2,381 University of Chester reviews

The uni only gives employability opportunities to nurses and any kind of business related subjects. I understand that they are the easiest to cater for but there is over 200 different courses and maybe they should cater for them too. There should be specific career days and specialised areas considered so everyone knows the options that they have.

The lecture halls are good, warm and comfortable. The lectures are interesting and the lecturers are good at explaining things. The assignments are good and interesting and teach skills that easily could be applied in the future. I don’t like when the lecturers just read off the slides or have loads of information on the slides.

8

Honestly, I have no clue what they do or represent.

Chester is an amazing city and you can walk everywhere, you don’t need a car. Everything is close and you have to walk maybe 15 mins tops to go to the shops.

The sports and societies are good fun and very social. Although, some are like a cult and can be pretty vicious to eachother.

rubbish or non existent

Have a careers service but the tend to direct you to do one thing and meetings aren’t that helpful and you’re better going to see your tutors

They’re all diverse and no lecture is the same. Worst is when no one wants to discuss in lectures and the lecturer doesn’t know how to get everyone motivated

6

Don’t really notice them. They put on some events but not sure what they do day to day

Yeah alright. Could do with a lick of paint but there’s everything you’d need

Yeah everything is around a 10 minute walk away

Decent. Although there is more hype about some over others which isn’t fair. Definitely the su has favourites

Yeah I think very good. Always have a tutor available to talk to

We have a work based learning placement

Like the varying teaching styles - close timings for assignments doesn’t leave you much time to go from one to the other

16

Good with varying ways to get involved

Good some building could do with a refurb

Yes walking distance

Good with the option to start whatever you want

Good, personal academic tutor support and the SU providing advice

So many different skills which can be developed through careers and then used in wider world

Lectures are amazing and informative

16

Very good

Amazing

Yes perfect

Very varied. Something for everyone

Good

It is more up to students to organise these things themselves, but there's a huge variety of things to apply for. Everyone is more than eager to help.

The tutors are incredible and really want everyone to succeed. Plenty of extracurricular opportunities. Least: the texts chosen are very outdated and don't cater to lots of different interests.

6

It was a rocky start for the SU, but it is back on tracks after the bar was taken over by the university. The current president is a bit unhelpful, but is currently balancing a huge workload.

The library needs working on, as it is way too modern and unappealing. It's not a comfortable environment and has next to no useful texts.

Chester's Parkgate road campus is very close to everything - only a 15 minute walk from town, supermarkets and a gym.

There is a huge variety of sports and societies in Chester. Literally everything you could want to join and new ones are being added constantly.

Academic: takes a long time to receive feedback. Tutors always willing and eager to help. Personal: Counselling is inaccessible unless you have a Chester based doctor which is impossible for most students (will not accept a referral from current doctor).

Really great careers and employability department as well as plenty to do with different departments to make your CV stand out. And they offer the work based learning module.

Most, the staff do their best Least, some of the content and styles of lectures

12

Really good, always available when needed. Always engaged with students and very helpful.

Just some improvements to be made. More place to sit and eat, and hang out. Microwaves for commuting students, hot water, etc.

Quite spread out, some of which is a fair walking distance

Really good, something for everyone

Really great. Amazing departments and always someone to talk to.

I like the fact that the lectures are very small and quite inclusive, however I don’t like that the majority of my lecturers read off their slides because it makes me feel like I could just stay home and read the slides myself

12

I haven’t seen much of the student union! The student union bar is fab but in terms of representation, I’m not too sure.

They are good

Yep! Campus is about 10 minute walk away from the busy town and about 5-7 mins from all the main off-campus accommodation. The only thing is, that other campus’ like Queen’s Park Road and Riverside, are quite far for people to walk of a morning especially if they also want breakfast before their 9am.

I went to the societies fare and there were lots of different societies to attend and loads of random sports.

The tutors email back usually within the same day with good, detailed responses. The feedback given on our assignments is also normally very good. The personal support is very good

They have workshops ..both online and on campus and with my dyslexia if found in the online skills that was easily accessible via moodle very helpful in creating my CV .

The distance really !!! for me only issue is that i could not get certain programmes to work at home but they worked on campus only ...LIS help desk were great in trying to solve this.....but i still had to go to Uni to do the work on this bit of the course only.

Brilliant ! As a part time student even thought i may have only attend 3 days per module and even when was not there and was online I was included in all aspects of the Student Union and was able to participate in debates ,votes .....etc.

Excellent ! i have need a gluten and carb free diet and the cafe 's where really good and accommodated any issues my diet required. The liberality staff where so helpful too with access to wifi very good..

I think the University is location is really great for students with main campus easily accessible to Chester centre only being a mile away and plenty bus routes too.

They have a vast and varied of sports to take part in and have plenty of clubs socialites in which the students can join in and participate in.

Excellent I cannot fault them they supported me all the way especially the course lead and the Admin staff

I know I can sort employment/career advice through themselves. They’re more than happy to help! Which gives me such reassurance when I am not to sure of something. Also, I find my lecturers are very inspiring!

I love the inspiration that lecturers give me! They’re amazing and all have different backgrounds. Which can be such a great thing when considering my own future. Sometimes, I hate how small our groups are! Due to the course not being a popular one, you can’t always guarantee they’re many attending your lecture. So it is important to keep your ears on so you know what’s what.

6

I don’t really know much of these, I think it may be due to myself being part time. However, I usually get emails from them to tell me what’s on and I find it very interesting. I would love to be involved more, I think life just takes over sometimes.

The uni itself is well built! Very welcoming, and organised. It is just a typical university of how I imagined. Which really does help as I feel I am getting the experience, even though I am part time.

I travel to uni by car. It is a half an hour drive, usually it is not to bad as I go via motorway. Sometimes parking can be a pain but overall, I am happy to do this commute.

Sports is fabulous. There is a gym on campus which really helps. It is also free, so instead of silly memberships or contracts, you’re able to train of your leisure.

I’ve only had one incident within the Uni, this was due to a comment made by a lecture. However, it was dealt with accordingly. Although I never really heard of feedback, they did listen to my feelings, which really helped my wellbeing.

Well, I am studying a PGCE so this is kind of the whole deal. I’m basically working full time, so I’m probably not best placed to answer this.

Most - the staff are friendly and it’s usually enjoyable to go to lectures and seminars. Least - there is a lot of wasted time. I have 4 days a week on school placement then they insist on having me in 9-3 on Fridays despite not really having anything worthwhile to teach me on many occasions, time could be better spent lesson planning.

6

Don’t know enough about it to comment

The buildings are fine, Some of the rooms in Riverside campus are in need of new desks and chairs. Generally fine though.

Not particularly. They have various campuses over the north west and the accommodation varies in its proximity

There are sports and societies available but the spread out campuses means that they are very small, so the quality is low.

Support is essentially non-existent. For such an intensive course it is concerning at the lack of flexibility and self-awareness. The PGCE comprises of mainly school placements which they essentially leave you to it and hopefully the external subject mentor that the school supplies is good. fortunately mine was, but that was nothing to do with Chester Uni. They then expect you to complete various paperwork exercises, but never explicitly tell you what is expected. After several conversations about the paperwork I think I’m now doing it correctly, but it could easily all still be wrong. The most frustrating thing is the lack of empathy when it comes to the school placements. Chester give themselves a VERY lenient travel policy. As long as you aren’t commuting over AN HOUR AND A HALF!!! (One way!!!) then you are basically told to just get on with it, no travel reimbursement either. I spent my first placement doing a 60 mile round trip. This was hugely frustrating due to the travel time - sometimes it took me over 2 hours to get home if there was an accident on the motorway. But also the financial burden of driving 60 miles a day. Its exactly what you don’t need when starting out in teaching. Time is precious as it is, I wanted to stay late after school finished to do lesson planning and marking etc. This simply wasn’t feasible without almost doubling then journey time of my commute home. I didn’t complain though. I was told constantly that my next placement would be close. Then comes the wait for my next placement. You don’t get told where your placement is until 6 days before the start. I assume that the actual reason for this is so that when people have legitimate grievances about their placements, it’s simply too late for them to bother to try and find you a more suitable one. When I finally got given my placement it was closer than my 60 mile round trip, sure (could hardly have been further), but it was still close to 40 miles and the commute time was almost an hour. Not what i was expecting when I had been told repeatedly that my next placement would be close. I didn’t complain about the first placement but I did, very politely, address the Uni about my disappointment regarding the second, in light of the first. I was simply given the travel policy and told to get on with it. I find it disgustingly unfair that I have been forced to commute this far, I estimate the cost of my travel to be in excess of £1000 for the year, when others on my course have had both placements within a 10 mile radius. My advice is to not go to Chester for your PGCE, and if you do, whatever you do, don’t tell them you can drive, perhaps make up that you have a child at primary school, otherwise you will be the fall guy when they’re struggling to place people.