Student link up helped me settle into university life
Hannah Spiers, student at Edinburgh’s University of Linguistics is a Small Group Leader in the CU. She talks about her experience of linking up to the CU through UCCF’s student link-up scheme.
I was at Soul Survivor the summer before I was due to start university and it was there that I signed up with UCCF to be linked up with my future university’s CU. It sounded like a good idea as it meant that it ruled out the potentially scary initial contact of hunting down my CU by myself – something that can get pushed down the priority list during a busy Freshers’ Week and that you can lose motivation over. Also, I was certain that I wanted to find a church while I was at university, and knew that in a CU I would find people – who’d once been the same boat as me – to help me with my search.
After I signed up, I got an email straight away from UCCF to say that I was on their list, and then another a couple of weeks later to inform me they’d passed on my details to the CU, and also gave me some contact details of the CU Freshers Week coordinator so that I could contact the CU directly if wanted to – having an actual name of someone from my university was surprisingly reassuring; stepping into The Great Unknown that is university can be pretty daunting, but it doesn’t have to stay feeling that way!
A week or so before Coming Up Weekend I received an email from the CU with a big hello and friendly welcome, and to give a link to their website with the details of everything that was happening with the CU over Freshers Week. I received the weekly email updates every week from then on, as they’d put me straight onto the mailing list, meaning I could be clued up on what was happening and how to plan what to go to – the security I found a lot of other Fresher Christians didn’t have.
This prior link up with my CU was so valuable as it meant I could go off to university with the knowledge that there were already a group of people who were expecting me and excited to meet and welcome me in; it helped me to relax and to look forward to the general university Freshers Week as I knew that I could go out and grab so many of the experiences it offers, but with the security that there were other Christians to turn to for advice and support if it wasn’t turning out as great as I’d hoped. It made the transition from living and going to church at home so much more smooth and effortless.
