Accommodation and Living
After I arrived in Leeds, I moved into the accommodation that had been allocated to me by the University after I had been accepted. To get university accommodation, you apply through a separate portal after you have gained acceptance. In all honesty, the University of Leeds accommodation office is pretty useless, so if you have any problems, I recommend contacting SFU in the study abroad office and getting them to try and help you. I was in a threeperson pod for my accommodation, and my roommates were first years which tends to be the case for anyone doing exchange as most of the university housing is allocated to first years. They were great, and we had an excellent system for purchasing food and cooking. It was an equal relationship. This and the fact that we all respected and liked each other helped with living together and getting along well. Another critical aspect of the accommodation is that laundry is all in the main building of your housing and is shared. You will need to download an app to use the laundry, which is super annoying. On top of that, the app for the laundry does not always work, but because a third party facilitates it, the people at the accommodation cannot do anything about it.
Learning and Adaptation
The overall academic layout at Leeds is very different from SFU, as courses are modules and tutorials are seminars. However, that is not the only way they differ; lectures tend to max out at about two hours there are very few that are 3hrs. In addition to this, they have very little in terms of assignments during the actual school year. Basically, all my courses only had assignments, one due in the middle of the semester and the last one due in January. Instead of a final exam, one of my courses had only one assignment worth one hundred percent of my grade. Also, the grading dramatically differs from the Canadian system a failing grade in England is forty percent, and then they also don’t do A, B, and C systems; they do First, 2:1, 2:2 as their grades. Something else that is different about Britain and Canada in terms of schooling is that if you have more than your max credit limit in terms of module credits, they can force you to drop one without your permission. However, despite these differences in academics, I still had a fantastic time and learned much from all my classes and roommates.
Cultural and Environmental Observations
In terms of what Leeds is like, it is a very eventful city, especially at night. It is also very wet and rainy; it honestly reminded me a lot of Vancouver.
Social and Extracurricular Activities
There are many clubs you can join that the University facilitates; the only downside is that most of them require you to pay a fee to be part of them. But many study abroad international student events are free, and I would definitely recommend them as they are entertaining to attend and meet new people from all over the world. I would also recommend getting a student rail pass so that you can get a discount on train tickets as most places in the UK and Europe can be accessed by rail, so it's super handy to have. I used a rail pass while I was in Leeds and travelled all over the UK, visiting different historical sites and cities. Because Leeds is in Yorkshire and relatively central compared to the rest of England, it makes it a great home point if you want to take day trips, as most places can be reached in four hours. Some of my favourite places where York, Bath, London and Edinburgh.
