Salt burn makes me worry for poor kids at ‘posh’ unis.

The really wealthy students at DS university are the overseas ones.

I think you are being a bit bonkers here OP. I haven’t watched Saltburn but Exeter is very different from Oxford (I have looked around both universities). There will be students from all backgrounds at all universities, and what bonds them is their love for the subject they’ve chosen not their class background. I had a very nice upbringing but my parents cut me off completely when I went to university so I could learn the value of money. I was far more skint than any of the “working class kids” because they got government grants whereas I didn’t! They could afford a drink in the pub whereas I couldn’t! DC will fit in just fine, students at 18 will make friendships based on who they are in halls with and who they can go for drinks with.

This.

You only really find out people's backgrounds if they invite you to stay during the holidays and they have a manor house or 2 up 2 down. I gravitated towards my kind of people and I'm still friends today because of who they are not where they came from. One of my friends had a really difficult upbringing and had some well thought through views as a result of that. I had not experienced anything like it but as I grow older and work with young people in those circumstances my views are growing ever similar to hers. She was 20 years ahead of me with a less privileged background. Shows you money can't buy empathy and compassion.

Do you think Saltburn is a documentary?!

my uni when I went was 50% private school intake. I came from a very poor background and self financed (worked all the hours) but I never experienced any snobbery from anyone. Telling perhaps majority of my friends weren’t from private school so perhaps people naturally find similar tribes. I do have antidotes of posh students saying really daft things completely unaware of their privilege but they were the joke not the poor kids

Ah @Pippetypoppity , are you focusing on this because actually you're worried about dc going away to uni at all?

Lots of parents have to really tighten their belts to educate their kids privately. Being at a private school is really not necessarily an indicator that the kids have travelled or owned a pony.

How lucky the household was able to live perfectly well off the contents of the game larder?

And actually if you think your jaw is going to hang open with drawl dripping off over Jacob Elordi maybe don’t watch it with DH/ partner either. He’s a little bit embarrassingly desirable even for undersexed ladies in their forties.

Exeter has a lot of privately educated students, a lot of Oxbridge/Imperial rejects go there. My friends DS is there and has a nickname realating to them being poor as they went to state school. It’s more of a joke though, as it is between friends. They are from a very middle class affluent area but don’t have the lavish lifestyle of some of their friends. For example, they have a p/t job whereas their friends are fully subsidised so wouldn’t dream of having a p/t job 🤷🏼‍♀️. I don’t think it’s a problem but it is true that there are a lot of privately educated students .

I'm as common as muck and went to a "posh" university. There were some Hyacinth Bucket types who tried really hard to be posh, but everyone thought they were a joke. It never occurred to me that posh people were superior, and I got on well with everyone.

No. And have a stiff whisky before the grave scene.

Just watch it. Not with the kids or parents though..! 🫣

I went to Oxford from a state school background, around the same time Saltburn was set. It was fine, didn't feel out of place at all.

Yes there is that. But the problem is the drawbridge is so old and unreliable. Last time we pulled it up we couldn’t get it down again for three weeks.

That’s why you have a moat, darling… 😀

(This thread is making me wonder whether I shouldn’t see Saltburn, which sounds eminently daft…)

Contrary to legend, not all posh people are vile anyway.

What do state selectives have to do with Saltburn? Anyway, grammars are a tiny % of the state system.

Ha ha yes I thought this!
But seriously OP there will be a vast mix of students, a lot of whom will come from overseas.
My son at uni has made a best mate from Taiwan. They will find their crowd.

What I found when I went to Cambridge from a comp 20 years ago was that where you went to school didn't massively come up. There was actually quite a lot of reverse snobbery (Jarvis Cocker was onto something with Common People) and all the posh kids were actually trying to hide that they had been to Eton and Harrow.

I had the shock of my life when I visited a few peoples houses in the uni holidays and discovered they were massive and had pillars and tennis courts and stables! This had definitely not been mentioned. We were all more interested in sex, drugs and rock n roll (well grunge or Britpop)

Oliver was middle class and an absolute psychopath. He wasn’t ostracised, he was a bloody creeep!!

https://thetab.com/uk/2023/09/18/these-are-the-universities-with-the-most-private-school-students-2023-329459

Exeter and Bath are in the top ten of highest private school % so it's not an entirely unfounded fear. The majority being 'state school' also hides the fact that many have been to grammar/selective schools in the state system.

All these type of unis (plus Imperia, St Andrews, Oxford and Cambridge) have outreach programmes and will offer contextually to boost their state school numbers and to widen participation, and most will have a range of students.

It's daft though to pretend all unis have the same demographic, they don't.

I was a state school kid at a posh uni about 15 years ago. It was absolutely fine. I had “normal” state school friends and “posh” private school friends (one of whom I married). Uni is a good time to meet people with different backgrounds, posh and not posh.

Honestly, I met more people from more “normal” backgrounds who wouldn’t hang around with the “posh” kids because they prejudged them than I met posh kids who wouldn’t hang around with “normal” people.

Oh dear OP.
Is your DC likely to be friends with people who are not very nice to him? Or do you think he will move on and find friends who he enjoys being with?
Maybe you should make sure he has all the skills required to live an independent life and be able to mix with people from all walks of life.

University should be a brilliant time of life.

I went to a very posh uni, highest number of public school kids in the nation, and many were complete twats. Many were perfectly nice and although I was the 'diversity' - ie from a poor area - there were many many people who I could bond with. Certain people never spoke to me though or made fun of me. I would tell them what I thought of them.