DS1 finding 1st Year of Uni Very Overwhelming

[BaconAndAvocado]

DS1 is at Manchester studying Chemical Engineering and is finding the workload incredibly hard.

He said that lots of students are feeling the pressure and going to a "Mental Health Issues" event (not entirely sure what he meant by this)

He facetimed us his evening and I know he was close to tears re coping with the workload.

I don't know what to do. Or if there is anything I can do apart from reassure him and boost him up.

He has always coped quite well with hard work (A levels) but then he was at home and now, being away, I think he is struggling.

Any advice welcomed.

Oddly the London experience is that people are not very happy with the French system, or perhaps specifically the Lycée CDG

This is a different topic, but FWIW my networks and experience largely tell me that the lycée CDG is a very anonymous factory. I know many families who have either moved to or from the lycée CDG and it doesn't bear comparison with a Paris private school (which will charge less than the lycée CDG). Even the better, free, French state schools seem to be nicer places (and they don't meet my expectations).

bacon my son has just started his second year at Manchester studying chemical engineering. He too struggled in the first term. He did settle down, loves his flat mates and is enjoying the course. I suggested he went to talk to some 2nd year students when he was wavering. I am going up to see him this weekend. If you would like for him to talk to your lad do pm me and I can let him know.

Minmooch - I think that would be so helpful for the OP's son. To talk to someone who's got through that nightmare would be such a help.

I think the thing is, by this time in the term they are very tired. They have moved away with home and are coping with shopping, cooking, washing and generally looking after themselves. They are making a whole lot of new friends and coping with a very different style of working. As far as I can see Freshers basically run on adrenaline for the first couple of months and then about now, even if they have been coping brilliantly, it all starts to hit them.

A good engineering course IS tough.
You wouldn't respect the degree if it wasn't.
He can get thru this... there's nothing special about him that means he can't do it. It won't get easier exactly, more like he will get used to how much hard work it is & then it won't be emotionally draining as well as intellectually & physically exhausting. It will just be very tough for a while.

Think this is the kind of time the first load of deadlines loom too!

I do think that people who have had to work hard for A levels can find the step up to University daunting because often hard work does not bridge the gap, especially when the subject is not a direct follow-on from A levels. I know from Engineers that these courses are full-on and sometimes the required A levels are not enough to succeed at the highest level in Engineering. It may be that their Maths is not strong enough and that at school they had no idea of Engineering concepts ( were not taught any) so find the requirements of the degree a challenge. No academic Engineering degree from a top university is easy.

I also think young people overlook the drain on their time that cooking, shopping and cleaning take out of the week unless it is highly organised with flat mates. It is great to want to self-cater, but it is not always the wisest decision. DD always recommends catered for the first year as it takes a lot of pressure off and is excellent for making friends. Regarding friends- they are important. If he is not going out and socialising, he may get left out. This would not be good so try and talk to him about work/life balance and that he needs to keep his head above water but going out is a release from pressure . There will always be those who will sail through everything but he will find his level before too long. Suggest to him that he looks critically at his workload and plan what he needs to do and when. No first year course should take all hours so a critical evaluation of what is required is important.

I do hope he can see a way through and he is definitely not alone.

Ds1 went through exactly this sort of thing last year (also doing a full on STEM subject at a top university). It was partly struggling to take care of himself and study but his primary problem was as described by soapybox - his standards were just too high. He berated himself if he didn't get an A in everything and put himself under horrendous pressure. He wasn't alone and one of his friends was gently chastised by a tutor for thinking she should be aiming for marks of 90% plus all the time. The tutor had to remind her that 70% is a first!

Luckily ds1 wasn't far away so we encouraged regular visits home. I also sometimes had to be near his university for work so I would take him out for lunch. Obviously if Manchester is far away that won't be an option for you but the main benefit of it was keeping lines of communication open. This you are clearly doing and it is brilliant that he feels he can tell you the bad stuff. Ds1 also took full advantage of all the support offered by the university including support from his tutor and stress management sessions that were provided.

A big thing for ds1 was realising that he was not alone in feeling the way he did. Lots of students have the idea that everyone else is having a great time and coping without any problems but it just isn't true. I wish you lots of luck - just keep talking to him and "being there" for him. I feel your pain - this time last year I thought ds1 was going to have to leave but he is still there, still a perfectionist, still sometimes trying too hard and working too much but it is better than it was and he is much better able to cope. I'm sure things will pick up for your ds too.

Apologies for the essay!!!!!

How lovely that he feels able to tell you of his struggles and that you're trying to help. The main thing I would suggest is to make sure that your son is telling someone - personal tutor, lecturer, academic counselor, whomever. If it's course specific, his tutor should be able to help, or at least give him an idea of how most of his peers are dealing with the course (not grades, of course, but going back to soapybox's comment, it might be a fruitless quest for perfection that is the issue, rather than the actual quality of his work.)

I hope it works out for him, and it must be hard seeing him so upset.

The sciences at A level are relatively light in workload and most students haven't had to work hard to get good grades in then

......said no student ever

Do you think your son is having any doubts about the course? If he is 'just' struggling with the workload then it's arguably easier to deal with than if he is struggling with whether he wants to pack it in.

OP I did chemical engineering and it's a bloody exhausting degree. There were more times than I care to remember when I found myself completely overwhelmed with coursework, lectures, labs...... All my friends from school did Arty degrees and were in about 2 hours a week where as I had a full time degree. I remember crying lots about wanting to quit but my parents convinced me not to.

Roll on 15 years and all the hard work was worth it. What kept me going was, at the time, chemical engineers were the highest paid graduates.

If he's struggling he should speak to his tutors or maybe just needs to come home for a feed.

I do feel that my uni years were not the fun drunken party years I thought they would be however as an adult I know they set me up for the future.

I left after 8 weeks. I came home got a part time job and did another A Level. Found when I applied the following year (closer to home) I had matured a little and coped much better!
Bless him it is difficult!!!!

Wow, thank you ALL for your advice and support

mysterycat re the 1st year exams, he wants to transfer to,the MEng Year in Industry course, for,which he needs to get quite a high percentage (can't remember what this is)

soapybox yes! he probably is setting his standards high. He's always done very well academically and is a real perfectionist.

chemenger
The students I see who do well and seem happy are those who concentrate on getting things done rather than too marks This is interesting - and something I'll pass onto DS.

HighPriestess yes! he is Halls. I wonder whether he realises there's a Pastoral Tutor on hand? I'll pass that on too.

chattermummy'your message is so reassuring. I will print that off for DS.

minmooch thank you so much for your kind offer. I will see what DS thinks.

Over perfectionism is a significant problem. So often I mark something, give feedback and sit back thinking "that was very good, that student should be proud" only to have the student come and see me near to tears or furious because I have given a B for part of the work. Rather than read the feedback and think how they can improve in the future they start the conversation with "everyone else got an A for this" (in the same way that everyone else had an I-phone when they were 11). Then we have a conversation and usually they come to understand what they need to work on. Their focus is on the mark not the learning. From our point of view an assessment where everyone gets full marks is not fair, because it doesn't reward hard work or ability, there is a growing group of students who seem to believe the opposite.

As nearly all students have achieved highly to get on the course in the first place, it is inevitable that some will end up with a 2:2 and some will get firsts on engineering courses, with the majority getting 2:1. Therefore some under-achieve, others over-achieve and others get the degree you would expect! The students cannot all expect firsts, can they? This sounds totally unrealistic. Does anyone know why they expect this?

Where very many students have been high achievers, should universities do more to help students have reasonable expectations and a healthy work/life balance? Thoughts appreciated and no criticism intended.

If had to describe students' expectations I would say that at least 90% of them aspire a 2.1 or better and 50% aspire to a first. Given that a first is described as representing attainment well beyond what is expected at this level, there is always disappointment. Students fail to realise that to get a first we need to see higher understanding, synthesis and application of ideas and critical analysis, not just a lot of work. So doing something competently two different ways does not move the grade up. Doing it very well one way with insight into the uncertainties involved and ideas of how it could be improved will. The problem is that not all students can do the second thing and they substitute volume of lower level work for the insight, they do twice as many hours of work, get a lower mark and are bitterly disappointed and sometimes plain bitter.

DD has found the change difficult. She has gone from being a 'top set' school pupil to being middle of the road and not feeling very clever at all. As I have pointed of to her, the grade requirements for her course were A*AA so everyone is a high attainer. At school, they were expected to aim for 90%+ now the mark requirements are a lot lower to end up with a good 2.1 or even a pass. It is a huge change for them learning to be living independently as well as a difficult course. They will hopefully get there in the end.

My dd also found 1st year hard going. She is in 2nd year now lot more happier with everything work wise. It wasn't till 6/7 months into the course that she turned a corner.

For her it was getting her head round to a completely different way of thinking and learning to get better marks in her essays

I blame it on A levels how they are set up. Students are stuck with exam boundaries/ mark schemes, what constitutes a 'A grade' etc is clearly defined. Which in way gives them a limited way of thinking and in way fixed ti to their minds. The whole intelligence thing, becomes a tick boxing exercise. And the more boxes they tick the higher grades they get. The more they feel thats how things are defined, which is no good at uni level. Plus also it pretty much fuels perfectionism which is partly caused by this learnt behaviour. The gcse/A level way of learning requires alot of remembering, understanding and application skills. Whereas Analysing, evaluating and critiquing skill is very limited. Uni learning is probably more of the latter 3 skills as another poster mentioned. It's hard for them to grasp it if they've never been properly taught it or they lack the confidence to argue and defend a judgement on a piece of work or researchave. When they have perfectionism as well to breakdown and re- un learn those traits, it's hard work for them.

One assumes that 50% aiming for a first is not realistic, so who can help the students work smarter? Less work, but still get a 2:1. In Engineering where good graduates are sought after, a 2:1 is surely respectable and they are still very employable.

My DH finds it is not always the people with firsts that demonstrate the best skills at work. For example, dealing with clients and working collaboratively is a highly desirable skill that is not always present in some graduates. Therefore it is a good thing for students to join societies, have a life outside studying and become a rounded personality, not just a work machine. It is a shame if students are working themselves to a standstill but could do less for the same result and gain other skills with the extra time they could get back into their lives.

Spoke to a much happier DS today.

It was a brief conversation - he was out house hunting for next year and wanted to know if £100 a week rent was doable!!

bojorojo DS has mild Asperger's Syndrome so not sure if dealing with clients etc will come that easily!

However, he has joined a couple of societies which we're really pleased about!

I'm glad he's sounding brighter today!

One thing I will point out that Manchester has is Peer Assisted Study Sessions, which have the formal academic help from older students, but I'm sure they'll also do informal chats about coping with workload etc. www.ceas.manchester.ac.uk/study/undergraduate/pass/

They've also got a counselling service, which students can self refer to and is totally free www.counsellingservice.manchester.ac.uk/

One thing I would say about Manchester student rents is
(a) £100pw is excessive, unless it includes all bills and a live-in butler
(b) there's no need to rush into renting a house. This is partly because Manchester has an oversupply of student housing, partly because prices drop once you get to Easter or so (this is the point where landlords and agents start fretting about having an empty house for the next academic year) but there's still enough choice
(c) it can be better to wait - he's only known his prospective flatmates for 2 months, but he's signing a £25k (or whatever) contract with people that he will have to live with for 10-22 months from now. Does he know them well enough?

That said, I know it can be hard to get freshers to listen to that advice. If he speaks to some more savvy 3rd/4th year students then they might be able to impart that information themselves! Has he come across Manchester Student Homes yet? They can dispense impartial advice on such matters...

Thank you rightsaid for those links! that's really helpful.

I have no idea about rent prices in Manchester and DS and his mates probably don't either! I know the £100 does include bills but no mention of a butler!

I completely agree with you re the time scale but I'm guessing, as you say, if I bring this issue up he will tell,me that they're all great mates (because they've known each other for an incredibly long time......!)

Due to his AS though, I'm going to let him take the lead on this one as the social side of things at Uni was always a big worry for me so the fact he's found some mates who all (at this stage!) want out make this commitment is very reassuring.

Re the Peer Assisted Study Sessions, I do remember that for the Open Day, I thought it was a brilliant idea so,I'll definitely remind him of this resource.

Glad things are looking up!