Parents of Year 12s - exam time again! (oh no!)

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

Just noticed we were running out of thread!

The torrential rain that was in Lancaster last weekend seems to have moved here this weekend :(

That's good progress kitten

The hiccup of exploring campuses during summer weekends is that everything seems to be closed. Not great when it's peeing down with rain and you are desperate for a wee

I'm at university of Birmingham tomorrow for an event with DS2. Annoyingly DD refused to come with us, despite the uni being on her list!

they are so stubborn Raspberry!

Just dropped dd off at the station to go to her summer school. She went off happy and confident, but I'm having a little wobble - 2 weeks suddenly feels like a very long time!

She'll be fine lobster. I'm sure she'll have a great time, although you might be a nervous wreck the whole time.

Hope she has a great time Lobster. I'm sure she will.

Hope she enjoys it lobster. DS started a week of work experience today, over an hour and a half away by public transport, if they had a shower it would be quicker to cycle! Pleased he has organised it himself, and is actually working not watching. He was most amused he is not allowed to tell us exactly what he was doing! He met friends to go to the cinema tonight so was out of the house nearly 17 hours.

Lobster, I know the feeling! I dropped ds1 off at platform 9&3/4 yesterday for a week. So far he is thoroughly enjoying himself and the uni know seems to be firmly at the top of his list.
I had to stop myself from nagging him by messenger
It's nice he contacted me though, I asked him to tell me when he was settled but then I wouldn't expect him to contact home unless he wanted to. It was nice to hear from him.

PandaG - my DD is doing an engineering degree at Leeds and is really enjoying it. Both the course and the social side! She has lived on campus for her 1st year and is now renting a house with friends 10 - 15 mins walk from the university.

Starfleet - I have a DD at Liverpool university (different course though) and she loves the City and the university. She says it is all very friendly.

Thanks hellsbells. He loved his week at Leeds, is definitely on his list to apply. He just has to finalise his choices and draft the PS now...

Lobster, it'll seem weird I'm sure! I think it's partly because in just over a years time they'll be doing this for real. That's a bit scary!

dd is really enjoying her nuffield placement, she's getting on well with her supervisors. It's quite an open ended project though, so I'm not sure how much break she's going to get. Her epq seems to be on the scale of war and peace.

Uni wise, I think there's one or two more slots to fill. These visits over the summer seem to be helping, then she's going to a couple of open days in September.

Just signing in to catch up later. My TIO is pants since I was reincarnated.

I turned over the calendar to see what was happening next week and there was results day and re-enrollment staring me in the face. I flipped back quickly because I'm not ready for summer to be over.

Just popping in to say hello as the thread disappeared off my TIO too

welcome back missing people! Best not to look ahead to next month I feel.

Disappeared from mine too. Spooky.

DD had a brilliant session at St Andrews last week. We expected maybe 20 minutes to half an hour with the admissions tutor, and he gave her two hours (and would have happily spoken longer I suspect). I'd urge anyone whose DC is seriously interested in a uni, but who can't/couldn't make the open day to get in touch with the admissions tutors directly. The one DD spoke to also offered to answer any further questions she might have at any point by email. We were a little bit blown away tbh, and she's now seriously considering it.

Interestingly too, he said that a decision on taking direct entry to second year could be delayed till she starts. It's possible to apply for it, but for them at least, the decision need not be taken till she arrives. That would make studying in Scotland no more expensive than in England, though it would mean a tough first year.

Ds1 had an amazing week with the Sutton Trust. He knows where he wants to study, what he needs to do and a back up plan if it all goes wrong.

For a child who has had friendship difficulties in the past he made a huge number of friends all of whom want the same as him. They have plans to meet up through the year and seem to be a good support group for each other.

Now he just has to crack driving.

Driving - yes we're working on that one too. We have advanced to going out on the road with a parent which is a step in the right direction. DH had a panic over the weekend when DS pulled out from a junction in front of an oncoming car. As DS told him afterwards, the driver of said car had waved, flashed and slowed right down to let him out and "it was just as well that one of us had our eyes on the road". He had his first experience of driving miles behind a tractor but so far has not been faced with oncoming livestock.

I am concentrating on Being A Good Role Model which involves strict adherence to the speed limit, perfect parking and not swearing at other road users, not even the ones that fail to give way at roundabouts. It's killing me.

I suspect it is my swearing at other road users that is making DD refuse to even apply for her provisional licence... Though to be fair to us both, I wouldn't fancy learning to drive in our area - very heavy traffic everywhere, no quite roads, and certainly no disused airfields, or farm tracks like I learnt to drive on.

You fell off my tio.

Driving is going well here. Dd has now booked her theory test for next week, and her instructor says she should be ready for her practical test soon. Dd has warned me that she expects to fail at least twice. That's got to be ok, cos I failed mine 4 times before I passed.

Does anyone know if we can have student finance assessed on 2017/18 tax year instead of 2016/17? We may have quite a big change in income coming up, as the company dh works for went into administration today . They say they are trying to run it as a going concern to sell it, but nobody knows anything beyond the next couple of weeks. So we have no idea if he's going to have a job next month, and that will obviously have quite an impact on our household income.

After ds1 did the under 17 week course where he learnt maneuvers and car control, I have been brave and taken him in my car.
He started in a car park with some driving around in a circle and a reverse park before driving me near home on the road, in school traffic.

He asked me to drive off our estate to start with as he didn't feel confident but now does it with ease- even coped well when a child ran out from behind a parked van in front of him - although there was some swearing at that one!
Tonight he drove 20 miles to the nearest city and back which he enjoyed. I'm thinking it might be a good time to get an instructor to tidy him up for the test but he is doing really well.

Dragon that's a worry. I wish I had those answers for you, hopefully someone knowledgeable will come along soon. Hopefully they will keep it running though.

MrsAD I'm sorry to hear that. As far as I understand, yes you can have it assessed on this tax year if you expect a significant change in finances.

LittleDrummer, that's brilliant with the driving, good planning!

I'm so pleased that people are enjoying their summer stuff.

dd is practising recovering from stalling the car. important life skill in not panicking when you mess up at a junction. She seems to have an instructor she gels with and doesn't get too worried before each lesson, which I'm pleased about.

Her nuffield placement is going really well. She likes her supervisors and to be frank I'm pretty amazed at the quality of work she's doing, the report she's writing is a really high standard - lurking year 11 parents, it's well worth applying!