WHEN THE fi re alarms went off at school what was your fi rst re-action?

Probably to roll your eyes and hope it’s not raining outside, be-fore trundling off down to the playground and chatting with your mates about what would happen if there really was a fi re.

Of course, there never was. It was always a science experiment getting a bit smoky, or someone poking their fi nger through one of those glass-covered alarms.

From the age of three I’d make this annoyingly loud and usually cold trip to the playground, line up in register order and wait to be let back in. There was never any fear or panic because we knew that there was never a fi re.

This is probably why no one seemed to rush out of the John Galsworthy building last week when a classroom erupted into fl ames. The alarms may or may not have gone off right away, but class-rooms were individually told about the fi re, yet according to witnesses students and staff alike were slow to react.

It’s good to be calm in such situ-ations; we don’t want hundreds of students piling down six fl ights of stairs, but needing to be told twice? This worries me. We are told from primary school how to act in case of a fi re but we are not taught to ig-nore them.

And yet I’d probably react in the same way. Oh it’s just another fi re drill. We haven’t had a fi re for ages, it must be a drill. I hope it’s not raining outside. Don’t forget your bag...

We’ve probably become desen-sitised to fi re alarms, just like how no one ever investigates a house

alarm, and car alarms are just plain annoying. Because we assume there probably isn’t a fi re, we don’t panic. It’s like the assumption of ‘it’ll never happen to me,’ when we fool ourselves by thinking we won’t be in such a dangerous situa-tion. In a weird way the system sort of works.

We know the drill, we always re-main calm and last week thankfully no one was hurt while trying to es-cape. Sure, the system works, but it’s probably cried wolf too many times for us to genuinely care.

But then how safe are we when we do need to care?

COMMENT12 Friday March 18 - Thursday March 31 2011

Comment & Opinion Comment & Opinion Comment & Opinion

WHEN deadlines are approach-ing fast and the library becomes a second home to most of us, the effects of university stress be-come obvious.

Sleep-deprived, aggravated and panicky are a few words that come to mind.

Not to mention the headaches, nail-biting and maybe just a little bit of hair-pulling.

I’ve suffered from it myself when desperately trying to fi nish that 2,000 word essay the night before it’s due in.

It is easy to say that the pressures of deadlines could be avoided if we just did our work in advance or re-vised for our exams every night.

But the reality is, even the most effi cient student can suffer from the anxiety of wanting to pass.

Exams and deadlines can seem like a Doomsday scenario, making some of us feel like the world will end if we fail.

Worrying over assignments can be worse than actually doing them,

so why do we put that pressure on ourselves?

Well, maybe it’s that huge debt hanging over us.

The cost of university is far from cheap and the knowledge of this could be why some of us get sick with stress.

Another reason could be due to pressure from family members.

Not wanting to let people down can make that looming exam seem even more important.

Or maybe we simply just want to do well since we all chose to come here?

Who wants to think this was a waste of time?

Whatever the reasons are, I think it’s important to remember that no matter what happens when we leave university, (with or without a degree) we can still do what we want in life.

Failing at university is not the end of the world no matter how

disappointing it might be. It cer-tainly isn’t worth making yourself ill over it.

We all knew university wouldn’t be easy, and it’s good to aim to suc-ceed, but let’s all take a deep breath, calm down for a moment and just relax. Check out the tips on page 16 and learn how to beat that stress of on-coming deadlines and please, no more fi ghting in the library over books or throwing up after drinking 10 red bulls.

KU students need to chill out to take on the heat of exams

ALISTAIR CHARLTONK0805903

NATALYA BENJAMINK0713023

What is the River? The River is edited, written and produced by journalism students at Kingston University. The views expressed in this paper do not necessarily refl ect those of the university.

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Kingston’s burning, Kingston’s burning

says...

Stress can cause serious health problems. Rex

Students are having a pretty tough time at the moment: we’ve been slated in the press for our behaviour in the student protests, promised unemployment rather than careers and the majority of us are facing increasing student debt just to top it all off.

Being labelled lazy, poor and badly behaved are three characteristics students are accustomed to, but we should all be dismayed that we appear to attend a University that tops the UK cheating league.

Kingston University has been overshadowed with bad press over the last week, arson in the JG followed by a full scale evacuation and a drugs raid in the SU by armed police. Being labelled as one of the worst universities for cheating feels like the cherry on top of a very sour cake.

Cheating is something that should not be tolerated at Kingston University, but what is perhaps most shocking is how easy it is.

Places at university are becoming harder and harder to obtain.

It’s a sad state of affairs that some students who are lucky enough to get a place at university are cheating their way through a degree.

Each of us should be able to look our peers in the eye and know they are here on merit and going through the same day to day pressures we are.

They say ‘cheats never prosper’ and the fact so many are caught would support that notion.

But the question is how many others go undetected?

How many students go into exams with notes written on their arm or feign illness to gain extra marks?

Thousands of people miss out on university places every year. It’s a shame those who get the chance are able to cheat their way to the top.

Whether it’s using friends or online opportunists to write assignments or, more shockingly, simply making up references, all students who commit these acts cheat not only themselves, but all of us.