Cambridge University Brilliant Club

Written by Finty and Kitty (Year 9) 

Once we had arrived at Girton College, Cambridge, we had a brief talk by the Brilliant Club about what was going to go on throughout the day and we received our course booklet (focusing on Roman History, the topic we will be studying) and met our PHD tutor, Dr Kitchen. 

Following this, we had our first session of the day which in our case (the blue group) was the tour of the College by one of the students at Girton College, while the other group had their seminar session. Throughout our tour we saw the Library, Chapel, Dining room, Swimming pool and all the dorms for the students, all of which was stunning. It was a great opportunity to speak to a current student at Girton College and ask them questions about their experiences of University, and see what University life was like.

Later, when our tour was over, we all met back into the main room, where we had lunch, then went onto our first tutorial with our PHD tutor: Dr Kitchen. During this tutorial we were introduced to him and we began our study of Roman Britain. 

As our trip came to an end, we had a final session with everyone together were we discussed study skills and note taking, as well as what it was like to study at University, different types of classes such as lectures, seminars and just classes in general. This will be really useful to us, as it will help us to revise and support us when studying at school.

In our opinion, the scholars programme will introduce us to all the opportunities open to us as we start to decide what we want to do after we finish school.  Furthermore, the trip also showed us that university is an option for everyone and that it is not all about studying and work and that it does include having fun and meeting new people. Also, the Brilliant Club is there to give everyone a chance at getting into top universities.