The Durham exam experience 

At college and high school the word ‘exam’ was almost akin to ‘he-who-shall-not-be-named’ and treated as this ominous bogeyman that lurked over us, so coming to university I was prepared for the same stress, panic and worry, however I couldn’t have been more wrong. 

Summer in the city

Having spent the autumn, winter and spring months in Durham I thought I had seen most of the beauty the city had to offer but coming back to the city in summer was beyond anything I had expected, I have never seen a city centre so green and found walks so beautiful and peaceful like in Durham. And then when the preparation for exams came I expected to sit in a library or my room for most of the day slogging away at my revision, however, I found myself making the most of the natural beauty and the weather sitting outside studying in the Botanic Garden with my friends, which made for one of the best study experiences I have had (and me buying myself one too many sweet treats from the café). 

The Botanic Garden

Exams are different at university

Given that the lecturers were writing our exams I also had this image of them as these ‘puppetmasters’ who expected us to fail and would work against us, much like the image I had of examiners in previous education levels. But all of our lecturers were happy to provide us support and revision lectures to help us with our study and ground our efforts into core concepts rather than abstract specific situations which helped me feel far more comfortable in preparing for my exams, knowing that they weren’t trying to catch us out. 

For me chocolate was essential

And then I actually had to sit these exams I spent months preparing for, which while still the same core idea as previous exams was also very detached from my prior experiences. One of the biggest things that I hadn’t even thought about but helped ease me so much more into my exams was the fact that I could take a snack into the exam hall with me. This could have made such a difference because I had Pavlov’s Dog-ed myself with sweet treats while studying and so having a bar of dairy milk with me not only did me a lot of good in de-stressing and allowing me to have a break but also maybe, just maybe helped my memory and built strong associations in my brain between the sweet taste of chocolate and the equations of classical motion. 

Walking to de-stress

Finally having finished the exam there’s the usual routine of ‘What did you get for this question’ which I never wanted to get involved with, particularly now, and walking back from the exam hall I expected the same, however, I could make use of Durham’s beauty and I would walk in the woods around Mountjoy, or down the river to relax myself on my way home so I could avoid other people and be thoroughly de-stressed by the time I got home. 

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Guy Mathieson

I'm Guy, and I'm from Warrington in the North West. I'm studying physics and I'm part of Collingwood College. I'm part of Collingwood's Music Society as part of a band and also the University Games Society.

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