Colleges offer a wide range of qualifications including: NQ - national qualifications, HNC - higher national certificate, HND - higher national diplomas, City and guilds, Access course, Modules. At college you can chose to study full time, part time, evenings, flexibly learning or even long distance learning.

When choosing a college course there is a lot to think about first, like

       · Do you have a course in mind you want to take?
       · Do you really know what the course involves;
       · Have you looked into it properly?

Once you have chosen the course you will need to find out which colleges offer your course and then choose which one you want to go to. This may mean moving away from home. Do you even want to move away from home and if so can you afford it? These are all questions you have to think about very carefully before committing to a college course.

Entry requirements vary widely between courses so you must contact the college to find out what they want. Often you don’t need any qualifications other than an interest in the subject, colleges will also take into consideration any work experience you have and may not be as concerned with exam results like universities are.

Binge Drinking

Scotland has one of the worst drinking cultures in the world. Plain and simply we like the booze…a little to much! Most people think binge drinking is when you consume lots of alcohol over a short period of time. This isn’t necessarily the case, NHS Health Scotland say that over 8 units in one night for men and 6 units for women is considered to be binge drinking. And those figures are for adults so even less if you are under 18. 8 units is roughly equal to 4 pints of average strength beer - not as much as you might have thought.

The reason for these limits is that if you consume over these regularly you will cause damage to your body. So do the sensible thing and keep the booze to a minimum.