Anyone with kids at Brunel?

[Tralalee]

dd is quite taken with it (sports degree). Just wondered if anyone had any mumsnetty experience with it.

[BubblesBuddy]

I know Uxbridge. It wouldn’t be my idea of a university town. It’s right at the end of the Piccadilly underground line and some distance out of London. If she likes the course, that’s important, but it’s not a brilliant place to be a student if you want a lot going on that’s handy. It’s a rather ugly campus university so one imagines the student activities are there. I would also check out how many students commute daily and how many stay in at weekends. As it’s close to London it may empty out and local students just stay at home.

I don’t know about teaching quality.

[spababe]

Quite a small University and it empties out at the weekends as many students go home. On top of that quite a few students live at home anyway so weekends are petty dead.

[Tralalee]

Yeah that would be a concern. Back to the drawing board

[BubblesBuddy]

Just look for a university in a city in the first place plus Loughborough. Many larger cities attract students from all over and are great places to live.

[Tralalee]

I thought London was a city!!

[AvocadosBeforeMortgages]

Uxbridge is so far out that it may as well not be a part of London. It's at the arse end of the Piccadilly Line. To get to Covent Garden (also Piccadilly Line) from Brunel it's going to take you 90 minutes each way, to illustrate how far out it is.

[beigepattern]

I don't live there now, but for part of my childhood I lived in Uxbridge & I still visit family and friends there.

Uxbridge is an outer suburb but is not as badly connected as Avocados says. It's on the Metropolitan Line which is 40 minutes to Baker Street. The Piccadilly line is slower but is about 50 mins to South Kensington, so would be about an hour to Covent Garden, not 90 minutes! There's also a night bus from central London.

Uxbridge is ok as a town - big shopping centre, pubs, cafes, cinema, etc, but I'd imagine there are a lot of students living with parents, and it doesn't feel like a particularly studenty town, just like a suburb. The campus is about 10 mins walk from the town centre. I've only been on the campus a handful of times, but I have noticed a few new buildings going up in the last few years.

Tbh it's not the first place that comes to mind if I'm thinking of places where it would be fun to be a student, but if the course looks good, maybe it's worth a visit.

[AvocadosBeforeMortgages]

My calculation was from the Brunel campus, not Uxbridge station. Having rerun the search this morning if you went at this moment in time it would be 70-90 minutes, but it's certainly not quick

citymapper.com/directions?endcoord=51.51291%2C-0.124159&endname=Covent+Garden&startaddress=Brunel+University%2C+Cleveland+Rd%2C+Kingston+Ln%2C+Uxbridge+UB8+3PH%2C+UK&startcoord=51.532868%2C-0.472819&startname=Brunel+University%2C+Cleveland+Road%2C+Kingston+Lane%2C+Uxbridge%2C+UK

[BubblesBuddy]

I did laugh at the idea that Uxbridge is London. It’s not. It would be frustrating for a young person if they wanted all the positives of a city. The travelling is expensive and time consuming.

Uxbridge is not considered a suburb either and is much further out than, say, Harrow or Mile End for St Mary’s university. It’s a town with a modern university.

[Tralalee]

I did laugh at the idea that Uxbridge is London

Glad I made you laugh bubbles. It is in London though.

She wouldn't care about being an hour from central London but the amount of students living at home would be an issue.

[beigepattern]

Avocados Not quite sure I understand the citymapper timings as the train is under an hour and Brunel is 10-15 mins walk from the station, but I guess we'll have to disagree on that. It's not central London, that's for sure, but it's not badly connected either.

Bubbles, Uxbridge is most definitely a suburb of London and is in the London Borough of Hillingdon. I think residents would be quite annoyed to be told they are not Londoners! You are right that it's further out than Harrow and a lot further than Mile End. Commuting is expensive, though rents would be cheaper than inner London.

[beigepattern]

Tralalee I would ask the university about how many students live at home for the course she is interested in. If she doesn't care about being in an outer suburb then it's worth investigating further.

[yikesanotherbooboo]

She needs to look at the course first and foremost.
Brunel has had a good reputation in certain fields and she could investigate that.
Secondly she needs to look at lifestyle.i don't think that many people would consider it to be in London As such but living costs might be nearly as high without the benefits.
If she wants London then go for London with all the obvious pros and cons.

[BubblesBuddy]

I do not live that far from Uxbridge!!! I know where it is. It might technically be a London Borough but it really isn’t London in any shape or form. Most people don’t consider themselves Londoners. That shows no understanding of the history of the town or the area. It was part of defunct Middlesex. However, students can study where they want but suggesting Uxbridge is “London” is utterly misleading.

[BubblesBuddy]

I note the university markets itself as London. Don’t believe all you read on marketing web sites!

[Tralalee]

Bubbles, don't be weird. I used to live in Hammersmith and Uxbridge is London. My husband worked in Uxbridge. Its in bloody London! If you just mean for snob reasons you don't CONSIDER it part of London that's different.

[Quartz2208]

I went there (admittedly I started 20 years ago). Lots of students live on campus and the University does have some good stuff in the nights out (at least it did)

In terms of London - its a reasonable cab back and you can go out but to be honest London is over priced for going out anyway

It is a 4 year work placement course as mine was and (at least back then) it was very useful in finding connections and figuring out what you want to do

[Tralalee]

Yes the course has very good work opportunities.

[Tralalee]

I doubt she'd want to be partying in Central London every night anyway. We'll definitely go and look it looks a good back up choice

[Hardwickwhite]

DD did a coaching course there - the facilities are great. Has she also considered St Mary’s?

[Quartz2208]

I will be honest it was my back up second choice but actually in terms of actually showing me what Law (my choice) involved and the work placement was actually the best course for me and the experience I got from it was irreplaceable - a lot of my coursemates have done very well in law and I moved happily into legal publishing. So from that side it was very good.

When I went the student union was good (Decades night on a Wednesday was a particular favourite) and the bar nights were good. I made good friends and had a good time.

[beigepattern]

It might technically be a London Borough but it really isn’t London in any shape or form. Most people don’t consider themselves Londoners. That shows no understanding of the history of the town or the area. It was part of defunct Middlesex.

I'll pass your opinion on to my family and friends in Uxbridge and also the outer suburb I currently live in. Silly us, thinking that we live in London. We'll tug our forelocks and get back to living in the last century, because towns and villages can't possibly become part of big cities - that never happens, does it? Hope the upstarts of Westminster, Kensington, Hammersmith, etc will also get back to Middlesex where they belong.

Bubbles, perhaps you could get in touch with Sadiq Khan to try and work out how the London Assembly & Mayor can disengage from the millions of fake Londoners who've mistakenly been given votes and free over 60s Oyster cards.

[Tinysarah1985]

My sister did her PE teaching degree there- absolutly loved it there, she said it was brilliant. She was there for 4 years, lived in halls for first year then in shared house for other 3.

[pastachucker]

Friend of mine went to Brunel 15 years ago. She had a great time but that was because she spent every weekend staying in central London with a friend who was studying at UCL.
She said Brunel itself was boring, Uxbridge was worse.
Then she found it really difficult to get a job afterwards and ended up retraining in another field.

[purplegreen99]

One advantage about Brunel in comparison to central London unis is that it would be much easier to get local housing in 2nd/3rd years, even within walking distance, so travel time and costs would be lower. Somewhere like UCL, Kings, etc you'd be very unlikely to find an affordable rental place anywhere near the campus.