Biochemistry – Bath

Biochemistry - Bath Review

by Anonymous

Overall Rating

Course Rating

Facilities

Faculty

Recommendation

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Mixed

Pros:

- City study areas are great and the security there are super helpful - Good sports facilities (but staff tend to be rude and you will not be able to use the gym at peak times). - People are amazing with big European diversity but that’s not facilitated by the university & it’s very much white washed. - New Biochemistry director of studies is a lot better than our previous one so things are hopefully looking up.

Cons:

Let’s start with the campus and living situation: Inadequate SU, library, campus eateries, groceries on campus and transport. - Bath is a campus university on a massive hill, you can walk up it but if you live in the designated student town (oldfield), it’ll take you an average 60 minutes one way and that’s walking fast (not counting the time to shower afterwards). - Oldfield rent is an approximate £500/month, excluding bills, for an old, chances are broken, house. In our first rented property here the oven was burning the side of the cupboard next to it, the landlords don’t care. - Buses up to campus are unreliable & the bus pass is ~ £400 for the year and in extreme weathers (hot or snowy) the buses are actually a huge hazard / do not run. - Once you manage to get to the campus, you have a choice of 5 main eateries with an average price of £5 for a standard lunch, but you won’t be able to sit anywhere at peak times and if you live on campus you have to shop at ‘fresh’ where a packet of crisps is £2.50 or more. - Library is too small and loud and is actually caving in on itself from the weight of the books that were not considered in its design. - SU is disruptive rather than helpful in terms of losing sports society kits, withholding funding raised by sports societies and limited support for sexual assault and support for those who have been wrongfully accused. The course: Generally been extremely uninspired and unimpressed with anything on offer but I’ve had a good experience until my placement year. The biosciences department has its own placements team whose sole job is to ensure placements are safe (I’m not sure what they do to be honest). They pushed for me to go on my abroad placement in the middle of the Coronavirus pandemic. Once I got there, the project which I came for wasn’t provided as well as my manager being completely erratic. I came back into my final year with severe mental health problem for which I daughter help and the only proper support I received was from the disability service who provided me with a DAP. Final year has been another disappointment with one lecturer refusing to give lectures (not because of covid). Some of the content is the same as in first / second year or extremely time consuming but pointless. This has also been the first year I sought pastoral help from the department and it’s left a lot to wish for. Overall: your experience and grade is very circumstantial on a lot of things you can’t control (supervisor for your final year project, worth ~ 30% of your final grade and placement experience due to lack of monitoring/education from the placement office) and exams in first and second year do not test your competency to be a researcher but you are expected to show that competency in your final year. Apart from my anecdotal placement experience, I know a lot of student feel the same about these issues, including unpaid placement experiences.

Suggestions:

Do your thing, build your network and don’t rely on the university to guide you but do take advantage of the resources they provide.