Your own university city is the best in the country - because it’s yours

“Here are five reasons why my city is the best for students” - a line many an article by a student journalist has begun with, with just the city’s name alternating between them. This well-worn article idea seems harmless but, for many A-level students, these so-called advice pieces play a crucial role in the decision as to which university to go to, and all the confusion that comes with it.

As a sixth-former trying desperately to figure out which university city was the best for me, I remember reading one after the other of the aforementioned articles, won over each time by the passion each student held for their city - only to be equally enthralled by another city, in another article. Talk about a vicious cycle.

Initially, after what seemed liked endless research, I settled on Edinburgh. I had finally been convinced Scotland’s capital was the best university city in the entire country. I, however, failed to get the grades. I was devastated. I thought that wherever I now ended up, in comparison, would be a poor substitute to this city of my dreams. I was so sold on this myth that there was just that one city for me that I refused to enter into Clearing and took a year out, hoping to try again next time.

A year passed and failing to even get an offer from Edinburgh I was heading for Manchester, my second choice. But now, three years have passed since I first called Manchester home and I’ve developed a love for the city, which I doubt any other city will ever compete with and it is the best university city - for me.

I could now list the many reasons Manchester has become the ideal home for me, or I could tell you, instead, it became the best city because I wanted it to be. I embraced every aspect of it, explored all it could offer - and fell in love. In the same way, if I’d been in London, Edinburgh, or Glasgow, the mentality you develop as a student causes a bond with your new hometown which is unlikely ever to be broken.

This development, of the strongest attachment you will probably ever make with a place, is all part of the university experience. This year, my younger sister started university in Bristol and, during a recent visit to Manchester, continuously pointed out the many reasons Bristol was by far superior to Manchester. I spoke to her about this recently and asked how, in just a term, she’s developed such an attachment.

She explained to me it’s “because it’s yours.” It is an individual and unique adventure: the friends you make, refreshingly new places you visit, and attachments you make to your new home. I never planned for Bristol, I fell into this situation. But, if I hadn’t, I would never have discovered a city I will now forever love.

I recently returned to my old school with the task of having to sell them the idea of Manchester as the place to study, something that was not a hard task. Yet, as it was stressed at the end of my talk by the head of the sixth-form, there are many other universities the students can pick from. She tellingly only mentioned her own university, once again reminding me how attached students become to the place they perhaps only call home for three or four years of their lives.

So, if you are one of those confused A-level students, bombarded by ‘the five reasons every university in the country is individually the best one’, remember each author of those articles was probably just as confused as you when they sat down to choose their city.

All in all, wherever you end up, if you fully embrace everything your chosen city has to offer, you will no doubt - in three years’ time - be sitting down to think up the five reasons your new home is the best in the UK for future scholars.