Heading towards year 3 exams (uni 2017)

[Xenia]

Continuation of www.mumsnet.com/Talk/higher_education/3538808-heading-towards-year-2-exams-uni-2017 as we have reached page 40.

Hard to believe they are all in year 3 now and many will finish university in June 2020.

Dd1 has an exam tomorrow at uni. 3rd year medics are going straight into 4th year when they return after summer but the dentists are still at uni . Think its inevitable that they will finish soon though.

Hope all goes well for your DD tomorrow, Redhen.

Thank you for that 20latedecember1963. I sort of want them both home with me now. Dd1 was at least able to enjoy her halfway ball on Saturday which is more than a lot of end of uni students will have. Just wondering how long schools will limp on for.

Sorry, RedHelenB, for the misspelling of your name. 😊
I've had a call to work tomorrow as my regular school has 2 TAs off and the Head said they may need me for the rest of the week.

I ve still got work too but I can’t see them staying open much longer now that any social gatherings are not advised.

Good Luck to your DD tomorrow RedHelenB.

Thanks Horsemad. Shes coming home Wednesday as shes got elderly patients for clinic and it isnt advisable for them to travel. They are still expected back after Easter though, as things stand.

Yes good luck Redhelen's dd. Your dd's exam feels a bit like the last bit of 'normal' uni life our dcs might be getting for a long time.

DS has had a message from his uni saying all clinical placements are cancelled for the foreseeable future and pretty much telling the students all to go home until this whole thing is over. The message from uni also says the most important thing is to stay safe and look after your friends, family and community . It makes me feel quite emotional.

DS listened to Boris's announcement in the pub with friends while waiting for the uni's decision. They decided that as they were already in the pub when he said you shouldn't go to pubs it didn't count this evening.

I know thus is nothing like ww2, but you get a sense of what they might have been going through with the early stuff, putting blackout blinds up etc. I think it all seems surreal because I dont know anyone with the disease, let alone died from it but unfortunately that seems set to change relatively quickly .

Good luck to your DD @RedHelenB

It does feel like we are entering wartime - I was saying that yesterday. Very strange times.

Dh and I were saying last night that the last time we sat having a similar conversation,trying to think through what we would do in different scenarios if we needed to, was the evening of 9 11.
Off to work now. Wish me luck "social distancing" with a YR class that love to hug!

I certainly never felt 9/11 was anything like as much of a risk (having lived through IRA bombings in England right across much of my childhood anyway) but the potential disruption reminds me of what my parents went through during WWII although much worse then of course.

My biggest issue is whether to pay the large balance for our late June Italy holiday to a package travel company by mid April. They say they still want people to pay 10 weeks before but I see for ski holidays they are only offering vouchers (and time limited ones - assuming the company still exists by 2021) not refunds. I am caught between a rock and a hard place. if it is safe to travel in June - if foreign office say so we will go but the holiday company's website even says if they do not have enough people booked on somewhere they could cancel it too and they have a useful get out extraordinary circs clause so all that seems to vary from what I was told by phone - that if they cancel you get refund and if they go bust ABTA fails - I am no longer sure I believe that telephone advice. However we all want to go if Italy is opened up again by then..... first world problems obviously.

Same first world problem here in relation to a whole family holiday to France, but that's not until late August. DD's carefully planned and much anticipated three week trip to Europe at the start of July with friends is probably in doubt. Two of the older DDs have had much needed breaks from work to Budapest and Santorini cancelled already.

Sorry to be a pooper but I'm going to dissent on the comparison to either world war. I think on so many levels it's wrong, starting (most obviously) with the number of casualties and the demographic of those casualties too.

Obviously aware that Xenia specified potential disruption, but wider comparisons are way over the top.

indeed. The war was dreadful - millions gassed, children sent away from parents to the country sometimes for 5 years, many men killed in battle, rationing of food, much of London bombed out. Definitely much much worse.

I don't think there's a cats chance in hell that travel (and certainly not non-essential trips) will be ok by the summer. Even if Italy is past the worst, the U.K. is unlikely to be.

DH saw the writing on the wall and cancelled our planned May trip to Sicily before the balance was due near the start of February. Lucky to only have lost the deposit. That was before Italy had emerged as an epicentre.

DD has already resigned herself to the idea that not only is any travel with her friends this summer unlikely (except maybe something like camping in the UK) but that there's a distinct possibility that the Xmas university ski trip will be off.

If by some miracle all of Europe including the U.K. gets this stamped out in the next couple of months there will probably be some fantastically cheap offers.

Yes Errol I tried to cheer up Santorini DD by saying think of the snoops

You are probably right. I just told the family we might not be going which I am sure they know although we are probably at the very extreme end of optimists in this family.... I think my daughter and I agree it is best I give the holiday company no further money at this point. Interestingly the company says it will charge people for flights it has already paid for if you cancel or breach the contract by not paying 10 weeks before (in our case it is 11 x return flights - 11 people) which if that element were £200 per person (total guess) is the deposit paid confiscated which I am expecting anyway even tough that is unfair as we are all prepared to travel if Italy is open in late June and the only thing I want to do is postpone paying the full balance until say mid June)).

I did try to suggest to my son going on a gap year that casual jobs this summer may be hard and gap year travel difficult after that so why not go to law school with his twin but he was not persuaded.

DD has a contingency plan now if the colleges kick them out - her BFs parents (who live closer and don't have 'risks') have kindly offered to take the pair of them if needbe.

We are contemplating borrowing a family camper van and doing the drive up the west coast, then across the north of Scotland over the summer as we didn't book a holiday.
I am so fed up with all this, it's meaning we can't go out to celebrate DD's 21st birthday in a couple of weeks, we can't have the family get together to go and scatter my father's ashes and now my job is at risk.

Xenia, I doubt this is going to be ok by June time unfortunately. I really wouldn't pay the balance.

My DS has just messaged to say his graduation ceremony (mid July) has been postponed.

Yeah, I feel bad for feeling disappointed when really, not much has changed for me, compared to some poor people in the world.

What a bloody pita this sodding virus is turning out to be.

Horsemad is that Bristol? :-(

Shes scored really high in her exam, thanks for the good wishes! Got herself 7 pound train ticket and I'm picking her up tomorrow. Dd2 is having a whale of a time in Liverpool and says she ll come back at Easter. Juat heard rumours that a local primary school.is closing.

Newcastle @solarisbabe.

Well Done to your DD @RedHelenB, good on her! 🙂