could be improved greatly if renovations are done at the accommodation sites as some of them are quite old. Also, if the city gets developed more over the years to offer wider variety of entertainment and jobs it would be absolutely awesome to live in as a student and even after graduating, as now most of us intend to leave after graduating looking for cities with more opportunities.
I like that the professors are nice and help when you need it.
TL:DR - My education was on par with YouTube tutorials - If you're a cyber security student prepare to be ignored - Pointless modules - You're told nothing other than your timetables and log ins - Bad spending Never have I felt more scammed that when I attended this university. The amount of times I said to myself "I should've gone somewhere else" is insane. Even though I chose to do Cyber Security and Digital Forensics I still had to do programming in C#, Web development and networking for some reason. All online which caused problems for me since I have ADHD and found online learning extremely difficult. You may be thinking "You could have gone to student support" and I would have if I knew how to contact them. You're not told anything, just given a couple of emails about log ins to time tables, Canvas, etc. Not to mention the quality of the education was poor, nothing I learned I couldn't have learned in my own time at home via YouTube tutorials or SkillShare. Plus I would be learning at my own pace and could go as fast or slow as I liked. In my 3rd year we got kicked out of our class because it was turned into another games room, we weren't told about this, how I found out is by going to the old classroom which had a piece of paper on the door telling me where to go like it was the early 1900's or something. Not to mention the place is causing me all kinds of stress at work, random time table changes, 2nd year changed 3 times before everything started, 3rd year changed twice and is still changing despite the fact that we are 3 weeks in now. Anything not on the time tables is sent to us last minute. I had a shift at work from 8-12 then I get an email the day before saying there was a lecture on at 10. They couldn't have sent that a week ago when I could get someone to cover my shift? I was excited to go to this university, I really was but if I could tell my past self one thing it would be "take a gap year, build up money, learn everything you can about ethical hacking and digital forensics and DON'T GO TO SUNDERLAND." Out of everything I have been through in my life, coming to this university is one of my biggest regrets.
Overall, due to covid my uni experience has not been the best. This is due to the quality of teaching and learning not being as high as expected. Everything seems a lot more unorganised and last minute and there is ALOT of last minute changes to timetabling and plans.
This was the worst decision that I have ever made, and I was a teenager once! We are doing assignments with software that we've not used for all of last year, and the computers do not even keep time! THIS IS IMPERATIVE during a forensic investigation, and 2 years and 2 months at uni, still not discussed cybersecurity other than the breach(es) and still not learned anything of value. I wish I could go back in time more than anything. PLEASE RESEARCH ALTERNATIVES!!!!!
The gateway staff have been really helpful and everyone seems to be eager to assist, students and staff as well. It’s a nice place for value for your money tho
It’s been good overall 2020 is making it great
It’s pretty fun.
Overall experience is good. They can conduct more excursions and trips to industries.
My university experience has not been that good. There is a lot of stress, and a lot of the assessments are not reasonable or important. I think this university should be more understanding with student issues such as travelling, the cost of living, and time.
So far so good.
4.3
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