Freshers advice offered via Twitter

The Freshers Survival support sessions will run until Friday, tackling a different issue each day, with experts dishing out advice to thousands of new undergraduates.

Founder of the financial advice forum MoneySavingExpert.com, Martin Lewis, will be on hand to offer tips on budgeting (Thursday), while relationship expert Tracey Cox will advise on social life, sex and relationships (Friday).

“I’m often asked for advice via Twitter so it makes perfect sense for this campaign to be organised through this medium,” said Ms Cox.

“The younger generation love and trust it and it’s an easy, effective way to get good, non-judgemental information about sex and relationships through to students.”

Mr Lewis added: “Student finance has been the subject of political spittle flying across the commons, yet for new starters it’s the practical impact on their pockets that counts and that’s often ignored.  

“Twitter is a wonderfully unvarnished way to talk to students directly, without allowing political agendas to spin and spiel - even in 140 characters it’s possible to bust the many myths out there.”

Other topics to be covered include Starting University (today), Careers (tomorrow) and Study and Coursework (Wednesday).

The help sessions come as new data from the Global Web Index show that 99 per cent of students say the internet is important for education, compared with 72 per cent of the population as a whole.

Three-quarters of students said the internet was important to organise their life, compared with 61 per cent of the general population.

Students can take part in the sessions by using the #FreshersSurvival hashtag on Twitter.

chris.parr@tsleducation.com