Fresher's & Semester 1 2026 - Welcome and What to Expect!
- Date Posted: Oct 4, 2026
Hello and welcome to everyone! CSS sincerely hopes you’ve had a great Fresher’s at the university, getting involved with lots of societies, events, and opportunities! We on committee have worked extremely hard to make Fresher’s a fantastic, unforgettable week for you, and from the pure engagement you’we’ve seen, we think it’s paid off! Of course, Fresher’s is just the start of the plethora of things we have lined up for this year, so read on and keep an eye out on our socials!
A Look Back at Fresher’s Week
Fresher’s Week (and week 1) were jam-packed and we’re so grateful it went so smoothly! And of course, as is tradition, it started off with the beloved Board Games Night! As usual, we saw the CS building fill up with people of all years come together to enjoy playing board games, meet new people, and enjoy some free pizza (a common theme at our events, you’ll soon come to notice). Whether you came out on top as a chess champion, bankrupted all your friends in Monopoly, or successfully got enough laughs to be the funniest in Cards Against Humanity, we loved seeing so many of you having fun and getting involved on the first day! Even if I did lose every game I played :/ it was a lot of fun! And a big thank you to Tabletop Gaming who ran some Blood on the Clocktower games, that proved very popular! If you enjoyed the event, keep an eye out as in semester 2, we’ll be running it again! And quickly, thinking of pizza, our own Secretary Henry has set up the CSS Pizza Statistics page so you can keep track of just how much pizza we end up buying this year. Thanks Henry!
Next up, we had lunch in the city centre at the wonderful Alfred Works food hall. After many years of declining popularity, this year’s new location brought in nearly double the attendees from last year! With my delicious tacos still on my mind all this time later, I know I’m not the only one who had some thoroughly good food! Whether you had Asian, Italian, American, or another great choice of food, we’re glad the event was such a success!
A new event for this year, the Fresher’s Quiz proved extremely popular! With rounds themed around Computer Science, the University, operating systems, and even famous Joes (I was honoured to be included), there really was something for everyone to have a go at. And the scores were incredibly high! We were extremely impressed and proud of the knowledge we saw! Although, to whoever thought that I, the Scrum Master, was Donald Duck… I’m not upset, just disappointed. I joke, of course; I was actually surprised how many of you remembered me! It’s been a pleasure so far to have so many people recognise me and wave, say hi, or come for a chat; if you do see me around the CS buidling, where I’m always working on my Ph.D., feel free to say hi and have a chat! The more excuses to not do work, the better! Anyway, a final congratulations again to Team 0, who won the quiz, getting them CSS branded rubber ducks!
Going into week 1, we ran our annual CS Societies Night, which was your chance to meet many Computer-related societies and learn about what they do. A massive thank you to the fantatsic societies who attended:
And, of course, I go to finally wear the famous TeX costume, which looked much more enjoyable than AFNOM’s monkey suit!
Finally, our last big event was Pub Night on Friday of Week 1, which saw us pile into The Soak Bar & Grill in Selly and enjoy some delicious curries, and have a couple drinks to celebrate finishing the first week of lectures. So many people, new and existing students, came along and made it a fantastic night - a great way to end out an incredible Fresher’s! If you enjoyed the pub night, we will be making them a regular event, with them happening every other week (the next happening Friday week 3), so come along and chat, relax, and enjoy a couple drinks, whether alcoholic or not!
Throughout the week, we also had other smaller, but equally as important, events happening! Throughout the week, we had our stall up in the CS atrium, at the Guild Societies Fair, the School of CS Fair, and the EPS Fair. We had such good interest from you all, coming to chat, ask questions, start your TeX sticker collection, and join our socials! If you haven’t already, check out our website’s links page to join our Discord, WhatsApp, and Instagram pages to get all the latest updates about upcoming events! We also ran the annual Scavenger Hunt around campus for you to learn some fun facts about the place you’ll study at for the next 3 (or more!) years, as well as earn a special edition Old Joe TeX sticker to become the ultimate collector of our stickers. This year, we again saw more interest than we’ve had for years, so thank you to everyone who participated!
Amongst everything that’s happened, you may have noticed that we have a modded Java Minecraft server running! All the details you need (server address, mod list, rules, etc.) are available on the Discord Minecraft channel. Whether you play Minecraft all the time, or you’ve not played for years, this is a great chance to get stuck in, master magic, build the most efficient Create machinery, or like me, just build pretty things! We hope to see some of you in the server!
If you’ve enjoyed your time in CSS so far, and want to support us - along with getting many benefits - why not get yourself a £5 membership at cssbham.com/join. The membership lasts for the whole year, and gets you discounts on ticketed events, saving you money! It also gives you a pretty colour on our Discord server, a free t-shirt (soon), and the ability to vote at our upcoming EGM. Still unsure? Well, your membership goes straight to supporting the society, so we can pay for all the pizza, get you cool merch, and run incredible events for you and your friends to enjoy whilst at uni!
What’s Coming Up in Semester 1?
As usual, we have tonnes of events planned for you this semester on the run-up to Christmas, so let’s tease some!
Firstly, we have our Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) in a couple weeks. The EGM is a meeting for people to run for roles on committee, vote on the candidates, and propose constitutional amendments. This event requires attendees to be members of the society, but it’s a great chance for you to have a chance to say how CSS should be run, as well as see some early access sneak peaks at events and, wait, tickets for events?! I wonder what event that will be! The EGM will be in the Winifred Hackett Building on Wednesday 21st October from 1pm. If you’re interested in running or attending, keep an eye out on our socials for more information soon!
Then, on Thursday 29th October at 7pm, we’re running our Halloween Quiz; get dressed up in your halloween costume, form a team, and enjoy more free pizza! Much like the Fresher’s Quiz, we’ll be running the quiz in the atrium in teams of up to 6, and we’ll have free pizza and alcohol on offer like Board Games Night. Perhaps most importantly, there will be prizes! The winning team, and the best dressed, will all get prizes; however, we will have Halloween TeX stickers available for all who participate in the quiz! Oh, and did I mention? We have guest rounds! A beloved member of staff, and a beloved ex-secretary; what more could you want?
Finally, our last big event of semester 1 is my personal favourite: the CSS Christmas Meal! Join us at the Green Man in Harborne for delicious food, good vibes, and a celebration of semester 1. This event is ticketed, so keep an eye out for when tickets release, to get yourself in on the fun! Of course, we highly recommend getting dressed up in your best and ugliest Christmas jumpers (I’ll be there in mine, and my Santa hat)! And it’ll be your chance to get your hands on the Christmas TeX sticker for your collection. The date and time will be revealed soon, so keep your eyes peeled!
Besides our big events, we have plenty more on offer! Maybe you’re an arcade bar fan, and are looking for a reason to go to NQ64? Perhaps you’re looking for a new society, and a collaboration would be the perfect chance for you to find one? Or maybe, you’re looking to learn a new skill? Well, we’ve got it all! NQ64 evening, workshops, collabs, sponsor events, (did someone say mini hackathon?!), and a whole lot more! We’ll announce these events as we go through the year, but if you have more event suggestions, don’t hesitate to reach out and tell us!
Oh, and t-shirts! As you may have heard us say - and you’ve likely seen people wearing them - if you get the membership for the society, you will get a free t-shirt. Now, we haven’t forgotten, I promise! Issues at the start of the year pertaining to funds (I don’t know how Idris has managed the finances so well!) meant they were delayed, however, they have been ordered and are on their way! The moment they arrive, we will be running a big collection event in the CS building so you can come and collect the shirt, or buy a membership there and then to get one! It even has our sponsors on the back.
We are looking forward to seeing many of you continue to get involved in the society as we go through the year, and we can’t wait to run these events for you!
This year, we decided to revive the WhatsApp community to make it the proper social it deserves to be! We now announce all publicity from Discord on the WhatsApp too, and we have added plenty of new channels for you to find coursemates, chat about work, and learn about our events! It’s still brand new, but if you’re not a Discord fan, then the WhatsApp might be the place for you!
Memberships
Finally, how are we doing with memberships?
Well, with t-shirts being delayed, we understandably haven’t broken any records yet, however, we reached over 200 members by the end of Fresher’s, and we’ve been climbing every day! Below is the graph of Fresher’s Week:
We started off really strong with early renewals and early joiners, which was incredible to see! And yet, even without t-shirts, we have been able to maintain a solid growth of memberships throughout the two weeks, which we’re very happy to see!
Want a membership? Looking to make your time at university better than ever? Then cssbham.com/join is the place to go!
Sponsorships
I would like to welcome our sponsors for this year! As always, we’re excited to work with our sponsors throughout the year, so let’s introduce them!
- Capital One - Gold Sponsor
- TPP - Silver Sponsor
- Interrupt Labs - Bronze Sponsor
We’re very grateful for the support they’re giving the society! If you’re interested, keep an eye out for events, messages, and exciting opportunities from our sponsors!
Going Forward
I just wanted to say one final thank you to you all for making 2026 Fresher’s Week something I will never forget, and I
hope you all feel the same! Despite being my 3rd year on CSS committee, I’ve never been on committee during Fresher’s,
and for my first Fresher’s on committee to be as President Scrum Master is an honour! I’ve met so many incredible
people, been to all our fantastic events, and had an absolute blast. Maybe I’m exhausted, and maybe I’ve not done much
work on my Ph.D., but wow, it was worth it.
So, if you’re a Fresher, a student who’s getting into CSS for the first time this year, or a long time supporter of the society, I can’t thank you enough for being here, participating in CSS, and having fun!
Also, I want to extend my thanks massively to my brilliant committee; without them, Fresher’s simply would not be possible, and the future events would be pretty lackluster! So, committee, whether you’ve done admin work, ran events, planned events, worked behind the scenes, chatted to students on stands and at events, liased with the school, the uni, or the sponsors, or something else, thank you so much! I see that this committee are extremely dedicated, hard-working people who just want the best for CSS and our members, and that fills me with lots of hope for the coming academic year!
Many thanks,
Joe (He/Him), your CSS Scrum Master
And the rest of committee <3