Why I chose to study in the UK

When choosing where to study, a lot of options pop up. They include everything from Europe, to the US, to Australia to many other countries in the world. So why did I feel that the UK was the country for me?

When I was first starting to look at universities, my first thought was the United States, as I believe it is a popular choice for quite a few people looking to study filmmaking. The US does have quite a few world-renowned universities in the field that I was looking at, but I quickly realised how unattainable they were. Besides costing a fortune, getting into them was quite impossible, especially with a Latvian diploma, and the living and travel costs also were impossibly high for my budget. All that, paired with the paperwork I’d need to just get to the country and then the political uncertainty (at least in my opinion), made me think that it was not worth travelling that far away from home for. So my mind turned towards the UK.

But why the United Kingdom not anywhere else in Europe? Because the UK has some incredible universities to choose from, people from which would even travel to Latvia to talk about what is on offer. And it was much closer to home than any other English-speaking country. Being able to meet people from the unis I was considering was a great first step in my journey and just hearing about them, made them feel much more approachable and real in my mind.

Of course, there were options to study in other European countries as well, but the thought of going to a country where I don’t know the language put me off such an idea. But even if we put the language aside, it felt like I could achieve the biggest success in the UK compared to other countries, as there are films and television programs that are known worldwide from the United Kingdom, and as this was the industry I wanted to go into, it seemed like a natural choice.

Being able to meet people from the unis I was considering was a great first step in my journey and just hearing about them, made them feel much more approachable and real in my mind.

These were the main reasons why I chose to study in the UK, but also I knew I didn’t want to stay in my home country, as the style in which the universities operate didn’t suit me. I wanted my experience to be much more practical than what they could offer. What also didn’t help my country's case was that the course I would have wanted to apply for wasn’t open for applications in the year I wanted to start (I would have had to take a gap year, and I felt that that wasn’t the right choice for me).

Now I am into my third year of studying, I can say that I am really happy that I chose to come to the UK and I am even happier that I chose to study at Falmouth University, it is everything I wanted and more! To anyone trying to decide where to go, my biggest suggestion is to make your decision based on both the university AND the country. There are plenty of options everywhere and you have to find what works best for you, not what has worked best for others. At the end of the day, it is your future you’re thinking about not somebody else’s.

Applying to Falmouth as an international student