Umair from Dubai, Studying Aerospace Engineering
There’s definitely a few things everyone takes from their time at college. For me that is the confidence that I have gotten speaking to people, and just going out and being with a group of people a lot more than just staying in my room, which I would do most of the time before coming to New College.
Umair from Dubai, Studying Aerospace Engineering
Umair's Experience:
Hi my name is Umair, I have come here from Dubai to live in New College. I am currently in my first year of college and I study Aerospace Engineering.
So I decided to stay on campus because it would make my life in Australia very easy, because it’s my new year here, my new start, so obviously it’s easier to stay on campus and you get familiar with your surroundings. I applied to several colleges, including New College, which I found out about at the last moment because my friends were already living here previously. So I applied, and a few days later I spoke to the Dean for my interview and ended up getting an offer very quickly.
When I came to university here, I wanted to get quickly settled into life so that I could begin university, so my expectation was that it would take me a while to build a group of friends around me, but that wasn’t the case. O’Week is a thing you would find very helpful for you to do at New College. As soon as you arrive, you are greeted by one of your oldies or RAs. For me that was my RA who greeted me and helped me to find my room and get to where I needed to be. Soon after I saw that they were all gathered downstairs in the courtyard on the first day of O’Week, with lots of strangers meeting each other for the first time but also having fun together.
Something else that ticked my boxes was that I wanted to have the least amount of responsibility in my first few months in Sydney. New College allows you to have your own comfortable lifestyle while also being able to manage your studies and social life in a very balanced way.
Apart from your own room, you’ll find that every group has its own common room, with tables, sofas and sitting areas. Most people use these areas in their own time to study in private or in groups, while at night, say on most Sundays, you will find that we have group suppers, where everyone from the group gathers around and we share stories about our week and it just helps build that community.
At college, you’d find the Resident Advisors, Assistant Dean, and tutors are all there to help you with whatever you need. The tutors are there to help you out with your studies...The Resident Advisors and Assistant Dean, on the either hand, are always available for your other needs - if you need someone to talk to, or like in my case, when I got injured, they were there to run me… to the Prince of Wales hospital on a Sunday, which is something I really appreciate.
One thing you want to do at university is make friends because you’re not just here for studies. You want to get involved in the community around you, and we do that at college by having various social events throughout the year, during the term, or even during Stuvac and summer vacations.
We have several sporting events with intercollege sports with several of the other colleges. You can take part in sports such as basketball, rugby, water polo, handball, and several others. Aside from that, at college we also have plays and revues, and there will be several roles you’d never think you’d throw yourself into, like I put myself in a rendition of Romeo and Juliet that I never thought I would get in. You get experiences such as these at college that you never think you have, and opportunities you never think you would have anywhere else.
There’s definitely a few things everyone takes from their time at college. For me that is the confidence that I have gotten speaking to people, and just going out and being with a group of people a lot more than just staying in my room most of the time, which I would do most of the time before coming to New College.