- Hi and welcome to St John's, I'm Hira and I'm doing a DPhil in Oncology.
- Hi I'm Christopher, I'm doing a DPhil in Public Policy.
St John's has about 230 graduate students which is about 40% of our student population.
- So we're at Canterbury Quad right now, this is apparently the quietest, um, city space in, well,
all of Europe, except for that airplane now but if you come here at night it will be very quiet.
Over here we have the Old Library, there's some teaching rooms here,
study rooms, and then just over on that side we have the new study center which is open 24/7.
- And these are the gardens here at St John's. So this great lawn area here is used
for the St John's commemoration ball which is held every three years
and is night long full of food, drinking, dancing and socialising
to celebrate the end of the academic year.
We're now in garden quad, [with] some more postgraduate accommodation,
and the auditorium to our right is where there's a large number of events.
- We also have the MCR/SCR suppers here, so the MCR being the Middle Common Room comprising
of the graduate students, and the SCR with the research fellows and professors,
so we have a talk normally, and then we'll have dinner and a drinks reception here,
and it'll be a nice chance for MCR and SCR members to, you know, meet and discuss their research.
So one of the places I always bring my friends to
when i'm giving them a tour of St John's is the chess room...
which is...
locked.
- St John's also has an active sports community, and there's a
variety of combined teams between the MCR, the postgraduates, and the JCR, the undergraduates.
And the thing that I like the most about being involved in sport here is the ability to meet
other people both from the MCR and JCR, and also do it in a way that isn't particularly intense
or competitive, and you can really make the most out of what you want to get out of the experience.
- So we're at the MCR now, which is the Middle Common Room,
so you see there's places to just lounge around, hang out with your friends,
there's a little library, we have a printing room upstairs,
there's more study space, here we have a little bar where,
when we have our events, we serve drinks and snacks, so it's quite a nice lively place to be in.
- And the MCR is not just a physical space, it's also the heart of the graduate student community here at St John's.
I'm currently the MCR president and the goal of the MCR is really to make this feel
like a home away from home for everyone, so we have exchange dinners with other colleges,
we do guest dinners where you can bring a few guests, and events that are led by also our officers like
women's talks, and events for international students. So it's really a great place to get to
know your fellow MCR members, hang out and relieve some of the stress of all your academic work.
Here in the MCR TV room we have our weekly movie nights, and also
people often come in here to watch sport and other major TV events.
- So we're at the games room, we have another TV, we've got a PlayStation, Wii, board games...
- So this is the MCR kitchen. So if you're not in the mood to get dinner in hall one night, or lunch,
you're welcome to come here and cook, or cook in your student accommodation.
We're now in Tommy White Quad, which is mostly undergraduate accommodation, and behind me here
is a St John's college bar, which is a great place for JCR MCR members and fellows to hang out
over some cheap drinks, and our bartender also has these really inventive cocktails that are quite delicious.
- So we are at Kendrew Quad, we have accommodation here.
If you're a graduate here you're lucky to be able to get guaranteed accommodation in
your first year, and there's also a lot of rooms available if you're in higher years.
Here we are in the café which is as you can see a study space,
but it's also an alternative to hall, we have lunches here as well
and they run a bit later, so if you aren't up for lunch then you can always come here.
- So this is the Kendrew gym, it's one of the three gyms that we have here on site.
We have this gym, which has a variety of workout equipment, and also we have an old gym which has more
for lifting weights and that type, and a rowing gym with eight to ten rowing machines inside.
- Now we're in North Quad which has some professor offices
as well as undergraduate student accommodation.
And one of the benefits of St John's is the college advisor system,
so each incoming graduate student is paired with a fellow here
who may or may not be in their discipline,
and that person is really there to provide support if you're having issues with your supervisor,
or other problems they're your number one point of contact.
- We also have a number of generous grants and scholarships for students,
so we have academic grants where you can get things that you need for your course,
like electronics or books.
We also have travel grants, we have the hardship fund,
so there's really a lot of support available to you if you're a student here.
- So this is our hall, we have breakfast lunch and dinner here every day of the week,
and formal halls which are seated three course meals four times a week,
and the food here is really delicious, very cheap,
so I'm actually here pretty much every day of the week for lunch
and most days for dinner.
The hall also caters to people's dietary requirements,
so there are always options for vegetarians, vegans and those who follow halal.
- We also do a lot of themed dinners here, so Christmas dinner, women's dinner, BME dinners.
Um, we also have international formal every term which, um, I help organise as the international officer,
so what you do is you celebrate the international community, we try different every term,
so last year we had the Tunisian formal, so it's all a really nice
chance to get the MCR members involved with what they're actually eating.
- So this is our chapel, we have services here several times a week
that are open to people of all religious backgrounds.
- Our Chaplain is also our Welfare Dean,
we also have lots of other student support systems like peer supporters,
MCR welfare officers and the college counselor, so there's a lot of welfare support for students here.
My favorite thing about being at St John's is actually the people,
and how kind and caring everyone's been, everyone treats you like family, so it really is like home.
- And we really do have also such a vibrant social scene here, where we have so many
events going on that there's really never a dull moment here in college.