Bath University - Student Life

Housing: All first years on campus (incl places for disabled students); some university accommodation for final years, on or off campus. City accommodation often expensive and sometimes hard to find; help from (excellent) uni accommodation office.

Eats: Range of food on campus (meal for £1.60+); good selection of restaurants in town including vegetarian and wholefoods, kebabs, curries and fish and chips, pizzas and burgers; thai, lebanese, japanese and (excellent) indian, the Rajpoot; Manuels, Cafe Martini (meal £10-£15 a head).

Drink: £1.75+ a pint in SU bar. Plenty of pubs, lots of real ale pubs and student pubs (eg Pultney Arms). Local brews: Bath Gem, Ushers, 6X; Scrumpy paradise.

Nightlife: Events held almost every night in SU venue; discos, live ents and student run nights; Sunday cinema. Moles, good student club. Extensive freshers' week, discount card for shops, cinemas, restaurants.

Locals: Harmless enough, no real problems (can sometimes be more studenty than the students).

Sports: Olympic-size swimming pool and excellent facilities for squash, badminton and tennis on campus, astroturf and 8-lane athletics track (free to students); many teams and clubs from snooker to hot-air ballooning, mountaineering to skiing. Sports centre in town more expensive. Sports scholarships available.

Travel: Buses very frequent and reasonable and run to 2.30am. Good rail and coach links: London 75 mins by train, Bristol 15 mins. SU travel shop on campus for discounts.

Annual living costs: The minimum amount students say you need to live on each year (covering all living expenses but excluding tuition fees) is £5750 (in uni accommodation), £6700 (in private accommodation).

Financial help: University access fund; money advice centre.

Jobs: Some tourism, part-time shop work; standard availability. About 30% students work part-time in term-time. Large tourist industry means summer and Xmas work available. Job Centre advertises in SU; student employment centre on campus.

Best features: Friendly campus; beautiful town.

And worst: Cold wind and rain. Good news: New radio mast so broadcast campus-wide.

More info: Contact SU on Tel 01225 826612, Fax 01225 444061, website www.BathStudent.com

Past students: John Kiddey (TV reporter), Martin Hedges (world champion canoeist), Chris Martin. David Trick, Gareth Adams and John Sleightholme (England rugby players). Dr Fox (Capital Radio DJ), Don Foster MP.