I’ve been studying Business and Management at Durham since September, and I have to say, I’m loving it!
When I stepped into my first lecture, I was a bit nervous about how tough the material would be and how different it would feel compared to A-levels. While the content is more challenging, there’s a real focus on theories and it gets pretty technical, but the lecturers are so engaging and fun. One of my modules even features weekly Kahoot quizzes, which took me straight back to year 9!!
The hardest part for me has been adjusting to the amount of independent work. I’ve got about 9 contact hours a week, so I spend a lot of my time on my own, reading, preparing, and reviewing lecture notes. There’s a ton of reading to get through! Which can be challenging, especially in first ter,m but honestly, even though it’s a lot, I’m really enjoying the journey.
Average work week
My contact hours consist of a combination of lectures, workshops, and seminars.
This term, for my current favourite module, “Strategy in Practice,” our formative assessment involves forming teams to run our own bicycle businesses. I am proud to be the CEO of Cyclix.
Each week, we have a decision day during which we make all our business decisions for the year, and then we can see how we performed based on our position in the stock exchange. On Tuesday, as soon as it hits midnight, the laptops come out. I check the stock exchange to see how the team did, hoping we’ve moved up. I feel like a kid at Christmas—that’s how excited I get about it.
In addition to that project, I’m currently working on two other presentations, which are also formatives, in addition to attending my three 2-hour lectures.
Assessments
I’m talking about formatives but you may not be familiar with what those are. Formatives are projects or assessments assigned to us to check our progress and provide feedback, but they do not contribute to our overall grade.
What does count towards our overall grade are summative assessments. In the business and management program, we have three summative assessments in the first term and three in the second term—one for each module. These summatives consist of essays, and they are worth the entirety of each module.
While that may sound intimidating, I actually find it to be a lot of fun. When I initially received the summative assignments, I felt quite stressed; however, as I began to work on them, I started to feel like a real businesswoman and genuinely enjoyed the process. You might think I’m just saying this for the blog, but it’s true! Since returning after Christmas and submitting my first three summatives, I’ve really missed them. They have become my favourite part of the degree.
That’s my journey so far, and I’m looking forward to seeing what the future brings!
Discover more
Take a look at Durham University Business School
Download our latest prospectus and college guide here.
Follow The Durham Student on Instagram, TikTok and YouTube.
