The Truth About Uni | Workload

The Truth About Uni | Workload

First of all Happy Mothers day if you are from The Netherlands! This is the already the fifth topic in The Truth About Uni collaboration. This time we are talking about the workload and the details about our courses. Since I’ve already done my bachelors and I’m currently doing my masters I’ll talk about both. They are both very different in workload and the type of workload, because my bachelors were more practical and my masters are more theory based.

During the first three years of my bachelors we had lectures quite a lot of lectures. Usually around 3 to 4 hours of sports a day, with 1 to 2 hours of theory based lectures. This was quite intensive and every now and than someone from our class had an injury. I managed to get through those first three years with only minor injuries. They were all during the second semester and luckily just muscles injuries. The forth year was quite different, because we didn’t have any sports just theory based lectures. Besides that most of the course existed of your own choice of specialization. I chose to do a couple of subjects at the Uni in Amsterdam where I study now. These courses were required to start my masters after I got my bachelor degree. The study load in my forth year therefore was quite different. It consisted of less lectures and a lot of studying at home.

The study load during my masters is quite comparable to the premaster. It depends on the subjects that you choose how many lectures you have. Some subjects have some practical lectures and others don’t. Also the amount of lectures per week differs between subjects. The workload over all has to be the same if the subject has the same amount of credits. The biggest difference between my bachelors and my masters is the amount of papers we need to read. That’s were I struggle most! Does anyone have any tips for me?

Don’t forget to see what JasmineToriKateSaffronSophieBex and Jen have to say about their workload! And if you have any study tips please leave them below in the comments!

Xoxo Annaleid

9 Comments

  1. May 14, 2017 / 5:52 pm

    I found in my undergraduate degrees in History (at a Canadian university) my workload was far heavier than my MA in Ireland.It did mean that I essentially lived to study in the last year of my Honours degree but I was overprepared for my graduate work and didn’t struggle at all in that transition! History is all reading and papers, so I much prefer that to any other form of work/assignment but I would recommend paying close attention to how long you can thoughtfully read and engage with your readings- if you can only viably read and comprehend for 2 hours, reading for 5 without any sort of break won’t help you! It takes a bit of planning and reflection but can really help you. Best of luck!!

    • Actually Anna
      Author
      May 15, 2017 / 1:37 pm

      Thank you so much for sharing your uni experience and for the reading tips! 🙂 I’m going to try this and see how I get on with it 😊
      Xoxo Annaleid

  2. May 15, 2017 / 1:09 pm

    Uni can be overwhelming, keep going your doing well.

    • Actually Anna
      Author
      May 15, 2017 / 1:33 pm

      Thank you so much for the encouragement 😊
      Xoxo Annaleid

  3. josypheen
    May 15, 2017 / 1:43 pm

    I studied two majors and I noticed a huge difference in workload for the Japanese side of my degree compared to the history side.
    – I loved my history lectures and readings, but it was only a few hours contact time a week. I found that as long as I wrote all my essays on time, I could coast a little until the exams when I’d have to revise like crazy!
    – Learning a language is totally different. We had far more contact hours, with small classes so they knew if you were getting behind! We also had constant tests, so I had to spend hours and hours studying characters and vocabulary each week. The revising at the end was different too because you can’t really learn a language just for an exam! It’s more of a constant struggle!

    • Actually Anna
      Author
      May 15, 2017 / 1:51 pm

      Thank you so much! It’s awesome that you all share your Uni experiences 😊 I feel like it’s so different in every country but also in different courses/majors/subjects/masters ! Thanks for sharing yours and my compliments for learning Japanese !!!
      Xoxo Annaleid

  4. lolitambonita
    May 15, 2017 / 7:56 pm

    I cant help much as I just did an undergrad bachelors, however reading tips would be to take your papers everywhere so when your travelling/commuting you can read them. Not only that see if y ou can find audio versions anywhere x
    Lola Mia

  5. Katherine
    May 18, 2017 / 11:13 pm

    The readings I am set are the worst part of my degree, I have to sit there and force myself to do it, and pretend I have an interest in them and know what on earth they are going on about! It’s so interesting hearing about the layout of uni’s in other countries! My course averages around 10-15 hours in lectures and workshops a week, and the rest is for us to do our coursework, especially our paired practical work!xx

    • Actually Anna
      Author
      June 2, 2017 / 11:04 pm

      Yeah I know what you’re feeling about working your way through the papers! Thank you so much for sharing your experience 🙂
      xoxo Annaleid

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