New international students were introduced to De Montfort University Leicester’s (DMU) Chaplaincy and spiritual support, as part of their welcome to the university.
Celebrating diversity on campus, DMU provides practical and spiritual support to students of all faiths or none.
The Reverend Hilary Surridge, DMU’s Anglican chaplain said to the new starters: “Together we hope we can be here for you now or in the future. It might even be for a friend.
“We’d love to help you connect with places of worship and to worship families across the city.
“We also work with the university’s student support services, including disability and mental health teams.”
Imam Mohammed Laher, DMU’s Muslim chaplain added: “We work as a team, all the chaplains. We’ll be here for you, whatever you want to share.
“We want you to have the best student experience, including supporting your religious and spiritual beliefs, whatever they may be.”
Tam Wai Si, from Hong Kong, who attended the meet and greet said: “I’m looking forward to visiting the Chinese Christian church in Leicester, I found out about this church before I applied.
“I’m really enjoying the international welcome week. The trip to Stratford-upon-Avon was great too, with free time given for us to explore and it was really well organised.”
Tam, who calls herself Eunice, is a second-year Contour Fashion exchange student through one of DMU’s successful global partnerships, with Hong Kong Polytechnic University.
Mohammad Alhajri, who has arrived from Kuwait to start the International Foundation Certificate in Business and Law at DMU’s Leicester International Pathway College (LIPC), added: “I think it is important to have representation of all faiths.
“It’s great that DMU offers Muslims daily prayers and it will help with my motivation and keep me feeling happy.”
The prayer room at DMU serves more than 3000 Muslims on campus and is one of the biggest at any UK university.
LIPC opened in June 2014 to prepare international students for entry to DMU degree programmes.
After completing his foundation for a year, Mohammad will join BA (Hons) Political Science and International Relations.
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French student, Ophelie Castellani, joining the third year of BA (Hons) English with Erasmus, the European education exchange programme, is a practising Catholic: “It’s a great thing to know we have people in the university who we can visit to talk about faith.
“I like to meet people of different faiths, who have different beliefs to me. It is so interesting.”
Posted on Friday 25 September 2015