Hello! I’m Hannah, I’m from County Durham but I live in Edinburgh, and I did my Masters at Cambridge in 2017/18. I did my undergraduate degree at Newcastle, but I heard I could do a Masters in Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic at Cambridge, which sounded fun, so I thought “why not?”. 

Hardly anyone at my comprehensive school went to, or applied for, Oxbridge. I might have got the A Level grades if I’d pushed myself, but I 100% assumed that Oxbridge wasn’t for people like me, that everyone was either really posh and/or spent all of their time studying and doing nothing else, and therefore had no interest in applying.

But the main thing I learnt in my year at Cambridge was that it’s an extremely diverse place to live and study, and the only thing everyone has in common is that everyone is bright and loves their subject. I went to Churchill College, where 77% of undergraduates come from state schools, which is a much higher figure than many other Russell Group unis, including Newcastle. I met people of all ages from all over the world, and it was such a fun place to be. Also, you wouldn’t think it would be that important but the facilities at Cambridge are amazing, and I still miss the libraries!