What to bring to your graduation ceremony

Your ticket comes first. Manchester Met emails each graduate a digital ticket the week before the ceremonies begin, so find it in your inbox, put it on your phone, and take a screenshot in case the signal drops. Keep it to hand for the day: registration is at The Midland Hotel, where you're given your seat allocation card and the tickets for your guests.

If you've ordered official robes, the robing room is your next stop, in the same hotel. Hiring from us instead? Your gown, hood and cap are already with you, picked up the night before or first thing, so you walk in dressed and go straight from registration to the photographs, or on to the hall.

Now the rule that decides the rest. Bags and overcoats aren't allowed into the auditorium; there's a cloakroom for them. The hall also refuses flags, banners, smoke bombs, confetti poppers, pyrotechnics and liquids, in line with its own security policy, and there are bag checks at the main entrance. So whatever you carry into the ceremony, carry in your pockets: phone, ticket, a card, maybe a lip balm. Everything else waits in the cloakroom.

A power bank earns its place. Your phone will hold the ticket, field messages from family who can't find the entrance, take a hundred photographs and share the livestream link, all in one day. A slim one that fits in a jacket or trouser pocket comes into the hall with you.

That's the core kit: ticket, phone, robes, a way to pay for a coffee while you wait. Lay those out before bed; everything after that is about comfort.

Hair grips are the smallest thing on the list and the one people miss most. The mortarboard goes on before you leave the Midland and needs to survive the walk outside, the climb up the stairs to the stage and a long round of family photographs. Push two or three grips in along the edge of the cap and it stays level all day.

Wear shoes you've already walked in. You go up a flight of steps at one side of the stage, cross it, and come down the other side, and the university asks for formal footwear. Between the hotel and the hall you're outdoors, so if rain is forecast, a sole that grips matters more than height.

Eat properly before you set off. Liquids aren't allowed into the building, and once you're seated you normally stay in your seat until the platform party has left. Ceremonies usually run 60 to 90 minutes, and the largest up to two hours, on top of the time you spend seated beforehand.

The official photographers work in a room at the Midland. If registration and robing run long, you don't have to rush: the university lets you join the photography queue after your ceremony instead.

Plan the day from the start time backwards. The university recommends arriving two and a half hours early, because registration, robing and photographs all happen before you're seated, and registration closes about an hour before each ceremony. Graduates are seated roughly 45 minutes before the start. Arrive late and you won't be let in: you'll be offered a place at another ceremony instead.

The Midland is around 200 metres from Oxford Road station and a kilometre from Piccadilly, and St Peter's Square tram stop is close to both buildings. Driving? The car parks the university points to are Q-Park Piazza, NCP Manchester Central, NCP Great Northern and NCP Oxford Street. Blue Badge holders have free bays on Mount Street, opposite the hotel, and there's a drop-off point for wheelchair users on Lower Mosley Street, outside the hall.

Your guests sit apart from you, in unreserved seating in the upper levels, while graduates sit on the ground floor in department and course order. Everyone in the auditorium needs a ticket, whatever their age, and the university warns that a long formal ceremony may not suit babies and young children. For anyone who can't come, the ceremonies are streamed live, and the recording can be downloaded afterwards.

When it's over, the university asks everyone to leave the hall and the area around it promptly, to make room for the next ceremony. Agree a meeting point nearby before you go in, collect your coat and bag from the cloakroom, and if you hired official robes, return them to the Midland before you head off to celebrate.