Would it be foolish to not choose a Russell Group uni?

[MollyHuaCha]

DD has 5 uni offers inc. two from RG universities to study history. Mock exams and grade predictions indicate that she is likely to achieve the required grades for all five places.

Common sense tells me she should put the two RG unis as 1st and insurance choices.

But she is now talking of putting one of the other unis as 1st choice simply because she prefers the city it's in.

Ultimately it's her decision not mine, but she's unsure and keeps asking other people that they think of this.

College tutor recommends the RG universities. But DD says this is for their own benefit, not hers.

Any thoughts from anyone about this I could share with her please?

I'm told RG are very exam based,

I don't think you can generalise that much!!! Good point about checking assessment methods and choosing according to your strengths though.

Thanks everyone for this discussion. I'm still following!

We told our two DSs that for value-for-money, it needed to be RG, Bath or St Andrews.

Fees are the same wherever you go, and 9,250 for a university that ranks low on the tables and offers very little contact time, it is basically a rip-off.

For history I'd favour the RG option. BUT the quality of course content is also important to consider. What will be your DD's ticket when she steps out into the world of work? Will it be the actual History degree....maybe if will be if she intends to teach or stay within that field? If it's not the degree itself and she heads towards multinationals for any career discipline (law, marketing etc) then the RG tag does carry weight .....along with a min 2:1

....we have same dilemma btw but for medicine. Look at Which?university re: satisfaction, employability and starting salaries for each place and course.

"it is basically a rip-off"

I don't think things are that simple. Academic Universities (and RG is a sort of proxy) will suit academic students. Other students may find their careers launched by studying for vocational type qualifications elsewhere. So product design at Northumbria. Or marketing at Bournemouth. For example I can think of a couple of German students who studied Finance at Bournemouth. Perhaps not the most academic course, but in English with a placement in the third year in a town where several large banks have back-office operations.

Yes fees might have been the same as history at St Andrews, but I assume they will return home equally employable.

I visited Royal Holloway & Bedford college (a gothic castley thing) but disliked the people - plumped for Nottingham as the people were cool, course was fun, campus was excellent and I'd heard nightlife was up there! That was in 1989. I'd never heard of RG. TBH the RG woman does come across as being up own bottom. But I was lead to believe that RG have significant research v others and that's what sets them apart.....that might not be as relevant for an arts degree?

That was in 1989. I'd never heard of RG.

Because the Russell Group was only invented in 1994.

Fees are the same wherever you go, and 9,250 for a university that ranks low on the tables and offers very little contact time, it is basically a rip-off.

What "tables" are you referring to? Are these the league tables produced to sell newspapers? You do realize they're not official rankings, don't you? There's no Ofsted equivalent: the Quality Assurance Agency and the Higher Education Statistics Agency don't produce league tables. Journalists do. And their methods for calculating scores & rankings are often quite odd.

Contact time varies much more with subject than institution. An English degree will have little contact time wherever you study because you're meant to spend most of your time reading books. A chemistry degree will have a lot of contact time wherever you study because you have to be fed a lot of stuff and spend many hours in laboratories.

Sussex is an excellent university. If she really prefers it I don’t think she’d be throwing away her entire life if she chose it above a RG uni.

The notion of a Russell group university is dying anyway. As universities have become bent on business they care more about the profitability of undergraduates than grades. Many have already began to lower their entry requirements.

Your daughter is right, the teacher is reaching for good school statistics more than anything.

Thanks. She's STILL deciding...

OP, where did DD decide on in the end? DS is also looking at Sussex.