International Orientation January 2027

Hello everyone, welcome to the University of Portsmouth. 

My name is Paivi Leivo de Lacy. 

I'm here with Heather Dickey and we are the international student advisors at the University of Portsmouth. 

We're going to run through our welcome presentation for international students and afterwards if you have any questions you can come to the international orientation event or contact us through the contact method that we explained during the 

So welcome to all of our international students arriving to the University of Portsmouth in September 2026. 

Today we're going to introduce our team, tell you a little bit about us, what to do in your first week, month and semester, what to do after your studies and about some we will also cover some ISA visa workshops we are holding throughout the year. 

So we are the international student advisors at the University of Portsmouth. 

There are four of us and we are here to provide international students student visa and immigration advice. 

We also refer students to other services for support, for example, for the presidential life team, student life team, 

mental health, counselling and other services that we have here at the university. 

We organise international orientations to smooth your journey and your transition to the UK and UK higher education and we organise 4 coach trips during the year to give you an opportunity to get to know the country and the local area. 

We also organise visa workshops that help you understand your student visa conditions and whether you can work and how many hours you can work and also to prepare you for your post study work time and consider what visas are available to you afterwards. 

We also have an international newsletter that we send to you every month to keep you informed of important matters relevant for international students and particularly important to those who have a student visa. 

You can reach us in the Bateson Centre on Mary Rose Street. 

It's quite easy to find in the city centre. 

Our service hours are 10am to 3pm. 

In that time you can book an appointment to discuss your visa or any concerns you have and you can also phone us through the number on the screen. 

I would say the best way to contact us is by e-mail. 

Again, the e-mail address is on the screen and we will try our best to respond as quickly as possible. 

Here is some advice on how to use our service. 

So when you call or e-mail us, make sure you have your student number that will speed things up and help us support you better. 

Also, it's really important that when you need visa and immigration advice that you do that quickly and proactively. 

If you have a worry about your visa, please get in touch so that we can provide support or refer you to another service if necessary. 

If you can't get a hold of us, for example, during the weekends, you can use the UK Council for International Student Affairs website for advice and guidance. 

They also have a helpline if you want advice from a different source and they are the best organisation and the best website for any matter relating to international students in the UK, including visa and immigration advice. 

If we can't help you, we will refer you to other university services or external resources, depending on the query that you have. 

If you're an exchange student joining us this year, the best e-mail address to contact is the one on the screen and they'll be able to help you with any queries you have. 

During your first weeks, we have four things that we'd like you to focus on. 

These are important for international students. 

So firstly, let your loved ones know that you have arrived safely. 

They're waiting to hear from you and want to know that you are okay, so please do that first. 

Then you should complete your online registration and pay your tuition fees. 

You will have received an e-mail regarding the registration requirement as well as your fees and how you should pay them. 

You should also complete your in-person ID check. 

You will need to present your passport and your eVisa share code in person at the registration centre, which will be in the Spinnaker building until the 2nd of October and in my port after this. 

You should attend an orientation session and a social event. 

If you arrive during the orientation week, you're still welcome to join us. 

Just make sure you come to the Neptune building and we can advise you on the sessions available to you. 

During your first month, once you've had your induction week with your faculty, make sure you attend all classes and understand how your attendance is recorded. 

As a student visa holder, attendance is very, very important. 

So if you cannot make it to a class for any reason, please contact your student success advisor and your personal tutor. 

You need to open a bank account as well. 

There is a letter that you can access in your student view once you are registered. 

We will also have members from different banks available at orientation week to give you some support with opening an account with them. 

You can also register with a doctor. 

That's really, really important so you can access the NHS care. 

We have doctors available during orientation week to support you with that too. 

So during your first semester, we really recommend that you explore your new home, Portsmouth. 

Make sure you join in in any activities you are invited to go and explore the city. 

It's a beautiful island city with beaches and lots of shops and restaurants, so make the most out of your new location. 

Make sure you get involved with the university students union societies and other sports and social clubs. 

This is a very good way of making friends, which is something you need to do when you first arrive in the UK and to the University of Portsmouth. 

Make sure you get to know the university's support services and your key academic contacts. 

You will need to know who to contact if you require support and make sure you ask for that support. 

We're here to help you and we want to hear from you if you require any assistance. 

Also join one of our coach trips which we'll be telling you about later in this presentation. 

We organise 4 during the year and they're a really good way of getting to know the local area as well as making friends. 

Our first coach trip coming up is to Brighton. 

That's a nearby seaside city and that's on the 26th of September. 

So sign up for that one, particularly if you are coming a little bit later and missing out on some of the orientation. 

We are also travelling to Bath on the 5th of December. 

They've got a lovely Christmas market and it's an ancient, very beautiful city. 

There'll be more to come throughout the year, so just keep an eye on our website. 

After your studies you may want to consider applying for the graduate visa. 

This visa is also sometimes referred to as the post-study work visa. 

It's really important that you're aware of the eligibility criteria. 

The 3 main things to keep in mind is to successfully complete your course and have your degree awarded while your student visa is still valid. 

You need to be in the UK to apply. 

It can get complicated if you fail any modules and if you have to resubmit work if the timings don't work. 

So make sure you seek advice if you get into that situation so that we can support you and advise you on your options. 

It's really important to speak to the careers and employability team while you are at our university and after your studies too. 

They provide expert guidance and career support. 

They can help you write a CV, they can help you apply for part-time jobs. 

They also know quite a lot about the skilled worker route. 

So if that's something that you are interested in doing after your studies, then definitely speak to them about it. 

If you're arriving at the University of Portsmouth between the 7th and the 11th of September, please come to our international orientation event. 

It's designed for international students and we have lots of different sessions and fun things happening that week. 

And all of those sessions are there to support your transition to UK higher education and to help you make friends and to find out about the key contacts at the university and in a local area. 

You can come to our welcome desk at the international orientation event between Monday and Friday and we can give you more information about the event and what's going on that week. 

You can scan the QR code on this page to find out more. 

We'll be in the Neptune building, which is in the city centre, so it's easy to find us. 

So just pop in between 10 and 4 and we can support you when you arrive in Portsmouth. 

We are hiding some workshops to support you with visa advice throughout the year. 

So the student route visa essentials workshop is being held on the 7th of October. 

You can book your place in the QR code on the screen. 

Another workshop we do is student route work conditions explained. 

This will help you understand what you can and can't do and how many hours you can work or how to get a letter to show your employer what your working conditions are. 

You can book your place now. 

The session is online. 

So we should have plenty of place available for all students who want to attend. 

It also holding a graduate route visa workshop on the 9th of October. 

If you are planning to stay in the UK after your studies, it's really important that you attend this so you're fully informed. 

Thank you so much for listening to our presentation. 

You can find our contact details by scanning the QR code on this slide. 

We are here to support international students, mainly with student visa and immigration matters, but we can also refer you to other services. 

We're also here to welcome you when you come to start your journey at the University of Portsmouth and we would really love to see you at the international orientation event. Which runs from the 7th to the 11th of September. 

And we look forward to seeing you very soon. 

Thank you. 

Thank you. 

The English with Specific Purposes programme is designed to support students in their academic English. It is a provision that offers short, practical modules that are meant to help students with their academic, professional, and workplace communication skills alongside their degrees. ESP has two strands. One is your English for academic purposes to support students during the degree programmes. So this is things like how to take notes  effectively, how to write engaging assessments, how to target and figure out plagiarism and making sure you're  referencing properly. The other is English for occupational purposes, which supports students for employability, so how to interact in the workplace, how communicate effectively. We've got a number of different modules available. Students are going to be able to mix and match according to their own priorities and what they really want to learn. We have one on presentation skills, for example. Academic writing, note taking, Using AI effectively, and we also have a couple of modules specifically targeting dissertations and end-of-year projects. The modules are designed for all university students regardless of their discipline or level of studies, regardless whether they are home or international students, undergrad, postgraduate, so it's for everyone. Academic language and academic English is nobody's first language, so it is a skill that everybody needs to grapple with. And everyone will have their own different ambitions and types of work that they want to go into. So we're keeping it broad and open, but helping the students to figure out which style will be right for their ambitions. One of the big changes that we see from students who have completed the programme is predominantly one of confidence. They'll have a clearer and more confident understanding of what it takes to get recognised as a professional. I think the best thing about the ESP provision is that students join from everywhere around the university. You get to learn different ways of approaching problems, different skills that you can pick up, and it's a great way to network as well with people in other areas.

The University Library is a busy and lively building which reflects the multicultural nature of the University and Portsmouth as a whole. Please remember your student card to scan in and out when you visit the Library. The Library is an essential source of information for staff and students. We hold an extensive range of books and other printed materials, and our online holdings of electronic resources, including ebooks, ejournals and specialist databases are more expansive still! You can use your mobile phone or our touchscreen information kiosks to find books and look up all manner of other useful information about what is happening on campus. 

By searching the Discovery Service, you can quickly find useful, high quality academic journal articles on any subject. The subject pages on the Library website offer almost everything you need for your studies in one place.

The Library is open 24/7 during term time, our electronic resources are available around the clock, and all our borrowing and return services are self-service so you can study where and when suits you best. You can borrow laptops from the lockers on the ground floor to use in the Library and book group study rooms up to two weeks in advance, where you can work in groups and practice presentations. You can also bring in your own laptop or mobile devices, plug into our power sockets and connect to the fast and secure university wireless network.  You can even connect your laptop or tablet to a large curved desktop monitor and work from your mobile device while enjoying all the comforts of using a desktop computer.

You can borrow and return books and other materials using the self-service kiosks. The library catalogue shows you where to find books within the library. If you need any help, please ask a friendly member of staff. You can also request books be picked off the shelves by library staff and moved to the collection point using our Click & Collect service for added convenience.

If you need help with anything from finding a book to research for your thesis, pop into the Library Skills Drop-in office off the atrium, or click the chat button on the library website 24/7, and chat to a librarian. We look forward to seeing you soon!