I’m Gee. I’m a first year. Which means, I’ve been living in Stoke for a whole month now! Yes, despite the fact I’ve already started referring to my flat and the town as ‘home’, it has only been one month!
Now, as someone who grew up in the same teeny tiny rural tourist town my whole life, the concept of moving into a city for university was daunting and, quite frankly, a little scary! So, why have I gone from seeing a city as horrifying to homely? And why was Stoke the place to change my mind?
Firstly, the size of Stoke-on-Trent is far less intimidating that most British cities – especially university cities! Instead of being one big block of heavy ‘city-ness’, Stoke-On-Trent is actually divided up into numerous mini-towns, making it far easy to digest and get used to!
The biggest of these mini-towns is Hanley – which is a Staffs student’s best friend! The intu Potteries shopping centre and surrounding area has almost any shop you could need (including Forbidden Planet, luckily for us Cartoon & Comic Arts students), just like any larger city. And it’s all in one place – just a five-minute taxi ride or half hour walk from campus!
Living in Stoke also means you’re never too far from the countryside (thank goodness)! There are plenty of fields and footpaths near the campus for getting the fresh air you need, as well as a nature reserve just behind the uni accommodation.
As well as this, we have the convenience of the train station on just the adjacent street to the main uni buildings. And, due to being in the near center of the country, it’s never more than a few hour train ride from anywhere!
So, all these factors – everything that makes Stoke, Stoke – all contributed to why I’m so at home so soon, and why I’m #AllStokedUp to be living and studying at Staffordshire University’s Stoke-On-Trent campus!
There are a few #AllStokedUp events being held over the next week to celebrate the opening of our new facilities here in Stoke – one of which being the Campus Launch Party on Wednesday the 12th of October! http://allstokedup.staffs.ac.uk/
I’ll be covering this event myself, so keep your eye on the Staffs Uni Instagram to see us celebrating our campus!
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