10 Things International Students Should Watch Out For!

Hi everyone, good morning, good afternoon and good evening! My master's life in London is finally coming to an end. I'm busy looking for a place to live right now😢 and hope I can find a new home in London by September😭 Today I want to share 10 of the most dangerous things, the ones that need the most care, that my friends and I ran into this year. I hope those of you about to study in the UK don't make the same mistakes as me or my friends!

Let's get started:

1. Your dissertation supervisor standing you up. Lately lots of friends have complained to me that their dissertation supervisors aren't pulling their weight, often turning down meetings or not showing up. Since a master's is only one year, many schools bring in outside academics as dissertation supervisors. They aren't on campus, so once a supervisor starts avoiding students, they're hard to track down.

How to prevent it 👉Pick a professor based at the school (someone you can actually find on campus) 👉Before choosing a supervisor, at least have a chat with them to see whether they're easy to book meetings with and whether they speak in an organized way

2. Losing your BRP. Your BRP is really important; it's like your ID card in the UK. A friend of mine lost their BRP, couldn't leave the country, and spent over 100 pounds and a month getting a new one… don't lose it…

3. Starting the job hunt too late. I honestly don't recommend waiting until just before graduation to look for work, because without a job you're easily swayed by the people around you who one by one give up on staying in the UK. For example, at the start of the year lots of my friends wanted to stay and apply for the PSW, but by graduation they still hadn't found an internship or part-time job, and watching other friends go home made it easy to drop the idea of working in the UK. On the other hand, if you already have a job, you're less easily shaken and you have the confidence to stay!

4. Trusting employers too much (jobs). Little me has been stood up by UK employers so many times. Stood up for an on-site aptitude test, stood up for an online interview, even stood up after they called to say they'd give me an offer. My sincere advice to everyone job hunting in the UK: until you've got the contract (a verbal one doesn't count), be ready to keep searching.

5. Using your phone or listening to music while walking. Two of my friends had their phones stolen by people on bikes while walking and listening to music. Thieves in London love robbing people from bikes, so be careful even on the sidewalk!

6. International students' rights as tenants and shoppers are easily trampled. If your roommate smokes weed, if you were promised an all-female residence but ended up in an all-male one, if your rent isn't what was agreed, you need the courage to fight with your landlord. Be ready to stand up for your rights all the way!

7. Wandering into unsafe areas by accident. London is really big, and not every area is lively and safe. In some neighborhoods, just one or two streets over, the whole vibe changes.

Here's a crime map for reference. Check here:

London burglary crime statistics in maps and graphs.

Crime rate trends and ranking. Comparison to national crime rate and to other regions.

www.plumplot.co.uk

8. Only studying what the school assigns, with no plan for learning outside class. Maybe this is less of an issue in academic subjects? But my program is very career-oriented, and so is the school I chose, yet the workplace skills they teach only scratch the surface. If there are skills you're interested in, I'd suggest spending extra time on projects and online courses!

9. Three kinds of racism. I think racism comes in three kinds: others toward you, you toward others, and you toward yourself. For me, the last one affected me most, because I often doubted whether my words carried any weight before I spoke, and assumed foreigners wouldn't want to talk with me before I'd even really interacted with them. Of course not everyone is friendly, but basic courtesy is something everyone has. Honestly, at school and at work in the UK I've never run into direct discrimination, at most stereotypes, plus people avoiding certain groups or only inviting certain groups for group work or outings (it's usually clueless passersby who make racist remarks). P.S. Older students told me discrimination comes up quite a lot with promotions, and Brits still prefer British managers. But that's just hearsay; I'll check it out for myself🥺

I have my own stereotypes too, like Asian students being better at math and tidier, or European students being more talkative and better communicators. But that's not what I actually saw. My former British roommate is a total neat freak, and my Chinese friend is terrible at math. I think having stereotypes is natural, but you can't take them for granted; checking for yourself is more accurate (maybe everyone I met was an exception!)

10. Doubts and snide remarks from family and friends. Even before I left, lots of people told me it's hard to find a job after studying in the UK. Similar posts show up on Dcard all the time, asking whether going to the UK is just buying a degree or whether you really learn anything in one year, not to mention all the school-bashing debates (honestly, these doubts aren't unfounded: a master's takes two years in Taiwan and the US, but only one in the UK). You really need to think through what you want to achieve in the UK, so you don't get easily led by other people's values!

That's it for today's little share. This post is basically a collection of all the hardships I went through this year😢 What difficulties have you run into while studying abroad? Feel free to share with me! And to everyone about to head abroad, have a safe trip～