Questions about Studying at Bangor University

If you know the person's name you can use the Bangor University Directory. You will be asked to sign in with your Bangor University username and password before you can search. Alternatively, you can search for your module code on MyBangor and contact the module coordinator to ask how to contact the person of interest.

Lectures in Bangor University start 10 minutes past the hour (9:10am, 11:10am, etc.) and finish on the hour (11:00am, 1:00pm, etc.) to allow students to move between teaching rooms.

This question is impossible to answer - the United Kingdom has devolved higher educational system. Thus, there are some differences between expectations of lecturers' in England versus Wales or Scotland, for example. Further to that lecturers' expectations elsewhere (the rest of the world) vary greatly, not only between country, but also between region. One thing that might be new to students starting their studies in Wales is that students are expected to be independent learners. So they will need to follow their own initiative in finding information about areas of study that are new to them as well as previously studied areas, where they do not feel they know enough to follow a lecture. 

Yes, all of your lecturers will have office hours, when you can go and talk to them about your studies and academic work.

Some lectures will be recorded and will be available online shortly after the class. But some lectures will NOT be recorded or there might have been technical difficulties with the recording and it might be incomplete. It is best to ask your lecturer and to try to attend as many lectures as possible, in case there are technical problems with any of the recorded lectures.

Yes, all work is submitted electronically at Bangor University. The period of time that you could submit your work prior to the deadline will depend on each assignment. Therefore, it is best to ask your lecturer about it. In most cases, you will be able to submit at least 3-4 days before the submission deadline.

When you sit down for a long period of time (1 hour or more) your body temperature decreases and the room seems colder. Then as you leave the room your body temperature starts increasing and the outside of a room seems warmer than its inside.

No, there is no such a map, but you could use the Lecture Room Directory to find in which building your lecture is scheduled to take place in. It is a good idea to bookmark this webpage so you can access it quickly.

Yes, usually everyone loses points for grammar and spelling mistakes. As 'a lot' is a subjective term it is impossible to answer this question. So check for each assignment how much of the mark is given to grammar and spelling or language expression. If you are unable to find such information ask your lecturer.

Using an idea from a source in your work is NOT plagiarism, as long as you acknowledge the source of the idea (i.e. where you have taken it from). So every time you like an idea take a note of its source. Then if you choose to use it in your work you will be able to quickly find where it has come from, cite and reference the source and you will be sure not to plagiarise the work of the original author. Please read the Avoiding Plagiarism online guide to get more information about this topic.

Some modules will have a draft submission link for your work. That will generate a Turnitin similarity report and give you an indication if you have plagiarised the work of others. You have to ask you lecturer if your assignments will have draft submission links.

Some modules will have a draft submission link for your work. That will generate a Turnitin similarity report and give you an indication if you have plagiarised the work of others. You have to ask you lecturer if your assignments will have draft submission links.

Explanations of a referencing style rarely exist and they are usually in physical books rather than online. If you are interested how to use a certain referencing style you can find a number of guides online. For example, the Academic Librarians team has created a Bangor Harvard Referencing Guide that you might find useful. Your module handbook will tell you what referencing style you are expected to use and where to find the related guide. Please check Blackboard for more information and speak to your lecturer if you cannot find the information there.

No, the rules of a referencing style are the same worldwide. Even if you are using a source originally published not in English you need to provide all bibliographic elements (author, title of publication, etc.) in the same format and order as for a text published in English.

TheAcademic Librarians team usually deliver a session for most academic schools discussing the chosen referencing style for that specific school. There is no workshop that discusses 2 or 3 different styles at the same time as that will be rather confusing. There is a 'Paraphrasing and Avoiding Plagiarism'workshop run by Study Skills Centre where you can explore the process of paraphrasing and using the work of others in your own writing, but the workshop does not discuss a specific referencing style.

When you are using the work of others in your own writing, you need to cite the source of information in the body of your text. This is usually in the same sentence as the idea you are presenting. Citations are a shorthand approach of identifying the source of the information and they do not have enough detail for a reader to find your source. Thus at the end of the text you will add a referencing list where you will reference in full the source of information that you have used. Then your reader will have all of the details and will be able to find quickly the source of information. Therefore, you need to both cite and reference each source of information in your work. Please read the Avoiding Plagiarism online guide and the relatedrelated Referencing and bibliographies online guide to get more information about acknowledging sources of information.

APA referencing style has a couple of variations and it regularly changes. The most up to date guidance about it is on the related website APA Style Guide. For example, both the School of Nursing and the School of Psychology use APA style, but they use different versions of it. Therefore, it is best to check with your lecturer which guide you are expected to follow. They will often e-mail you a copy of the guide or tell you where you can find it on Blackboard.

Sometimes you need to quote ancient philosophers and their research in your work, so there is no limit on the age of the research you could use. What is important is not when some research information was published, but is it still accepted as correct by the present day researchers in this field. So, always check if the research that you are citing has recently been cited by other research publications, and if their authors agree or disagree with the research, you are citing.

The Maths and Stats appointments available through the Study Skills Centre are 20 or 40 minutes long. No there is no option to have an appointment that lasts longer than 40 minutes. The reason for that is that this approach allows us to help more students in the same day rather than if we give one two-hour long appointment to only one student. As you can book more than one Maths and Stats appointment in the same semester, you can get all the help that you need with your studies.

There are many ways that you can improve your English skills. Regarding oral skills, I strongly suggest that you try to speak as much as possible and not to be worried about making a mistake when speaking. The important thing is not how many mistakes you are going to make in a conversation, but what you are going to do afterwards. Once you have an idea that you have made a mistake it is useful to write down the correct way of saying things and to practice using the correct phrase as much as possible. When it comes to grammar and spelling the in-sessional courses by ELCOS are the best way to improve your English skills. In addition, ELCOS has a Writing Advice Sessions that will help you explore grammatical and spelling issues.

There is no recommended number of hours that you should study per day. The number of hours that you will spend studying each day will vary greatly. This will depend on a number of things like how many lectures do you have on a certain day, how many assigned readings do you have for a related lecture or seminar, do you find a particular area of study easy or hard to understand, do you have an assignment deadline or an exam coming up soon, and many others. Although each day you will study a different number of hours it is important for you to set yourself academic goals for each day. This will help you to track your progress and to have an idea what else needs to be done in the following days. The Organising Your Time online guide can help you to manage your study time successfully.

Giving a presentation is very stressful and most people do not like doing one. It is similar to sitting an exam - nobody likes taking exams, but throughout our studies, we have to take at least one exam. Therefore, if you approach an oral presentation with the same mindset as you approach an exam - something you do not like, but something that you have to learn how to do, it will be easier for you to actually stand up and present. You can prepare for giving a presentation by booking a 1-2-1 appointment and discussing the particular situation with an advisor. Alternatively, you can attend the workshop 'Presenting with Confidence'. 

'Doing research' means different things in different academic disciplines. For some areas, it will mean reviewing published literature, while for others it will be collecting samples during a field trip or lab experiment. The best approach is to discuss this immediately with your personal tutor. Then visit the lecturer, in their office hours, for the module that requires research to explore the details further. This will help you to get a better idea of what exactly is expected of you. Then you could plan your next actions and decide how you can increase you confidence.

During postgraduate studies, lecturers at Bangor University would expect a higher level of critical thinking and writing than at an undergraduate level. Furthermore, they would expect deeper analysis of discussed sources of information and a higher proportion of original ideas, especially when you are writing your dissertation.

Yes, you can book more than one 1-2-1 appointments with the Study Skills Centre. When you have your first appointment, you need to share the areas where you feel uncertain with your Study Skills Centre advisor. Then you could come to an agreement how many appointments you will need to work on all of these areas.

The Study Skills Centre has a number of online guides and interactive online quizzes that you can use at any point in time. The Centre also organizes free interactive workshops to explore key elements of academic study and to practice useful strategies for overcoming challenges in any of these areas. Further to these, the Centre offers 1-2-1 academic writing and study skills , and Mathematics & Statistics appointments.
If you are studying at PhD level the Centre also offers multidisciplinary writing groups where you can share your writing and receive critical feedback as well as practice research presentations. I do hope that you will find at least one of these types of support useful in your academic studies.

The Study Skills Centre can support you through 1-2-1 appointments in the process of planning and writing an essay, but we cannot offer a feedback on your work. Feedback on your academic work will come from your lecturers as they have greater knowledge about the areas that have been covered during the teaching sessions and what was expected to be covered through independent learning for each assignment. If you are unsure about the meaning of the feedback given by your lecturer, you can book a 1-2-1 appointment in order to try to understand what it might mean.

This is a rather unusual request, as most people would want a recognition for the work that they have done. It is best to contact ELCOS directly at elcos@bangor.ac.uk and to discuss with them the details of this specific situation.