DS hating UK uni and feeling guilty for encouraging him to go

Which university is it? Some in the North have many students with southern accents so maybe he has not met them. Think of Newcastle University and Durham University.

What were his grades at A level? (To get some sense of the extent to which a course could be difficult in practice).

He might have been better off at a European university, say in Holland, but as you say he is only two weeks in. The English language aspect will get easier, the other people will get bored of remarking on his accent. He can find people who have interests other than drinking all the time.

He should try to see his tutor first no matter what.

Might he be willing to change course, say to Russian?

It’s still early days I will say. There are def ‘dry’ events at universities. Not everyone drinks.
My DS had 3 international students in his flat but they didn’t really mix w the uk ones - and kept to people from their own countries.

I am from the south and all my flatmates were northern and they teased me about my accent, I thought it was quite funny tbh. We all teased each other a bit!

re the course, that’s more concerning but hopefully he’ll get in to it.

It sounds like going to the UK was more your choice than his.

If so I think he may do best leaving, and starting a course in his own country.

People usually do best in situations they freely choose for themselves when it's possible.

DD joined the international students society and found her tribe there - although she’s British, she was raised in Belgium and France, and went through the American school system. She found she had a lot more in common with international students than other Brits.

What?

Is this a racist comment? Totally inappropriate if so.

Reporting so Mumsnet HQ can decide.

Op I hope your lad is ok. Personally I would arrange to visit him and insist he carries on until Christmas at least. Encourage him to talk to his tutors and student councillor to see if his understanding of English is sufficient to follow his course (there is usually a competence test) and maybe a change of accommodation might help?

Lots of good advice on the thread. Your son’s experience is really common. My elder daughter who is very sociable and was a domestic student going to university in a city she loved from first sight really struggled for the first 6 weeks or so. But she decided to give it till Christmas and by then she was loving it. Encourage your son to give it a bit longer. Also, the students won’t all know each other but it can easily look that way from the outside. Are there any students of Russian at his uni? Perhaps he could offer to help them with their conversational practice and make some connections that way?

On an unrelated note: i studied Russian from scratch at university and had a year out in St P centuries ago. Such a beautiful language and such an interesting and beautiful place. I had an amazing time there. I’m aware there are still students choosing to study it, including from scratch, and am so pleased about that.

If he is thinking of switching to another university, Lancaster students have literally only just moved in two days ago and so he won't have missed out on anything and its a very sociable, collegiate university which is fully campus based so its very easy for students to feel part of a community. They have so much on campus - cinema, theatre, curry house, chinese restaurant, noodle bar, caribbean takeaway, pizzeria, deli, seven bars, Greggs, subway, costa, starbucks, barbers, post office, three supermarkets (one is a chinese supermarket), car garage, massive new sports complex etc, etc I mention it in particular because economics at Lancaster has two options; you can do a BCS which is more maths based or a BA which is not maths based and doesn't require A level maths.

Yep, I was going to suggest this too. It should help his confidence if he's the fluent one in the conversation for some of the time, and will hopefully allow him to get acclimatised more quickly to the various accents. I also agree with talking to his tutor about the fact he's struggling a bit, and getting access to lecture recordings/transcripts if they're available. He might also want to consider whether switching courses to something a bit less theoretical like maybe Business Studies might be worth doing, and finding out if that's possible.

I agree that it can take a bit of time to find your people, and he's more likely to find them doing stuff that he enjoys rather than those he's just been thrown together in shared housing with. But generally you have to keep going back to build a relationship with people - I had 2 really close friends at uni, one of whom I felt like I'd known forever the first time we met, while the other took a while to get to know but absolutely helped keep me sane when I was stressing out about exams and other stuff. Giving it till Christmas is a sensible cut off point if it's really not for him, but it really is early days just yet.

I hated the first term at uni. Hated it. And I was going home every weekend to see my boyfriend - a big mistake on a number of levels. I very nearly left. The work was so hard and I was left to myself a lot.

He’s not going to settle if he’s ringing you every night. That’s not going to work for anyone, let alone someone in a foreign country. So I would agree a time for a once-a-week call.

He needs to persevere with his clubs. Head down with his studies. It’ll fall into place.

It sounds very hard but it’s also very early days.

Can he record the maths sessions where the accent is challenging? then he can go back over it in his own time to make sure there's nothing he has missed. It maybe the lecturer can provide recordings or slides for this purpose - worth his asking.

Op, as a random suggestion re. The accents, I lived with a few international students at uni and they always insisted that I correct their grammar and pronunciation if they said anything wrong. Perhaps your ds needs to talk to them individually and get to know them a bit and ask that they help him out if they can. I hope he finds his feet soon.

Could he try some of the societies which attract a more varied group.

Your son wont be at Lancaster because Freshers only started two days ago but I know there M.U.N. (Model United Nations) has a lot of European students. There are Russian students, French students, German students etc alongside british students. It's basically role play but alongside some topical/political issues they do fun things like harry potter scenarios/lord of the rings based scenarios/dune based scenarios/fictional disaster based scenarios. It attracts lots of politics/IR/economics/law students. A lot seems to happen in bars and at flat parties! DS absolutely loves it.

My sons experience was very similar, not in to going oit drinking and just constantly felt on the boundary. Within weeks he wasn't eating as never had an appetite and just stayed in his room. His flat mates were mainly girls, only one boy who didn't integrate, so that didn't help. We convinced him to stay until November but inevitably he came home as he was deteriorating so fast. Had he left a week earlier they'd have wsived the tuition fees but we ended up paying out £7k to get him out. It's now a year on and hes applying for degree apprenticeships instead and has had a year out dounf an additional A level that he needed. I really wish your son all the best, hope things improve 🙏.

The language issue will sort itself out relatively quickly as he gets attuned to hearing English all the time in different accents. He shouldn't be self-conscious about his own accent, there will be plenty of people speaking in a myriad of accents.

Does he socialise with people on his course? It would help him to make friends with them, not least so that he can borrow notes if he is missing stuff at the moment. In the meantime, does he have someone like a personal tutor assigned to him? If so, he should talk to him or her about his current difficulties in following the course - they may be able to offer him some extra catch-up sessions or something similar.

That's not going to help if he is trying to avoid conscription is it?

Drop out before 1st December as that will mean you don’t at the full fee for the year BUT

Being an international student is hard in the early days but gets easier

Economics at University is very different but there are programmes that are less econometric driven and many places have two tracks based on Maths competence

if there’s a Russian language degree they might have language buddying

many places have student led mentoring which he could use and subject societies

but in most universities this is week 1 of teaching - give it a month of classes and decide

It is very early days, if he doesn't settle I'd look for different accommodation first.

As a Russian, I have to say that there's really no future in Russia for young people right now and for the next decade at least. Please encourage him. He may just need to focus on academics.

Is he at risk of getting drafted (does he have a health excuse) ? If not, he absolutely needs to stay for the sake of his life

I have no experience of University myself, but I think it's early days at the moment. I think a lot of students feel like this at the start of the term. For context, I live in the South of the UK, and even sometimes I struggle with a strong Northern accent! Can you son get some support with regards to his course? If he's struggling to keep up, as everything is in English and he's mentally having to translate, that must be exhausting. Can he join a group for international students? He doesn't need to go clubbing/drinking if that's not him. He needs to widen his friendship group, and find ways to do this. I can guarantee he's not the only student struggling to fit in, feeling homesick and wondering if they've made a mistake! He needs to give it a go at least until Christmas.

@Dailyster I have sent you a Pm because I have kids at uni in the North who don't go clubbing (they don't drink) etc and I wondered if they might be at the same place.

Also you will get more parents with kids in higher education if you post this dilemma on the "Higher Ed" board instead of the AIBU board, someone in admin might be able to move it for you.

There's quite a few parents talking about the difficulties their kids are having starting university this month, which may be helpful.

His “ear” will click with the accent eventually.
Are his lectures recorded? If so suggest he uses the recordings to enhance his notes at the time. If not he could ask to record them. My daughter has a specialist microphone and transcription software as part of the package for her disability. He should also talk to both his Academic tutor and lecturers about his struggles and how to overcome them (such as permission to record lectures).
Also if he has access to the gym going there regularly will help. As joining things like board game society?

Christmas is too long to wait. Encourage him to join a society for international students. A bigger concern is not being able to follow the lectures if he is only in week 2. Economics degrees at U.K. universities are maths heavy. Are you able to visit him in the coming weeks?

Strong agreement with this! I've moved to 3 different countries, two of which spoke a language I'd done at school - so fine with books and slow speech, but zero fluency - and one I didn't know. Immersion's the way to go. It's how we learned our native language - two in your DS's case, @Dailyster - and the mechanism's still there, it just needs waking up.

I also went through major culture shock each time. The first move was at 18yo, similar to your DS. I've learned that, for me, wandering around and observing everything, trying stuff out, works the immersion magic again. The rhythm of life in the new place seeps in. With a pre-made environment like a university, flatmates and social activities, DS will probably find this easier than this girl on her own did, but it worked for me and I'm betting it'll work for him too.

Advise him to look out for stuff he likes - people, food, music, shops, television, everything - and stuff he finds strange or funny. Imagine telling people at home about it! I wrote long letters home. He might fancy doing a vlog, facetiming his Russian mates from central Leeds or wherever, or just thinking about what he'd say.

One more hint: I was raised with the aim of doing one thing that scares you every day. OK, when you've just landed in a brand-new situation, it's going to be a lot more than one thing each day! The principle is, as every philosopher from the Stoics to yesterday's hottest motivational guru has opined, that this is what really grows us as people. It makes us interesting and it makes us proud. Here - I daren't try and find this in Russian, but I bet you can 😁

I hope he has a great time.

Early days, it's hard when our kids are sad. I'd be inclined to tough it out till Christmas.