AIBU to think going to an RG university means absolutely nothing

[Butchyrestingface]

Never one to shy away from a challenge (even if it's a challenge to someone else).

So I went to a RG uni. I didn't even KNOW I'd been to a RG uni until about 15 years after the fact when I joined MN.

Thereafter I referred to it as having gone to a 'Russell Grant' university (bit confused).

AIBU in thinking RG unis are not the be all and end all?

In terms of getting a job, English at a poly isn’t a great choice. When you want a job you are selling your research skills and depth of understanding of the English language. Employers want you for your skills and English is a hard sell at the moment. So complexity can matter. English is way down in salary outcomes for grads and is not popular now. At anywhere less than top 20, be very very careful unless your cv is sparkling.

There are 24 RG unis , aside from the top 3 no earnings aren’t all better from RG. It’s ridiculous to suggest that.

I think one thing we all can agree on, regardless of what university you go to, study hard and do your utmost best. Try to get a 1st, but a 2.1 is great. Choose modules you feel passionate about and excite you.

As far as I can tell from WIWIKAU, the opposite is true amongst a hefty cohort of able young people. They are generally earnest young souls predicted 3As to 3A star range. They want to do economics, or maths, or comp sci. And they all apply to Oxbridge, Durham, Warwick, Imperial, UCL and/or one of Edinburgh, LSE, Bristol as the banker. And they get 4 or 5 rejections and are totally floored. They are getting very poor advice that as a top candidate they can take their pick, they don't spread their choices, they don't understand that every bugger applying to everyone of those courses at those unis is that same standard. And they think their life is ruined.
When better advice would have been to spread their applications across the top 15 unis rather than just apply to the same 5 unis every other aspirational middle class kid is applying to.
At the end of the day unless they want to work in London hedge funds or similar, whether they went to Exeter or Loughborough makes not a jot of difference to recruiters.

The most important message we gave DT’s was to choose somewhere you think you will enjoy living for three years. DD turned down an offer from St Andrews as she thought it was too remote and instead went to York (as the partying was better in her opinion!).

I didn't say that's the only debate, and it's not the opposite just a different point of view. Infact, WIWIKAU is worse than MN when it comes to arguing about equality of all universities.

I visited St Andrews on a day trip when we went to Edinburgh for holiday. Nothing there at all!

@Timpot Most advice suggests dc have a bit more spread if you are aiming for an ultra competitive course. Of course they are not sensible choosing all selective universities but MN parents dc usually get in!

Maths is not ultra competitive everywhere. Comp Sci and Economics are more competitive. Many employers won’t look at university attended but doing little besides the degree isn’t great wherever you go. Also the rush to comp Sci is not sensible. Other degrees have similarities and are broader. Lots of options afterwards and comp Sci isn’t the best employment stats afterwards either. People are lemmings though!

Discoveruni website offers comparisons in salaries ( employability etc ) based on same course at different Unis after a variety of years.

There’s a link from UCAS

My kids used this for their courses in extremely different subject areas
Zoology
Neuroscience
and Film Production
(and variations of the above )
it was clear what Unis got the higher salaries ( with the exception of Warwick in Film Production but that’s why the grade offers are lower ). Of note this is not the case for things such as Medicine as grads are on nhs salary pay scales.

So I had a go with Maths just now as it’s a subject that’s been flirting on the thread
I chose 4 random Unis of varying notoriety and ranking
Heres the results

After a while salaries ‘might’ even out as it’s all about the graduates themselves by then but you will see that at 5 years there is a significant difference.
As is clear, just like in the other subject areas my kids have looked at in the past, graduates from better Unis ie the top ones and RG realise higher salaries.

Do you not think that could be at least in part because St Andrews has a "posh" cohort with a high percentage of private school kids based in London and the South East, Reading is "in" the South East, whereas Lancaster is in the North West where salaries are lower?

Can you compare Lancaster, Leeds, Sheffield, Liverpool instead?

I’ll give it a go.
Im with my niece at the moment as she’s stressing about not getting some offers and so doing the same for her as money is her main modus operandi it seems.
I’ll do those once I’m finished

Those will not show a huge difference for maths. It’s fairly well known Cambridge, Oxford, Warwick and Imperial are THE maths unis. Below that, RG and a few others will be great and of course dc will get jobs.

St Andrews has “posh” dc from Scotland and abroad as well as rest of uk. That’s its market position though and also what its grads want after university. It’s also very choosy on entry standards.

Lancaster, Leeds, Sheffield and Liverpool are all very similar so you would not expect huge variations. Also Liverpool has fairly low entry standards so often grad prospects follow this stat.

Ok. So this has been fun. I do like a bit of research and tbh it’s light relief as my niece has just realised she won’t be earning the £100k she thought she would….so bit of a melt down here.

Ive done two sets
I added LJMs to the first set as it’s in Liverpool as well, to see what the area difference might be
Plus I did the last lot you sent as well Warwick etc and added LSE as I know it’s a good one.

Second lot for you @Timpot

Not really sure what your point is. People choose maths for all sorts of things and bar Oxbridge the non Russel groups uni earrings are higher in that last chart and when the Russel Groups are higher it’s not by very much £500 a year in one case!

We were having a discussion on earnings v type of uni.
Timpot asked for some comparisons
Happy to do them

Whats more significant is that Lancaster for maths is at 12 or 14 on the League table and the three RGs in that list are all lower. Sheffields in the 30s but nevertheless the salaries are higher
meanwhile LJM which is quite a bit lower down the leagues than Uni of Liverpool but still in the same city are showing a salary difference after 5 years of

Sorry missed update time

of £2500.

It matters if you are upper class or aspiring to be. I went to one and its been useful in dropping that fact in order to wind certain people up. Other than that no

Its not just salary but employability. In my career a non RG uni CV would be bottom of the pile in most cases. And RG means 'research intensive uni'.

No Lancaster was the same as Sheffield and higher than Liverpool. Both the latter are RG
and Lancaster isn’t.The RG that was higher ( Leeds)was only higher by £3k - the same amount Lancaster was higher than as regards Liverpool. Bar the big 3 or 4 it really means very little as this illustrates . Also people study maths for different reasons and different unis attract different types of students. Many people don’t care about £500 or £1k difference in money after 5 years either. Some want maths as a pathway into London banking others want to teach.

Many non Russel group unis score higher in employability than Russel group unis.

@R3s3t In some vocational areas but not overall. Excluding Bath, StA, Loughborough, Lancaster and Surrey. Some RG are not as good as others but it’s not correct to say post 92 have the degees with more employable grads. IFS says otherwise. Of course courses only offered at Post 92 (eg nursing) will boost post 92 employability. Other courses can of course be great but it’s more patchy. RG, overall, has the edge. In some areas a very big edge as RG includes Oxbridge, LSE and Imperial. Post 92 don’t feature in world rankings.

Agree @R3s3t
I forgot Liverpool was one of them. They are ranked at 49 so 27 lower than Lancaster and do have a lower salary despite being RG ( but they aren’t doing well at all in Maths it seems so not surprising )
Leeds was higher by£3000 RG but a lower ranking @31 than Lancaster
Sheffield same salary RG but a lower ranking @19 than Lancaster

This does prove as with other subjects I’ve looked at that the old RGs name carries some weight salary wise in overall stats despite their league position .

Of note of course league tables vary

Hope it helps Timpot.

If only

But there are 24 RG unis with some that score quite low compared to non RG unis on league tables. They aren’t all more employable- far from it. You’ve listed Bath, StA, Loughborough, Lancaster and Surrey as non RG alone….there are others with higher/ equal employability. RG does not equal better employability and wages by default. It’s ridiculous to suggest that.