Applying for Uni 2020

[daydreamornot]

Thought it may be nice to have a 2020 support thread, everyone welcome! (maybe Oxbridge posts could be kept to the Oxbridge thread).

Philosophy

Paninis? It was a cheese & ham toastie in wavy triangles in my university days!

Indeed Hoghgyni! In fact, getting any food whatsoever involved a 15 min trek over to the Students Union building in my day. And when you got there, the shop was in a grotty pre-fab building. In contrast, there is now a choice of smart looking coffee bars dotted all over the place and everything is remarkably clean. University is clearly a different experience these days.

So we're back, totally shattered. Worked out we've done 525 miles on 8 different trains over the last 2 days - the things we do eh!

We liked Nottingham Campus and the course but we had to spend a couple of hours in the City centre and he wasn't impressed.

We loved York, both the campus and city and it's definitely on the list.

Funnily enough, I did see a woman eating a pack of Pombears - I smiled at her and she smiled back but she might just have been being friendly. So, if it was you, hello again

How did everyone else get on?

DD liked Nottingham but didn't love it. She was hoping it might be her insurance but the stories about shortage of accommodation in the past few years have put her off.

She has finally made the decision to not continue with her EPQ.
Neither of her top choices offer reduced grades for it, so the amount of work involved just doesn't seem worth it.
Not that she minds hard work, and would probably have enjoyed doing it - she was very enthusiastic about her subject and did a lot of research over the summer. But time is the problem - she just doesn't have enough of it and something had to go.
I'm so relieved!
I was worried she'd taken too much on considering how important this year is. This will hopefully give her a bit of extra breathing space.

We have a parents evening next week where she will be given final predicted grades and a look at her UCAS reference.
It's all getting real!!

We've driven a similar number of miles wine since midday yesterday. I didn't have the Pom Bears, just a slightly fraught look as I was watching the clock to drive home again.

Freebies: 2 bag lock clips, 4 pens, 3 magnetic postcards, 4 bottle stoppers to prevent drinks being soiled and 2 Bags of Potential tote bags.

No EPQ here either...but very much the right decision for DD...

DD knows the course and Uni she would like to attend so it's just a case of focusing on achieving those grades...

Ditto on the EPQ here. Just remembered there's aY13 form Tutor evening this week so we can hopefully confirm predicted grades.

Same here. Dd is much happier now she's decided to not do EPQ.
Parents evening for us on Thursday where I'm hoping we get confirmation of her predicted grades.

Hoghgyni
DS loves a freebie. Best freebie so far was a surprisingly good quality 30cm "scale of the universe" ruler from Nottingham.

DH & DS did the Wars of the Roses open days this weekend - Lancaster on Saturday & York on Sunday - I was on stage on Saturday night, so couldn't go. DS liked both, but preferred Lancaster. (Didn't manage to come home with many freebies, though!) That just leaves us with the potential trek of doing Exeter & UEA on the same weekend in October - hey ho!

The main issue at the moment, I think, is that Lancaster, York & Exeter all have a standard offer of AAB. He's reasonably confident he can hit that, but his results so far don't really back that up, so I'm a bit concerned that he's over-reaching. UEA is BBB, so that should be his backstop (aaargh, hate that word now!), and his aspirational is St Andrews (AAA).

I don't know quite how much guidance he'll be getting from college, or whether we get any meetings at all, but I'm hoping they'll be able to help him decide whether he needs to swap one of his current five for somewhere else with a slightly lower standard offer.

Weirdly we have a Y13 information meeting on Thursday as well! So I’m hoping to find out when we hear about UCAS predicted grades. DS is also hoping to drop the EPQ, but hasn’t had it officially agreed yet.

DS has chosen 5 universities but I think he’s likely to get the same offer for all 5. It’s hard to find a reasonable insurance that didn’t have places in clearing. All the reasonably local maths courses seem to be AAA. For aspirational, he doesn’t want Warwick because DS1 went there, Bath and London are too expensive, Bristol not a campus, Oxford too aspirational etc.

@MillicentMartha Is Cambridge too close to home...he has super predicted grades so should get an interview ...

@oneofthegiantsisme - At DD's school they have a meeting with the Careers advisor and discuss the predicted grades alongside the desired Uni courses...if the predicted grades are out by just one grade (overall so not on each A-Level). The student can put forward an argument on whether that grade can be achieved or whether they need to re-think their choices....

oneteen his GCSE grades weren’t good enough for Oxbridge and while his maths is very good, his 3rd subject isn’t amazing. Maths at Cambridge is incredibly competitive. He’ll be really happy at any of his choices and we’ll be able to use clearing as insurance if last year was anything to go by.

MillicentMartha
I realise the Y13s might have some idea of what their predicted grades are likely to be, but the school seems to be leaving it rather late to confirm them. Hopefully there won't be any pupils who have to do a complete rethink.

When is the school's internal deadline for early applications (Oxbridge, medicine etc)? Perhaps the school is extremely quick at turning around UCAS forms, adding references etc.

@MillicentMartha - I think Maths at Cambridge is competitive but were his predictions A A A - I think he would be in for a shout... GCSE's are less relevant at Cambridge BUT if he's happy that's all that matters.

@ironoaks - I think some schools leave it quite late - all of DD's year is getting their final predictions this week/meet with the careers officer ...most have finalized PS and UCAS applications though. The Oxbridge applicants have been sitting mock entrance exams and the homework still seems to be relentless and in terms of DD's subjects totally beyond my comprehension...not sure where the Scientist in the family has evolved from.

DD is going to press ping tomorrow. I'm still banned from seeing any part of her application.

Do you get a reject message if they are not going to make you an offer?

Hoghgyni
The applicant receives an email from UCAS whenever one of their chosen universites has made a decision. The applicant can then log into Track to view the decision.

oneteen you’re very kind, but realistically GCSE grades of 9777766555 aren’t enough for Oxbridge. He’s lucky that he can do 2x maths A levels! He’ll be much happier in the middle to top at whatever uni he ends up in than struggling.

Ironoaks their student deadline for early entry is 30th Sept. They have a 200 strong Y13 but only around 10% will be early entry. Their student deadline otherwise is 5th Dec. The predicted grades deadline for the teachers isn’t until 28th Nov.

MillicentMartha
Giving out predicted grades up to the end of November seems late to me. The open days will have finished. Although I suppose people could apply without visiting and then visit on an offer-holder day.

Hopefully the 20 or so early applicants will receive their predicted grades by the beginning of October.

So 5 options could feasibly drop to just 2 or 3 within the next few weeks? Oh my goodness, at least we will know either way.

Sorry, I've now read your reply properly and you said that the internal deadline for the early applicants is 30 September. So they'd need to know their predicted grades quite soon really.

So 5 options could feasibly drop to just 2 or 3 within the next few weeks?
Or they could receive no news about any of them for 3 months or more.