Personal Statements

[whateveryousay]

Am I the only person drafting their child's personal statement?

Please tell me I'm not alone.

Oh @PiratePanda I feel your pain. We may be going into Clearing possibly for the first time ever in history (falling birth rate, bloody Gove and co.) and I can't be there (am not admissions tutor this year but have been in the past & have valuable experience). I can't believe how guilty I feel having to explain to my HoD that I'd booked annual leave for the week of August results because of an important - and difficult - family event ie it won't be an actual holiday. One week! I feel I can't even take 1 week ...

Shall we storm Andrew Adonis office and tell him to boil his head and then fuck off to the far side of fuck and then fuck off some more?

Quite a few Unis don't start until early October so it's not too much of a stretch. - Warwick, Northampton, Coventry, Oxford etc

I'm sure it could be done somehow.

Well, that's very nice Articu _ I'm sure I could rock up to my VC and say airily "Oh I'm sure it could be done somehow." Yes, we'll teach all the way through Christmas - we'll give the students Christmas Eve and Boxing Day off, but we'll expect them back in lectures on 27th December.

Or - oh I know, we'll only teach an 8 week term. I'm sure it can be done somehow!

@WeyHay . Adonis (not!)....don't get me started. My DH was up at Oxford with him, says he was appalling even then. Loved Athene Donald's response (I love her; have had a bit to do with her one way or another over the years.)

Yes, we technically aren't in clearing, and as things stand I shouldn't get a call, but our subject across the country has been suffering a downturn in applications, so there is a possibility we might take a few. Last year they didn't ring; I just sat in the local deli for two days feeling like a lemon.

Yes, Athene Donald, and now also Mary Beard.

Good to hear he was an arse at Ox. I suspected as much. Did you read the brilliant thread of Tweets by Christina de Bellaigue about what Ox was like for a JRF in the 80s.

Brought back such nostalgia for me - those carefree days before REF & TEF and QAA and ...

WayHey

Not sure why you felt the need to be quite so sarcastic but never mind.

Changing the system to allow for students to apply with achieved results isnt exactly a new idea. There are plenty of people that advocate it. I can't google well as I'm on my phone but a quick google flags up numerous reports and articles supporting a change. I've easily found THIS article on the University and College Union website which includes the following..

UCU polled 2,156 of its members at universities and colleges across the UK who help students with their university applications or are involved in the admissions process. Of the 1,120 respondents to the question about when students should reply to university, seven in 10 respondents (70%) backed the creation of a system which would see students apply to university once they had received their grades

...so presumably it's not that ridiculous a suggestion.

The current system isn't working. Predicted grades are getting more and more inaccurate every year and personal statements are of questionable use for many courses (but not all) University places should be awarded on merit not on guesswork. (and yes, I do understand that at the highest tariff Universities this is much less of a problem than at other Universities)

Changing the system so that students applied after receiving their results would require a lot of thought and would obviously be more complex than just shortening the first semester at University.

(Sorry for any typos and poor English. I'm on my small phone and I'm not good at English!)

The current systems not that bad actually. Places ARE awarded on merit - actual grades. It's offers that are given based on predicted grades and if the grades are better or worse there's a robust system in place to deal with that.

Universities can't wholesale start a term later (it takes more than a few weeks to apply for many many courses so a mid October start wouldn't work for those that use interviews, portfolio, exams like BMAT, LNAT etc), and you can't reduce the time the exam boards need to turn around A level papers.

Articu if you the thread you'll see I am one of those who would welcome a post-results system. However, there are very very complex timings and also habitual practice which would need a very detailed, careful think through, rather than your "I'm sure it could be worked out somehow."

For those of us working in HE (and working long hours for increasingly little thanks or valuing of what we do), that sort of comment is risible. Particularly when - on current appalling record -- our government is likely simply to shoehorn it in, with little regard for academic work/life balance & mental health.

And titchy makes good points about the way the system works now. The problem is the way that parents & schools try to play the system.

Which brings us back to the problematic attitude of the 1st post on this thread - "drafting" a DC's personal statement is writing it for them, and contrary to the spirit & intent of the personal statement.

I have not drafted any of my 5 children's ever. I do like to look ati t before it goes in. The twins' school this time last year wanted first drafts in before end of school term in July which mine managed and then it was all finalised in the Autumn. The school has a lot of checks over it by their tutor and ultimately by the teacher in charge of admissions. one of my twins wrote a really unusual and very personal to him statement which amazed me actually last year. Even his head mentioned it to me. We had both been struck by it. The other's was more like their older siblings and bit more run of the mill. Let your son have a go himself and then see if the school can help improve it if it needs improvement.

Wayhey

I'm not sure why you still feel the need to be so condescending. My comments weren't 'risible'. Did you miss the bit where I said Changing the system so that students applied after receiving their results would require a lot of thought and would obviously be more complex than just shortening the first semester at University 🤷🏻‍♀️ I haven't suggested it would easy.

I'm not involved in admissions and I get that means my comments have less weight than those that do but the fact that so many people that DO work in admissions favour a change makes me think that it's not a viewpoint that deserves to be ridiculed even if you don't agree with it. The study I quoted early stated 7 out of 10 people working in admissions that were involved in the survey backed a change to the system to one where students applied with achieved grades.

You've missed the point twice now: I would like to see a post-award admissions system. But your comment that "Something can be worked out" came from a position of ignorance and was silly.

WayHey
Why are you so rude and patronising? Are you that blunt in real life ? . My comment wasn't based on ignorance. You've picked out one sentence in my posts, put your own slant on it and decided to ignore the rest of my measured comments.

Anyway, I suspect you might be trying to wind me up for fun now so I'll leave you to it. 😶

I quite like the idea of postponing the start of the university year until January to allow a post A level results admission system. Students could earn a bit more money between end of A levels and December; that time would give them a mini gap year. End of university year exams would be November/ December.

I would rather they pushed on as now otherwise they might drop out and find it hard to get back into the studying routine if they had to wait until January. The pre A level system works pretty well and it is very useful having a central UCAS system rather than having to apply to individual places. If it's ain't broke don't fix it. We have had far too many changes recently already - this cohort - my twins have some old style and some new style A levels. It will be interesting to compare the twins - one has 2 new system - all on this year's exas and the other 2 in the old system - the latter may have an advantage (particularly as they both got AAAA in AS last year).

From a new students point of view I think that'd be pretty ideal Send. It would mean that they could really focus on their a levels without being too distracted at all of the which uni should I go to stuff. They could also nail learning to drive if they've not had a chance before too.

End of university year exams would be November/ December.

There are pros & cons for either way. I wouldn't like to be teaching through the summer frankly, and to have the 3 month break for students over November-February woulds be awful. Neither students nor academic staff would get the possibility for a decent "sunshine" holiday for a start (I treasure the one week I manage away from my work over the summer).

But OTOH, I don't think it's a bad thing for students to get off the study treadmill. They then have the chance to find out whether they really want to go to university, rather than it being the next conventional step in middle-class life.

They'd have to go back to learning because they wanted to, rather than because they're on the conveyor belt.

Starting in January would be administratively lovely!

However it wouldn't be great for learning - academically students would be much weaker having had a six month gap - and particularly disastrous for subjects like maths. Many wouldn't bother. And what are quarter of a million 18 year olds supposed to do for six months? Not all can get short term jobs, or afford gap years. Child benefit would have to continue to be paid. Many parents would struggle financially.

And universities would lose five months of income in the first year - who'd plug that gap?

swinggofthimgs I did.
I have 4 dc and teach, i feel very strongly that dc should get places on merit ( i turned down an offer by my grandparents to get me into medicine when i failed by 1 grade back in 1993.)
I currently have 3 dc at uni, inc one at Bristol doimg medicine on the strength of his ps, i did not draft it, or write it in any way, the dc is bright and clever, albeit dyslexic. The dc got an offer presumably based on academics, and the fact they were head boy, played in the first fifteen and had been volunteering at a physically and mentally habdicapped club for three years, they also had a load of relevant work exp. i think it may also have played to them that they turned up,to interview on an appalling day without mum or dad ( we were at work)

titchy
And universities would lose five months of income in the first year - who'd plug that gap?
Fair point although compared to the pensions deficit .
There would be ways on increasing income, including short foundation courses not relying on A levels plus postgraduate courses.
Re students losing momentum, I don't think it is insurmountable even for mathematicians to have an extra 3 months without losing motivation and skills.
Summer term teaching would be the price to pay but actually exam marking is not much fun either.

How does a university know you didn't take the student to the interview? You don't go in with them! However, they need to draft the ps. They need to do the relevant work experience. They need to do the degree. All you should do is discuss and steer!

Surely if the course remains the same length there wouldn't be an income loss?

Rosie as a mum of an aspiring med student I know how hard your ds must have worked to get into Bristol and congratulations to him. He sounds fab. But really, no school staff or other professional read and edited a dyslexic student's medicine PS? I find that surprising and remiss of his school if that's the case.

And perhaps you didn't take him to his uni interviews or read his PS, but who took him to all those rugby matches for all those years? Who supported him to do all that volunteering from the age of 13/ 14? Who supported a dyslexic student through the minefield of SATs, GSCEs and A levels? I'm guessing he had an enormous amount of loving and positive support (social and academic) from a pretty clued-up family and a decent school. And absolutely nothing wrong with that. My ds has had all that too, as have most medical students. But to claim he did it all based entirely on academics is perhaps disingenuous not acknowledging the other advantages he has had that not every student gets. And if getting their mum to read through a PS is the best or only support a dc can get, then it's unreasonable to imagine that they're not going to do that.

Sorry Haffdonga.
I was not intending to be disengenious, of course he had lots of support at home, and is advantaged in many respects. The PHAB club ran on Friday nights from six thirty to nine, and yes no public transport so i took him and collected him every week 😳
I also did not mean to suggest that no one looked at his ps, his tutor at school did, but after he had written it and rewritten it.
What i am objecting to is parents actually writing the wretched thing, expecially as nearly always their dc will be like yours and mine, getting plenty of advantages in all other respects.

This is the best guide (and method) I know of for writing personal statements.

Full disclosure: I'm completely biased in recommending it, as I created and developed this approach over the 10 years I spent supporting young people with applications to university (which is also how I know it works).

Don't the vast majority of DC go to their med school interviews by public transport on their own? I don't think one can claim anything exceptional about that, even in grim weather, strikes etc.

But I agree it's irritating if parents do the PS. Absurd really, even if they apply to a uni where the PS isn't read.

titchy yes quite about all those DC looking for short term work.

Also yes about not fixing something which isn't broke.