Gabrielle Agor

The learning environment at Sussex was much more intimate than what I’m used to at UCI. Instead of massive lecture halls with hundreds of students, my Sussex cohort had roughly 35 people. We all saw each other daily, got to know one another well, and noticed whenever someone was missing. Despite the smaller scale, there were many familiar elements. Just like back home, we had dedicated "problem skills" sessions where a second professor helped us review tricky concepts and work through practice problems. We also had smaller discussion sections of 7–8 students led by a graduate teaching assistant. My experience with UCI’s quarter system helped me adapt to Sussex’s fast-paced curriculum, which made the transition smoother even though the course was still challenging. The laboratory setup was also very similar. Labs ran for four hours, required pre-lab reading, and paired us up with a graduate student supervising two pairs at a time and each group of four focused on a different lab topic each week. Finally, the lectures were co-taught by two incredible, inspiring professors who made physics deeply engaging.

The learning environment at Sussex was much more intimate than what I am used to at UCI. Instead of massive lecture halls, our cohort had roughly 35 students, so we saw each other daily and got to know one another well. Dedicated problem skills sessions and small discussion sections helped us work through tricky concepts, and UCI quarter system prepared me well for Sussex fast-paced curriculum. Four-hour labs paired us up under graduate student supervision, each group focusing on a different topic weekly. To top it off, the lectures were co-taught by two inspiring professors who made physics deeply engaging.