Uni open days. What happens and how expensive are they?

[CrapBucket]

DS is much keener on going to uni open days with his friends than with me. That's fine and I'm glad he is independent.

But I am on a tight budget and would appreciate some advice on (a) what do the open days entail, will they be structured so he is actually engaged or is it a good laugh and chance to piss around with friends (b) apart from travel costs what spending money would you reasonably recommend he needs for meals - I'm thinking of covering his train costs and £20 a day for food (based on a supermarket meal deal lunch and fast food for tea) - or is it like theme parks/festivals when they have a captive audience and charge an absolute fortune?

I am totally happy to go without myself, to invest in his future but less happy to do that for a series of fun weekends away...

We don't qualify for pupil premium so there is nothing official for me to apply for but I could see this getting expensive!

Ok, I am playing devils advocate here…but really? It’s an open day…they’re going to see if they like the city and pick up vibes on the uni. I think you’re bugging this up to be much more than it is. Most of stuff you talk about needs to be determined on line before they get on the train to visit. They won’t get time on a day visit to answer all these questions…they need to research before they go and just be checking stuff out. Uni open days haven’t changed significantly in 49 years, other than it tends to be a harder sell by universities now that students self fund. But essentially it’s the same glossy “perfect” picture they’re trying to sell. Believe me , until you get there and go into your first lecture or your accommodation, no amount of research or visits will tell you if you make the right decision.
it’s an open day. That’s it.

40 years not 49🙄

Exactly. It’s better to find out before. Years before! And to have saved up! Bit late by time they get to that point 🤦‍♀️

A lot of middle class jobs pay peanuts. Your son is privileged if you can afford to pay his travel and food.

My parents couldn't support me financially but I now have a number of degrees and have worked in both FE and HE. Some of the uni's that target working class students provide free transport. As others have said, lunch may be provided so he may not need to spend the £20 at every event and can roll some money over.

£20 and travel is a suitable budget, however, don't feel pressured to do this. There will be lots of students from all classes who have taken a packed lunch to keep costs down.

If money is tight and you're not sure your son will get much out of the open days I agree that you really need to sit down and discuss this with him, getting him to make a plan of the ones he really wants to go to so your not throwing your money away. If he needs to work whilst at uni does he need to ensure he's moving to n area with good job prospects?

The uni's that target working class students will offer greater financial support during is studies, although, you often have to look for these schemes rather than them being proactively advertised. I was a hall warden, which meant you got to live in halls during your 2nd and 3rd years for free. I know these schemes still exist today.

In my experience kids just don’t ask the important questions about accommodation (length of tenancy for example) and practical things like how much does it cost to do laundry. You’ve got to be confident that they will actually go to the lecture theatre at the right time at which their potential course leader will explain the syllabus and hopefully inspire the students. They should not be swayed by all the bells and whistles - free food, fairground rides, merch - that some unis provide on open days.

Also bear in mind there’s a second bite at the cherry in the form of offer holder days which tend to be far more course focussed. If a trip to a particular campus is going to be expensive I think it’s best to save money to go the offer holder day and rely on YouTube etc for a wider view of campus, accomodation etc

It's like a cult, some MNer insistence, that kids are inadequate & ill-prepared for life if they don't attend OpenDays by themselves. <pearl clutching>

And some MNer insistence that 16/17/18 year olds are mature, self confident adults who are capable of asking every single question about going to university, and who are capable of driving to universities when the trains are on strike.

Most of the DC will be somewhere between the two <pearl clutching at judgemental MNers>

I agree with you @VanCleefArpels

With five kids, I've counted that I've been to 12 open days. DS1 went to three on his own/with school.

I really second what someone said about visiting your local universities. This can be very cheap on both money and time.

It doesn't mean that these universities need to be candidates, but there will be a lot of common features, and if nothing else will give you a list of questions to ask at more likely places.

To me, universities all start to look the same. Their marketing is very swish, and they will tell you what they want about accommodation and facilities. There's no guarantee you will get the type of flat they show you.

The most important aspect must be the course, and the flexibility of the course, as well as student prospects.

After that, the young person needs to evaluate city vs campus, distance from home, activities on/near campus (eg water sports or hill walking).

I used my visits to have one on one time with my DCs (a scarce resource in a big family) so we made a bit of a holiday of it (first class or air travel, meals out, nice hotel - nothing they would experience at uni, LOL).

The most important aspect must be the course, and the flexibility of the course, as well as student prospects.

After that, the young person needs to evaluate city vs campus, distance from home, activities on/near campus (eg water sports or hill walking).

I agree that these should take priority.

It doesn't make sense to go with friends. it's a huge amount of debt to take on if you haven't taken the open days seriously. How much research has he done if he is just tagging along with friends

@spotcheck

No they can do a lot of online research to narrow down to the best five unis for their course - they publish so much information online, with video tours etc.

It doesn't make sense to go with friends.

It’s a day out.

Well we wouldn’t have known about DSA if it hadn’t have been for the first open day we went to. And Ds didn’t realise it applied to him (asd)

And at one place he wouldn’t have thought to ask about selection of module choices. The answer to that question helped rule out one place when he discovered that 1:1 piano lessons were only available to this who passed an audition after they started.

On the other hand the main impetus does have to come from the child but Ds comes from an area/school where the majority don’t go to uni. His college heavily pushed their own HND course instead. He needed some guidance as to what was out there and what the system is.

And visiting ruled out two places he’d thought were definites. On the other hand at one place he ended up chatting very nerdily to one tutor who arranged for him to have a private tour of some facility that particularly interested him and took him off to meet another member of staff who he thought Ds might like to meet. That place became a very close insurance.

Yes, but that is research which should be done before open days. The UCAS Hub is great- it allows them to search and favourite courses.

Much of the online information should be treated as marketing, and does not compare to actually visiting.

If students use up their 5 choices, they could very well be stuck with 5 universities they don't like.
I've been to many ( many) universities, and the most informative conversations are those you have, after the talks with the course leaders, students etc.

If students use up their 5 choices, they could very well be stuck with 5 universities they don't like.
I've been to many ( many) universities, and the most informative conversations are those you have, after the talks with the course leaders, students etc.

You should absolutely visit a university before adding it to your UCAS form. Other wise you could end up at a university you hate.

I've just looked up costs my god to go - rent and living and minimum loan they will need £5k a year from us. We have a good income but a massive mortgage on our basic box house and no spare. Better move to jacket potatoes and beans right now.

You have to screen universities before visiting and adding to UCAS.

In my day, you poured over prospectuses in your school library.

Nowadays, you can look at useful websites such as UCAS and WhatUni.

Then you can look at the more promising university websites.

Department websites should be fairly straight about what they teach and how the courses are assessed, and also the flexibility in choosing modules.

Happy with that, you can look at accommodation (I would not take this with a pinch of salt) and other campus facilities.

Once happy with course choices, you can look at the next level priorities. To me, this means the actual location of the university (city/campus/rural), ease of getting to home (and this could mean if it's hard to get home, there's a 7 day a week vibe), opportunities within the wider community.

Do (with my help as he is autistic) did do online research/open days. It whittled his long list of around 20 down to 8.

Should someone still at school have to pay for that sort of thing themselves? Not everyone has a Saturday job either.

Who do you think should pay?

As a parent I paid (the diesel) to take DD to open days. In order to enable her to attend (the trains were on strike, so there was no other option as we live rurally). It would have been extremely unreasonable to expect her to pay for my diesel as health issues meant that working wasn't possible for her. It's what I signed up for as a parent.

I absolutely see it as my job as a parent to pay for university open days, just as I would pay for educational trips.

Actually there's no way I would have picked my uni from MN browsing and departmental websites (it was the local choice for a very niche vocational subject) - but the departmental staff have been absolutely bloody fantastic throughout the course and through Covid when things went more than a bit tits up around the planet as well. That wouldn't have come through on a very sparse departmental website (being honest - lots of our staff are not the greatest techies but they're superb in their professional field), neither would the focus on just how small and close-knit the cohorts get. The uni-wide stuff was just pointless flashy window dressing really - but meeting the course staff was the huge deciding point for me.