A week in the life of a nursing student
You might be wondering what life will be like at university – from how many seminars you’ll have to what you can get up to outside of your studies. Explore a typical week in Year 1, Semester 1 for a nursing student at Surrey. Next year it could be you!
You'll spend lots of time in our Clinical Simulation Centre, practising techniques and scenarios with interactive mannikins and trained actors.
Monday
In Semester 1 of first year, you’ll be required to be on campus two days a week. Your first core teaching day is interprofessional, which means you'll learn with all nursing fields (adult, child, and mental health), midwives and paramedics. You'll have an assigned room and will work with a relatively small group to allow for proactive engagement and participation in activities. For each topic, you'll have a lecturer that specialises in that area so you benefit from their expertise.
This learning is a mixture of classroom-based theory and practical learning in our Clinical Simulation Centre, which includes wards, a critical care unit and a community flat. Classroom sessions take approximately 1 hour 15 minutes and sim sessions are 45 minutes in each space.
You'll be introduced to the foundational knowledge and understanding requirement of general healthcare topics and skills. This includes access to healthcare, evidence-based practice, clinical skills and observations, and health promotion.
Tuesday
This is the first of three days each week that are reserved for self-directed study. You might want to do some independent or group study at our Library or one of our other study spots, like the Hive or the Nest on our Stag Hill campus. If you're in accommodation on our Manor Park campus, you could go to Manor Park Social or the Health Sciences Dot in our Kate Granger Building, which is our common room for health sciences students.
Explore our campus study spots
Across our campuses, we have lots of places to get food and drink. This includes Hillside Coffee and Food Court, Young’s Kitchen, and our new Wetherspoons pub The Sir Ronald Wates on our Stag Hill campus, and Café Priestley Road (in the Kate Granger Building) and Manor Park Social on our Manor Park campus. There is also a Tesco Superstore conveniently located between the two.
Wednesday
This is another self-directed learning day. Across our undergraduate courses, Wednesday afternoons are left free for sports or society activities. So you could spend the morning studying, grab lunch on campus, then head to Surrey Sports Park if you've joined a Team Surrey sports club. Or you may have a society activity planned if you've joined any of our 170+ clubs and societies.
Clubs and societies are a great opportunity to meet people and explore interests outside of, or related to, your course. Our societies cover everything from cultures and countries, sports and hobbies to animals, activism and neurodivergence.
Thursday
This is your second teaching day, which is specific to your field of nursing. You'll build on core course content and be introduced to specialist knowledge and clinical skills relevant to your field, for example an introduction to common mental health presentations if you're studying Mental Health Nursing. This is also a mixture of theory and practical learning, with time in the classroom and our simulation facilities.
Friday
Your final self-directed study day before the weekend. You might want to practise some of the skills you've learnt during the week in our Independent Clinical Learning Space, set up with assessment and basic life support equipment. This gives you time and space to perfect your techniques in things like CPR, cannulation, and taking blood pressure. Then, if you've joined Surrey Sports Park, you could spend time at the gym, do a class, or use the many facilities available like the climbing wall, and squash, tennis and badminton courts.
With the weekend ahead, you might plan to do some exploring. One of the great things about Surrey is the beautiful countryside surrounding our campus. If you like the outdoors, there is plenty to explore in the Surrey Hills (an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty) or along the River Wey, whether you’re walking, running, cycling or paddleboarding. And Guildford’s historic High Street has lots of shops, restaurants and cafés, and plenty of nightlife too. You could also go further afield and visit London, 35 minutes by train, or Portsmouth and Southsea for a day by the coast.
Discover some highlights of Guildford’s High Street
Please note: the timetable referenced above is indicative, reflecting the information available for a typical week in Semester 1 for the 2026–2027 year at the time of publication.
