Uni students... risking the wrath of mn..

[redgin]

Firstly, I have had 2 children go through uni and out the other side and I fully understand the emotional and financial aspects.

But

They leave home, expect to be treated as adults (rightly) and have their first taste of independence. After a summer debating the risks of going to uni this year in the middle of a pandemic why are they surprised they have to isolate in their rented accommodation like anyone else? That they have to follow the rules like the rest of the law abiding?

IMO they chose to go, they couldn't have expected normal, so get on with it.

why are they surprised they have to isolate in their rented accommodation like anyone else? That they have to follow the rules like the rest of the law abiding?

Asking individual students to isolate is rather different from isolating all students in a residential building, even those who are not contacts of cases, and then posting security officers on the doors to prevent them going out for food or medical needs.

I don't expect that 18 year olds excepted to find themselves in a virtual prison with access to food or first aid dependent on strangers.

*expected

@user19542358662566

I don't think any adult would be happy to be trapped in a flatshare with maybe a dozen people who they have only just met.

yes and they're locked into pretty grim, basic places, with people they have just met. I dropped my dd off on Saturday - no adult would live like she has to.

And yet we do worse to people with mental illness and almost nobody bats an eyelid? In fact, they're supposed to be healed by being brutalised and traumatised, which clearly people are capable of understanding is a ridiculous harmful notion.

If it turns out you are capable of empathising with what a mentally destructive scenario this is, why do you not raise your voice against the treatment people living with mental illness are subjected to? It's all of this and worse - just because people fall into one arbitrary category of illness where we've decided to take their freedom and choices away.

Why have I never seen multiple threads on MN filled with people complaining about the conditions people with mental illness are subjected to - the experience of being forcibly detained with strangers in a noisy, mixed sex environment with no privacy, poor food, no access to fresh air, no ability to exercise, not believed if you speak of mistreatment, no right to say no to having male staff hold you down on your bed and forcibly inject you in the buttock, being held face down on the floor by male staff when distressed, forced to shower and use the toilet in front of staff? Oh, right, because they're "other" to you and you don't care.

Self-serving hypocrisy.

I’m a bit confused about this. I’ve been hospitalised for psychosis (Bipolar mania and mixed episode alongside anorexia nervosa) several times and no, it wasn’t great. I was attacked 3 times by other patients, once it went to court but nothing happened because she was a patient. I was also medicated against my will and had time out of the hospital grounds taken away. There are some issues with MH care, depending on where you go, your age and the viewpoint of UK psychiatrists (medication for acute issues, therapy only when stable enough). Not all wards are mixed sex, but some are. Bedrooms in general locked facilities have separate male and female areas with lounges and toilets. There is usually an outdoor space in those. Hospitals often struggle to believe mistreatment, but so do schools. My school never believed I was being sexually abused, these institutions tend to close around their own. There are huge issues with hospitals geared towards those with learning disabilities or autism in many cases. However, these issues are not other to me, they’re part of my history. I haven’t posted about them on Mumsnet much because that won’t change a thing. I have written to necessary medical staff, hospitals, politicians and advocated for those who struggle to speak for themselves though. I’ve also worked with people with lots of different MH issues. However, I’m not sure it has huge amounts to do with students?

We could all say other people are worse off. I do appreciate it’s a devastating topic and that people die due to the poor care here (I nearly did), but it’s different to students. Students need support, they’ve just moved away from home and some will have MH issues coming out at that point anyway - psychosis quite commonly occurs for the first time around 18-25. They are isolating with strangers, which will be an issue for some. They weren’t given much warning and security guards do feel threatening to many. Yes, many should have realised they’d need to isolate, but tbh if we look at most things the idea of it is different to the experience. You could say to all mums complaining of being tired ‘what did you expect’, but they didn’t realise what it would actually feel like.

Anyhow, you can be concerned about both without posting threads on Mumsnet. They’re quite separate issues and yes, MH care is more serious, however that doesn’t take away from students also needing support.

@TheNavigator

In Scotland, students were told not to go to any hospitailty venues over the weekend, on threat of being expelled from their course. No other section of society has been treated like this. Can you imagine the uproar if all over 65s were told they could not go to any pubs, cafes and restaraunts to meet a friend tis weekend (we are not allowed in each others homes, remember) on threat of losing their pension?

It is unacceptable to single out a section of society and police them like criminals. The treatment of students is the thin end of the wedge. No care workers allowed to meet their friends outside their household at the weekend? No hospital staff? There are many sections of society that could be singled out and subject to stricter measures. Do you think that is an acceptable way to treat law abiding citizens?

This. My DS has been in Scotland for a week. shut away in a disgusting mice-infested shoe box.

I am getting really sick of this now.

The elderly and the vulnerable should go back and shield. We cannot screw up our kids futures like this any more. All DC should be back at school and at college and Uni. Our DC cannot leave Uni and go on the dole so that others are OK. This is just not acceptable.

My dds went knowing the risks of lockdowns/isolation/online courses. Dd2s flat had to self isolate for a couple of coughs and they all pulled together, meant they got to know each other at least.
What worries me in Manchester (&other places) is the building lockdown with security on. That feels like a step too far.

Do people not understand that universities arent doing all this for the hell of it? They are responding to a quickly changing situation and government advice. They are trying to protect students (sometimes from themselves) and protect the community too.

Unis are doing their best but the whole world is screwed right now and everyone is affected.

Also---you don't pay for a party at uni or life experiences. Those are good things which usually come along with uni, but you aren't entitled to them just cos you're paying fees.

You pay for the opportunity to earn a degree, and this is all.

Yes its a shame but all students who agreed to go this year are still getting the same opportunity to earn their degree. No one is being ripped off.

Also---you don't pay for a party at uni or life experiences. Those are good things which usually come along with uni, but you aren't entitled to them just cos you're paying fees.

You pay for the opportunity to earn a degree, and this is all.

Yes its a shame but all students who agreed to go this year are still getting the same opportunity to earn their degree. No one is being ripped off.

100% this.

They’re adults but they’re very, very young adults and from that point of view they’re vulnerable. I cringe at some of the stupid things I did or failed to understand when I was in halls at that age. Leaving home is a tough adjustment to make even without Covid. I think the way they’ve been treated is just awful. You can know something in theory “I might have to isolate” - without being able to really imagine what it will feel like or what the reality will be. It’s even harder at that age. It’s such a mess and it’s certainly not the students’ faults.

I’m interested OP which other people who are self isolating are being policed by private security guards?
Which other group are being denied access to health care? Laundry facilities? Cooking facilities?

I’m also interested under which lawful power you think this is happening.

Or are you actually saying fuck it?

On the news yesterday afternoon ,They were interviewing both children and parents of some Manchester Students ,and as one Father said he had asked his daughter if she wanted to defer her course for a year.She said she wanted to go now ,as there were no guarantees the situation would be resolved in 2021.Also unless they can get a job for a year ,or can rely on Mum and Dad to back them what choice do they have ?If everyone delayed their start date by a year the courses would be full and many students would not get in!

@Irishgurl

We dropped our first year uni DC off last Sunday. By Thursday someone in the flat needed a test. It came back confirmed yesterday. My DC was tested yesterday. Walked 4.5miles there and 4.5 miles back with a temperature and sweating profusely.A girl in the flat below was offered a test 7.5 miles away at 5.30pm so had to walk 7.5 miles back in the dark. No one had their temperature taken when they arrived in the flat. No one was offered testing at the start of term. Each flat forms a bubble so they were told that they do not need to socially distance within the flat. It really seems as if either the university or the government wanted them to spread Covid amongst themselves!

On a positive note, 18 year olds are actually very resilient. They are pooling food and cooking for the boy who feels really poorly. He is bed bound but ok. They are treating it like an adventure and it is an amazing life lesson and bonding experience. Obviously the internet means that they are connected to family and other friends. I arranged a food delivery for Saturday from Sainsbury's. They were really sympathetic and had a protocol in place for delivering safely to quarantined students. All the students have money at the moment as it is the start of term and no money is being spent on going out. I'm not sure why parents are needing to drive miles to drop off food parcels. Surely this was anticipated and a student should , at the start of term, have a few days supplies of food in place. If they don't, they will have to share with other flat members, sort out money and organize themselves better in future.

These kids have been home since March. Hopefully the academic side can tick over and they are at least becoming independent. Maybe it was the plan to infect them all, keep them isolated and away from grandparents and then next term they can have more normal lessons? It isn't an ideal circumstance. My DC is healthy and super fit so we do not have the worry of him being high risk. We wouldn't have let him go to uni this year if he had any form of risk. The situation is not ideal but they have to get on with life. I don't feel that sorry for them. I feel far more sorry for the young children who were stuck in flats during lockdown with no access to education.

Completely agree. Such a sensible, measured response.

I can understand the ones who went a couple of weeks back in the blind hope everything would work out ok. But I have a friend (she’s a headteacher which is irrelevant but also not) who was posting photos of her son being dropped off at Liverpool for his first year on Sunday. And I just thought what the hell are you thinking, have you managed to miss all the news updates??

You don't pay hall fees to be imprisoned in them.

I don't know if you lived in halls yourself ever, but if I'd had to isolate in mine I would have been thoroughly miserable

I agree. It's great that some individual posters' children are fine but I find it astonishing that they cannot empathise that many will be far from fine, especially if they are not allowed home at Christmas either.

@WokesFromHome

I am getting really sick of this now.

The elderly and the vulnerable should go back and shield. We cannot screw up our kids futures like this any more. All DC should be back at school and at college and Uni. Our DC cannot leave Uni and go on the dole so that others are OK. This is just not acceptable.

Trouble is, as seen on the other Uni thread, there are some lecturers simply refusing to return to campus to teach F2F. Unless there's some way of forcing them to return, then we can't go back to "normal". Are there enough other lecturers willing to do F2F to take over if the refusers are made redundant?

@PuppyMonkey

I can understand the ones who went a couple of weeks back in the blind hope everything would work out ok. But I have a friend (she’s a headteacher which is irrelevant but also not) who was posting photos of her son being dropped off at Liverpool for his first year on Sunday. And I just thought what the hell are you thinking, have you managed to miss all the news updates??

But Unis are STILL telling students "it's fine", "it'll be blended learning", etc etc on their websites even today. The reality is being deliberately concealed so the Uni's can rake in the tuition fees and accommodation costs. It's absolutely disgusting what the unis are doing.

Just as a simple example, even now, just googled it, our son's Uni webpages say that the halls my son is in have kitchen cleaning 3 days per week, communal areas cleaned weekly, etc. In reality, they had an online welcome session on Sunday saying there'd be no cleaning at all this year!

They're just blatantly lying to get the students in situ for the money!

My son went back for his second year two weeks ago. He had had to pay his rent in advance and has a weekend job in his Uni town. He knew things were not going to be the same but for him it seemed the best option. He didn't learn until last week that he'll have no face to face lectures but he is flat sharing with friends on the same course so they'll be able to support each other with their learning. None of them are complaining, they are just getting on with it.

Going to uni is not just out the learning, it’s about living your own life independently. No way would my DC have stayed at home. They have A Covid cases in their buildImg, so expect to be self isolating if it comes into their designated household, of course, but it’s illegal to lock students in when their household does not have a case. Ditto the Christmas issue is the media stirring something out of nothing.

Suggest people keep up with the facts, rather than the Rumour- and scaremongering.

I don't know if you lived in halls yourself ever, but if I'd had to isolate in mine I would have been thoroughly miserable

I'd like to think that things have improved but my halls of residence had a pervading smell of damp, windows that only opened an inch, heating that was on 24 hours a day, and not even a washbasin in our rooms. We had one toilet with no ventilation and one shower with no ventilation. There were only six of us in our unit, and I already knew a couple of them from school, so not even much opportunity to make new friends.

I'd imagine that most universities have better facilities these days but even so, for every student isolating in a nice modern block with an en suite bathroom, there will probably be another one somewhere else isolating in halls that are 30 years old and not up to modern standards.

The issue is that universities are now businesses rather than seats of learning. Until that changes the conflict of interest is always going to be there ie students are revenue streams.

Are they refusing? Or are they higher risk? At my university, the higher risk (calculated by a risk assessment tool) staff are shielding/do not have to do face to face teaching, which leaves the vast majority teaching face to face- we've had to reduce the amount of ftf to meet government guidance now due to an increased alert level, so in fact, many of our staff who were prepared to go in have been moved online. I don't think anyone is 'refusing' to teach.

This is what should have happened in the school sector.

The other thing people are not taking into account is that many students prefer online access to education, so many of my students watched the recorded videos even though they could come in person, they chose not to. Same for seminars, there's always a core of 1/3 who aren't seen unless they feel like their attendance is going to be taken. Someone on the other thread said that we shouldn't teach for those groups, we should teach for the keen beans who attend everything- but actually lots of students were already sitting in their rooms, watching recorded lectures with patchy seminar attendance, they just didn't tell their parents about it (of course on mumsnet, all students want a lot of contact time and turn up to everything, ha ha).

I've said from the beginning that if I had a university aged child, fresher or not, I'd be highly encouraging them to take the year off and find something else to do, because no matter what happens with the path of this virus, they were not going to get a normal experience or value for their money this academic year.

But the government pressured unis into opening fully, promised them the moon, changed their plans, and now this. I have nothing but sympathy for any student caught up in this mess.

The government only needed to look across the Pond to see what happened when American universities reopened in mid/late August. But they chose not to.

Dd2 is at uni in her 2nd year ds leaves on Friday.

I have been hugely impressed by both the universities approach to dealing with covid. Both have moved their freshers weeks online and been so inventive about it. One has a joint beer tasting where the students collects (in timed slots) their beers and then it is done in zoom calls of 20 so they get to know each other.

Ds uni announced this week that those who had online only courses could choose to remain at home for the first term with no fees due. Ds has physical lessons so not applicable to him

Ds friends are having a mixed experiences one returned home after one night having experienced a fatal stabbing her one night there.

His 2 best mates 2 is in lockdown for the entire building complete with gates locked and chained so they can not leave. (They have people doing food deliveries assigned to them) the other has had people fined 3K for get together (he was not involved)

Very mixed experiences ds is still going but very aware his experience will be very different to that of his older sisters.

The friend group he is in of 6 are supportive with each other in their WhatsApp group (or Snapchat I forget) and what I have seen is young adults trying to handle all of this maturely.

That should say his friend witnessed a fatal stabbing

@MrsMariaReynolds

I've said from the beginning that if I had a university aged child, fresher or not, I'd be highly encouraging them to take the year off and find something else to do, because no matter what happens with the path of this virus, they were not going to get a normal experience or value for their money this academic year.

But the government pressured unis into opening fully, promised them the moon, changed their plans, and now this. I have nothing but sympathy for any student caught up in this mess.

The government only needed to look across the Pond to see what happened when American universities reopened in mid/late August. But they chose not to.

Trouble is there's bugger all else for them to do.

And Unis will only have the usual number of spaces next year, so if everyone decided to defer, only half would get in. People not going this year have a real risk of not getting a place next year.

They should have cancelled this term and re-started in January and done a few less modules. Year 1 modules don't usually count towards the final degree grade anyway. And the optional "non subject" modules could have been first to be dropped. They could have concentrated on the modules that really matter, so little, if anything, is lost. Year 2 and 3 students could have worked from home for this term.