Welcome to St Andrews

In your first and second years, you can try a huge variety of modules from different subjects, which makes the flexible degree structure fantastic, as you have the ability to chop and change things to suit you. Classes can be made up of lectures, tutorials, workshops and labs, and how many you have will depend on your subject. In third and fourth year, you begin to specialise for your degree, and so you will generally take less modules and have more focussed content in your classes. One of great things about St Andrews is the small class sizes which means that tutors are always there and ready to help you.

In the beginning, I was super afraid of moving away from home, however, I can definitely say that my room in David Russell Apartments, which is one of the bigger and more modern accommodations in St Andrews, immediately took away this fear of not feeling at home. When I’m looking around my room right now, I see my huge double bed, the desk and even my own bathroom. What a comfort! But, if you would like to have a roommate, there are also options to share a room or to share a bathroom with other students. Moreover, I am sharing a kitchen with 4 other students, cooking meals together in our well-equipped kitchen was a very easy way to meet new people. However, I am also catered, that means I get breakfast and dinner on weekdays, and lunch instead of dinner on weekends. Starting and ending my days doing meals together with my friends has become my daily highlight. However, you can also choose to be self-catered if you prefer cooking on your own. All in all, I didn’t know what I could expect from accommodation at St Andrews, but I was so relieved to find a community that felt like home so quickly.”

The majority of social life at St Andrews comes from student-run events, particularly through societies and sports clubs. We have 184 societies which range from subject-based societies to more specific interests. Every so often, societies will run more formal events, such as balls, fashion shows and ceilidhs. St Andrews also offers over 50 different sports clubs, so if you’d like to continue with a sport you are particularly good at, or want to try something completely new, there will be a club available. Once a month, on a Wednesday, the students union holds a sports-club only night, known as sinners, where students can socialise with different members of their sports club before heading to club 601. Club 601 is situated inside the student union building and, on a Friday, it also hosts a themed club night known as ‘the bop’. Although Club 601 is the only proper night club in St Andrews, we also have a multitude of pubs across our 3 main streets. Students can then use the university run night bus to get home after a night out.

what I really love about St Andrews is the beautiful setting that we have here. We’re really lucky to have three beaches and we usually get quite nice weather even if it is a bit cold, so that means that there’s always great opportunities for you to take a break from studying and destress, or just to go for a walk with your friends, or you know, if it’s really sunny go and have a swim in the sea. We also have lovely walks in town, we have a few that go through to town and one that goes further up the coast to small towns nearby like Crail and Anstruther, so that’s a really nice opportunity to get out of the town if you ever feel like you need it. And we also have lots of really beautiful and old historic buildings, we have the ruins of a castle and also the cathedral towards East Sands Beach, so we’ve just got a lot of really nice things to look at and things to learn about while you’re here