Uni offers for 2017 start

[Carriemac]

Could we have a handholding thread? I have two DCs going through UCSS at the moment, would love to obsess here so I can appear calm on the outside.
LNAT results go to the UNIs tomorrow I think, so offers could be rolling in soon for DD who has applied for law.

Yes, it's clearly not a contextual thing with DS but I'd have distinct reservations about unconditionals for my DC - glad none of them has ever been offered one.

You're probably correct - there's a difference between people who are 'good at maths' at school (like my DD, who is predicted 3A* in maths, fm and physics) and mathematicians (she has a couple of those in her set). DH and I were similar. And I think you're right that courses that need maths (in her case elec eng) will want people to have actually learned the A level content to the best of their ability so they can hit the ground running and not have to play catch up. So, these courses are likely to maintain high entry requirements and no unconditional offers... would I be wrong to assume that courses which do give low or unconditional offers to strong candidates are those which don't necessarily require specific subject knowledge from A level? (as an example, philosophy applicants won't all have done the A level, some but not all might have done RS - so they need aptitude and enthusiasm for the subject but might not matter so much if they did slack off in yr13)

My DS didn't get any unconditional offers either. I think if he had the two things I would have thought about were 1) accepting an unconditional offer over a university he preferred for the short term gain of less stress re results (although I can see this would be a big advantage for some) and 2) taking his foot off the pedal running up to the exam (to horribly mangle some metaphors there) . He did have a friend who he thinks did this. However, I don't know nowadays how important A level results are if you subsequently get a degree.

Good luck for the Manchester interview to Goodbye's DS.

DS's course will require very specific subject knowledge/ skills in at least two of his subjects Errol.

Thinking about it, none of the other DC have ever been given a high end offer either, despite them applying for some of the most over subscribed courses in the book - we've had a couple of lower end ones over the years but they've mostly been bang on the standard offer, despite all the DC having gone to a reasonable school.

I think the unis are bound to try all sorts of different approaches this year - feeling their way with so much in flux.

Thanks Basilisk :) Let's hope his navigational skills are better than the next DS up :)

Errol - I know Nottingham were previously giving out unconditional offers for Engineering, although I am not sure what their policy is this year.

Yes, good luck to all the interviewees, bless 'em.

I'm still a bit a puzzled about DS and his offer. (Warwick ABB, biomedicals). Errol rightly tracked down that that's the standard offer for 2017. So all good there.

But ... he went to an allegedly satisfactory comp, inner city.

However ... it doesn't have a sixth form so he's now at a marginally better sixth form college.

Our home postcode is next-to-the-bottom centile.

So, what's his 'contextual position' iyswim? If he dropped a grade would Warwick still consider him, do you think?

I'm so out of touch.

Goodbye , well if he does take after his brother he may get to have a good look round one of the cities where he already has an offer .

Does the MMaths mean you have to take a Maths masters. What happens if you decide pure maths is not for you, and you might want to shift towards something more applied like actuarial science, stochastics, or econometrics (or something engineering or physics based).

You can always transfer out of MMaths onto BSc programmes and finish after three years. You can transfer from BSc into MSci, provided your grades are good enough (min 2:i, often First required). There is a huge advantage financially in terms of integrated Masters - these are financed by undergraduate loans. A separate Masters can be financed (partly) by postgraduate loans but this increases the percentage of salary taken in loan repayments as postgraduate loan repayment is added to undergraduate loan repayment.

I would strongly emphasise that UK Maths degrees are NOT just pure maths. Over 2/3rd of the Cambridge Maths department, for example, does NOT do pure maths - they do stats, actuarial science, management science, financial maths, industrial applied maths, engineering maths, mathematical biology, quantum computing, scientific computing, theoretical physics,.... (Remember that Stephen Hawking is based in the Cambridge maths department.) So an MMaths in a top UK department already gives you access to a huge range of research areas/career directions. In the fourth year at Warwick, Cambridge etc you can specialise in engineering maths or mathematical biology or quantum computing or whatever.

I don't think DS would have qualified for a contextual offer, he is at a private selective school, though it isn't that selective. Bristol say on their website:

"A A A including A in Mathematics, plus at least one of the following subjects; or AAA including A in Mathematics and A in Further Mathematics"

He is taking FM, so he needs one A*, as per the standard offer.
Are there people on here whose children have been given higher offers than the Bristol website states??

(He also has an offer from Warwick and really wants to go to Oxford - he reported that last Wednesday went well. Time will tell.)

I thought a lot of good universities offered higher than their websites said but I am definitely not an expert.
Have now answered second query of the day for child - this time about a dispute between him and a teacher about position of commas. If nothing else this UCAS application is at least helping their (and actually in some cases their teachers' grammar).

anyone's DCs getting law offers yet?

Carriemac I'm not sure if any of these unis are on your DD's list and I know things can change year to year but the only pre-Christmas offers my DDs had (apart from Oxford) were Durham and Birmingham. Bristol, UCL and Warwick were all after Christmas. Durham and Birmingham were both towards the end of November.

DS says he was told by school not to bother with STEP, as he still has to get A* in each of maths and further maths, plus another A grade plus step. His A's in physics and chemistry are low grades for him - he is a mathematician through and through - happily spends hours working stuff out and has done from the age of about 6. By 9 they were bringing maths work down from secondary for him at primary as he had done it all.

Ugh, we'll see. Kids!

Oh, and he has it would have made no difference to his Warwick offer.

*said

carriemac, my dd's friend has had law offers from Cardiff and Nottingham.

Any offers for Eng Lit yet from Exeter or Bristol?

DD1 has an offer for Bristol, doglover. It came very quickly. It's A*AA, which is their typical offer, I think.

Any psychology offers for Bristol yet? Ds is waiting on Bristol at the moment.

Any offers from Durham or imperial?

DS1 has a Comp Sci offer for Durham jeanne16, we were surprised because they mention on their site that most are sent out in January.

DS says he was told by school not to bother with STEP, as he still has to get A star in each of maths and further maths, plus another A grade plus step.

Sigh. STEP would actually help him get the A stars and smoothen his path when he gets to university.

REally User7214743615 ? Ugh.

Well, what will be will be. Nowt I can do about it now.