A week in the life of Alex Harrison
About Alex
Alex is currently studying on the MSc Applied Health Research.
Alex lives in an outlying village 15 miles from York and commutes in to campus. He enjoys studying in York’s many coffee bars and study centres. He also enjoys visiting friends who live in the area and watching sports in one of York’s 365 pubs.
Monday
I have no lectures today, although I still go into University to see colleagues to work on prep for tomorrow’s lectures and catch up over a coffee. We usually have exercises to complete before the lecture, which we find useful to go through as a group.
I usually meet my study group friends in our favorite coffee bar, ‘The Kitchen’, or go straight to the library and sit in the postgraduate section. After studying, it is time to grab a quick bite to eat in another café and make plans to go to the cinema on Wednesday.
Tuesday
With a full day of lectures ahead, I get up at 7 o’clock to beat the traffic into York. Firstly we have three hours of Research Methods, which is made up of a lot of the core ideas for the entire course.
We all go down to Alcuin Bistro for lunch where most of us grab an essential caffeine boost to take us through the next three hours. Next it’s Statistics, where the lectures are split up into a theory session followed by application of this theory in the computer session.
After a long day, it’s time to go home and go for a run. I’m training for a charity 5km event with course mates.
Wednesday
It’s another busy day of lectures, where we have Systematic Reviews followed by Health Economics. I enjoyed economics at A-level and this is now my favourite module to study.
After the lecture, a few of us go over to a colleague’s house to make dinner. This is a weekly ritual, as we are a multi-cultural group there’s always something new to try before venturing to the cinema.
Thursday
Today is my day off from lectures, although not from work. The workload is quickly piling up and the revision has already started. I work on revision, going through lecture notes and preparing my dissertation most of the day. I go on a run in the afternoon, and in the evening watch a film.
Friday
Today I’m going into York city centre to go shopping and to meet some course mates for lunch in a new café. We spend the time talking about work, home life and things to do when lectures finish.
In the afternoon I head over to a town where I went to school, to catch up with friends over couple of beers and takeaway food.
Saturday
Saturday couldn’t come quickly enough as it’s rugby day! We are in the middle of the 6 Nations tournament, so my course mates and I all meet up early in the library to get some work done before later moving to a café on campus to watch the rugby. We stay there for a couple hours talking about the game and what to do next week.
Sunday
Today is a family day, where we all get up late. I watch the last rugby match of the weekend while cooking Sunday lunch. Later I catch up on some reading before my Monday meeting with course mates.
