Are all universities full of drug-taking party animals?

[Fibbke]

A friends dd is half Danish and after looking around a few unis in this country has decided to go to university in Copenhagen. She was horrified by the "drugs and the squalor" at the unis she looked at and knew people at. My own dd is very put off going to uni for the same reason.

Do they have a point?

OP there are kids at your child's school who take drugs. She's managed to avoid them at school and got in with her life, why wouldn't she do the same at university. You do your child a huge disservice thinking it's going to be awful and everyone will be sat at the back of the lecture theatre with a rolled up £20 note.

She'll meet a few kids who openly smoke weed. She'll probably find they're perfectly nice decent people who won't force her to partake if she doesn't want to. The idea that everyone takes drugs, and by extension she will have to as well is ridiculous.

There will be hundreds of groups she can join to meet people from different courses and residences.

And the point someone was making about working with drug users was that if she doesn't want to join in she should feel comfortable enough around such people to say no without being rude and pissing them off.

And the point someone was making about working with drug users was that if she doesn't want to join in she should feel comfortable enough around such people to say no without being rude and pissing them off

Why on earth should she worry about pissing off cokeheads or alcoholics? They'll almost certainly come up with a random reason to be pissed off anyway!

Why on earth should she worry about pissing off cokeheads or alcoholics?

Because working with other people is an important life skill. Because she's working in a team with them. Because one of them is her boss. Lots of reasons. Do you think if she worked with Michael Gove and told him he was a disgusting coke head that her career would go well?

I'm not condoning drug taking, but most recreational drug users are perfectly ok.

Well, i think theres a difference between a 'cokehead and alcoholic' and someone who does the occasional line of coke or occasionally gets pissed. If the drug use is serious enough to define them, and this means that people around them have to deal with them differently to how they would treat others then they have a serious problem.

Can't be worse than at ds's (very good) secondary school/sixth form. I'm not worried.

Dd1 came home early last year as she'd arranged to meet her mates in the pub and they were all on ket. Ketamine to go to the pub is fucking scuzzy. These are good students, two oxbridge, from a good state comp. I think its really sad and very different from smoking a bit of weed.

Watchingblueplanet: As I have said before and I will say it again: if you go to the University of Bristol there are the catered halls that give exactly the type of old fashioned student experience you talk about. Common rooms, dining hall, hall activities, Chapel if you want it and no large social spaces in the clusters of rooms. It’s a collegiate feel and students should choose these halls to avoid parties. If DC choose self catering with decent sized kitchens and flats, this is the type of accommodation that lends itself to parties!!! It is not rocket science to see why these flats are chosen by party types. Anywhere near the city centre is chosen by those who want clubs nearby. Ditto flats around The Triangle in y2.

I realise not many universities have catered halls with a dining room but it does help with avoiding parties. I hear all the time that students don’t want to pay for meals and then not take them. In my view, that’s a small price to pay and worth it to find students you actually get on with.

I also know Bristol do move students around. Some students decide the course isn’t right for them and there is some movement after Christmas. Students just have to keep asking about a move via the accommodation office.

First year can be full of DC let off the leash and experimenting. That’s always been true. I think though that students have to expect a bit of partying, drinking and some drug taking around them. It would be the same in their home locations for many. It’s a matter of having the maturity to move on and ignore the excesses in first year. Students never have to see these students again after first year. They move into houses with decent friends. The party types stick together.

Ket seems to be the teen drug of choice here too, it was always the real druggies that took it where I lived in the 80's .

That's so worrying re Ketamine and I say that as someone who was no stranger to rave culture in the 90's.

Bubbles, perhaps you should reread some of your old posts.

I appreciate your DDs views may have changed over the years, perhaps in light of social changes at Bristol. However three/four years ago when DD was making her choices you were a very strong advocate of Stoke Bishop, full stop, and quite scathing of city centre halls. In retrospect there is a case for advice on this board to acknowledge known problems.

I appreciate that inevitably your DDs views will change in the light of her ongoing experience . However assuming she has stayed in Wills throughout, she remains quite sheltered. Wills tends to suit some, but not everyone. Other SB halls have a definite drugs problem. I appreciate DC dont tell you everything but I believe DD when she said she was the only one in her large first year flat not using ket. Indeed I met someone by chance who knew one of the others, and who could confirm they are now in real trouble.

Not sure about Bristol, but certainly dd has no choice of halls. She can put 6 in order of preference but realistically could get any.

It's all down to the friendship group to be honest. The hardest partiers and most prolific drug users I knew were medical students and British Indians/Pakistanis 🙈 🤷‍♀️

As for people being sure that their kids don't do drugs... My most unassuming of friends introduced me to MDMA. Her mum would say the same if you asked her. "Not my daughter..." 👀

The parties were legendary.

How do you know everyone is taking drugs?

If she's sensible like you believe she is then she'll join the choir or the Larping society and have a lovely drug free / booze free time. If she's not happy in her Hal's
She can move. If you are religious, look at chaplaincy residency.

& yes, re: ketamine. My unassuming friend used to take that too. I didn't.

Stoke Bishop has two catered halls. That’s why I suggest Stoke Bishop. One year in Wills is the norm! As for my DD being sheltered!! What a joke!

As the problems reported on here are in self catering halls. Xenia and I who have/had DC in Wills say something different about that hall. You don’t have to believe us, of course, but your DD wasn’t in it. The larger flats are not the best places to be and halls near the clubs and bars have a different vibe.

You can express a preference at most universities and I fully recognise that many do not have traditional catered halls. It’s also fair to say a lot of ex boarding school DC like them as they are a continuation of school. However they do offer the type of experience that some parents want for their DC so it’s wise to consider that type of hall if it’s on offer.

She's not particularly religious but yes she will probably sing in the choir.

Not sure how easy it is to move!

There's a lot of odd posts on here that seem to be saying its easy to avoid drugs, while simultaneously saying that parents who say their kids dint do drugs are deluding themselves. If its easy to avoid drug taking, then it makes sense that some parents who say their dcs don't do drugs might actually be right!

My twns in Wills and Churchill Halls (both catered, both Bristol, both Stoke Brishop) last year (they are in year2 (almost year 3 now)) had a good time and liked the structure of meals, etc. One played his trumpet occasionally in chapel services at Wills, did a lot of sport . Neither of mine smoke although they drink if going out with friends. the fact they know people who smoke has not made them smokers - thankfully.

I believe ket bladder was first identified as a condition by physicians in Bristol.

Yes. The City can be a bit like that but it’s hardly the student body that’s suffering to that extent and most leave Bristol behind at 21 or 22.

I think most students weigh up fellow students they come into contact with. Therefore they generally end up with like minded friends. You do, however, have to be persistent about moving halls. Several changes were made when DD was there and I know others who have changed since. Universities do take this seriously now but of course a lot of accommodation is full.

Bubbles - as I have said before my DD didn’t not choose the hall she was allocated. And from what she has said Wills is not immune to drug problems either. My DD did find some like minded friends but it’s pretty crap when in your first weeks no one you meet is like you or shares your values.

And frankly it’s selfish when some of the behaviour of other students and their “legendary parties” scares you and impacts on your mental health. Onethread - you might have been having a fantastic time but did you ever think about the impact you had on anyone else?

Knowledgeable Manchester people - any advice on not-so-party halls for DS?

(He does drink, but I believe him when he says he avoids drugs given that we also have a close family drug-disaster in the background).

My DS goes to Uni this September. We live in a rural area, close to a pretty market town, the sort of place that is packed with tourists for 9 months of the year. There are people who take drugs around here, DS knows who they are and knows where he could get drugs from if he wanted them.

I think you have to be realistic. Any environment where young people are living together without much intervention from adults for the first time is going to create some issues. Some kids are going to go wild and alcohol and drug use is going to be a problem.

I have encouraged my son to be independent and go out and see different people and places before he goes to Uni. I hope I have taught him enough common sense to say no and stand up to peer pressure. We have talked about what its like to want to fit in in a new environment, but how this can easily lead to the wrong choices.

I would be surprised if drugs and alcohol misuse wasn't going on at any University, but it doesn't mean that your son or daughter has to be part of it. Dealing with lots of different people and situations and is all part of the experience.

Copenhagen is likely to be different as alcohol is way more expensive than in the UK so possibly not such a student thing.

However Denmark has a massive beer and alcohol culture so deluding themselves if they think everyone there will be teetotal remembers Danish relatives who thought 10am was an OK time to start drinking

If you are posh then drugs and alcohol are more likely simply because those students have the budget for it.

But you can equally well get through uni seeing hardly any, or just avoiding those students as universities are big enough for you to find your own crowd and if you want to get on and study, then you will do.

I meet a lot of Cambridge students and they tell me cheerfully about the drinking clubs - some of them have been. But the average student is there to study and getting on with it, not partying like mad. They might do it a few times a year, but then, didn't we all.