Thread 17 - Corona Cohort Summer Vacation to Yr 13, Finding Freedom?

[Orangecinnamon21]

PLACEHOLDER FOR NEW THREAD ...PREVIOUSLY TO BE FOUND IN SECONDARY EDUCATION

But he struggled to find anyone Northern was my point?

DS says thanks thanks for your honesty. Hopefully when he visits he’ll be able to see more clearly which ones will make the cut. He’s trying to balance overall university reputation against reputation for the subject by employers. I do wonder how much weight employers give to both or whether it’s just all MN hype that we’ve bought into.

Outside of certain circles this is almost certainly true shimy.

Does anyone know anything about Northampton Uni? My DS seems to have plucked it out of the air, it offers one of the courses he’s thinking of and they have an open day in a couple of weeks so we might go

We're visiting Leeds next week. Has anyone else been for their tour?

Have you ever been to Northampton?it's not a studenty place... What course?

@Piggywaspushed no I don’t know anything about the area at all. Multimedia Sports Journalism.
They offer it at Bournemouth too but aside from the gorgeous beach, I don’t know anything about there either

Morningfiddlers. In terms of journalism, I have not heard of Northampton having a reputation. Its main strengths are in nursing and caring type degrees. Bournemouth , however, has a good reputation for media and has more students, is more attractive and more lively.

Northampton is a pleasant enough town but last few times I have been it has been looking quite obviously run down in parts : there is a big out of town shopping place at Rushden and it has sucked local shops out of the towns. We like cricket so go there a lot and there is a nice theatre but I couldn't think of many reasons why too many young people would want to go there. Sorry Northampton! There are some towns where unis regenerate towns (eg Huddersfield) and some where the uni is barely noticed, in which I'd place Northampton.

DS1 looked at sports journalism for a while - under consideration were Lincoln, NTU, South Wales (again, not sure I'd want to be in Newport as a student) and Huddersfield. Not sure why we didn't look at Bournemouth and Brighton - perhaps he had lost interest or they may not have done Sport journalism. I have also heard good things about Gloucestershire and Derby for journalism.

Bournemouth has a very good reputation for film and TV, not sure what it is like for journalism. Do know of someone who was doing it but dropped out. That wasn’t to do with the university though.

I haven’t seen around the university but have heard it is very nice. I get the impression the students have a very good time and there is a fair bit going on.it definitely does have a student vibe with a fair few pubs and clubs. Lots of tech companies in recent years. Has a pretty central train and coach station. Most things you have to change at Southampton though for the train. During rhe summer it is heaving with foreign students as lots of language schools. Would be pretty easy to get part time work. Accommodation probably not cheap I would think.

Having just looked up the Northampton course it is accredited by the BJTC which I know is considered a good thing.

The other thing I meant to mention is that many Northampton students are pretty local.

DS1 has only done 1 year at uni, but he and all the DC I know at Swansea really value having a beach on which to congregate. Has been particularly good in Covid times - a Bournemouth student will have had better opportunities for a little normal life than a Northampton student this year. I think Bournemouth might be good at animation, but that is irrelevant!

I can imagine that has really helped them having the beach. Also not relevant to this thread but will put it up in case helps anyone in future there is a second university in Bournemouth- the Arts University AUB) It’s small and has the feeling more of a college rather than a university I felt when I did a course there.

I would really like to know when 17.9 cam book their vaccines.

My friend's son is at Bournemouth and absolutely loves it, we are booked into an open day in Oct. There are two campuses one is in Poole down the road from Bournemouth.

We dropped DS (15) off at a music course in Lincolnshire yesterday and it gave DH and I a premonition of what it might be like dropping DD at uni next year.

The drive was nearly 200 miles and when we got there, we were literally only allowed to walk the 5 steps from the car to the outside check in desk, where we had to say a quick goodbye to DS before leaving. 😢
It was much harder than I thought it would be; he doesn’t know anyone else on the course and has never been so far away from home alone before for so long (8 days).

Whilst map reading for DH, I realised just how far every uni is from South Wales (other than Swansea and Cardiff, obviously) - DD won’t get the grades for Bristol, and Bath doesn’t offer English, and she has discounted London, seemingly.

On the bright side, I overcame my fear of motorway driving on the way home, so at least I don’t feel that driving to see DD would be impossible for me.

My son is also interested in Bournemouth.

Thanks so much @Piggywaspushed @FoolsAssassin and @EverythingDelegated!
All info is very welcome and helpful!

Aberystwyth is good for English also? Although it is a ballache of a journey from anywhere , it's not too bad from South Wales.

Or Reading??

I feel your pain, Also - Bristol and Bath similarly off the table for DS. The nearest he is considering is Exeter, which we're going to have a look at next week. Other than that, Sussex which is a right old slog, or The North!

Is Swansea not in the frame then also?

She has said very definitely that she doesn’t want to stay in Wales…any part of it, Piggy!
No idea why, other than that DH and I are both English and she considers herself English, even though she was born here and has only ever lived here.
She had her heart set on Exeter, but her grades aren’t good enough. In fact, all her initial choices are now out of reach.

She has said very definitely that she doesn’t want to stay in Wales

DS is just the same - no Wales, no London, no Scotland. He thinks he's English too!

DH grew up in Cwmbran and considers himself English too!

@Piggywaspushed

DH grew up in Cwmbran and considers himself English too!

I have a DH from Cwmbran too, but he definitely thinks he's Welsh!