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.

[Carriemac]

also you should negotiate a discount for the works, i had DDs first month rent waived due to the extensive building works going on in her flat.

[Xenia]

Yes, I know, My son left it to his housemates and doesn't think their letters were that good, nor the one month of 10% discount,

If your daughter is reading law then she has as far as I know good options - she has started law before the change to the new exam system so it does not matter if she does a masters or the LPC with a masters or just the LPC course next (or the bar equivalents). I think some law firms still have their Autumn 2019 applications still open this month or she could do what my daughter did - started the GDL in my daughter's case (but equvally could have been the LPC or LPC with a masters) and applied - then my daughter was sponsored through the GDL/LPC years by a law firm but had a gap year after the LPC with the training contract starting the year after as she applied a bit late - which was a rather nice gap year working abroad after 5 years of study and with the job to come home to.

For those that want to do the LPC/become solicitors and needing student loan funding the LPC including a masters is covered I think by the loan but not the straight LPC on its own. www.bpp.com/courses/law/llm-legal-practice-solicitors

However lots of people read law and don't practise it and there are lots of other options. I have certainly not told my 5 chidren to do lwa, even though 2 have qualified and one starts the GDL in September. On the other hand I love it so I am not putting anyone off.

[Needmoresleep]

Xenia, I think they should reply asking that the September discount is continued for as long as the material is up. Not least because it would help motivate the contractor to get the work finished.

The landlord would probably calculate that he might lose more if they either refused to pay, or it went to arbitration. There must also be some health and safety regs about access to Daylight/sunlight.

And if it continues much longer and it is a registered HMO, they could phone the HMO person at the Council and ask for advice. A call from the Council would add a real sense of urgency.

If you don't ask you don't get. One of the many life lessons to be learned at University.

We actually drove DD back last night. She will be on a six month placement out of Bristol so needs a second set of bedding etc. Bristol really is very beautiful.

[Xenia]

yes, good advice although they should have insisted on continuation of the discount in October not all these months later. he had rather left it to his friends to do.

I am glad you got your daughter back okay. My twins go back on 12th I think it now is. One just had a good long chat with me about next year's plans - possible law school application (like his twin) and then deciding in July if he wants that or not once he has the place (as I thikn you can cancel then without having to pay the fees) which gives him a few more months to plan. Apparently a gap year person he was going away with now has a boyfriend so he thinks she is much less likely to want to go away for a year. Howeve rif he commits to the GDL course Sep 2020 then he will need to do the LPC course the year after as I am not paying for the first without the second. He says he feels he has got a lot further with his plans and what he wants to do so that all sounds good.

[Carriemac]

DD goes back thursday , hope she will get another masters application in before then. Xenia do you think a gap year is ok if she wanst to be a barrister eventually?
I'll miss her, got used to them being back over december and the house will be very quiet!

[Horsemad]

How does applying for a Masters work? Do you have a certain number of applications, are the offers conditional?

[Needmoresleep]

Horsemad, it varies. You can apply for as many as you want, or have the energy to do. Then:

1. Costs vary, as does the availability of funding. I think some of the Imperial management ones can be over £30,000 for the year. I don't think Masters outside integrated Masters are eligible for student loans.

1. Some probably take all qualified applicants, some take suitable applicants until they are full, others have application deadlines and waitlists.

1. They can vary in length. Oxford economics is 2 years, LSE is 10 months. (The latter cost more but DS could live at home.)

1. Offers can be conditional on, say, getting a 2.1. DS was pretty set for a first by the end of his second year but Oxford wanted him to also get a certain score (pretty high) in his third year exams.

The funding dance can be fun...DS was not prepared to consider a PhD without full funding. He had one offer of full funding but only partial funding for his preferred choice. The University needed someone to turn their offer down before they could improve his offer. At the same time the University offering him full funding was wanting to know whether he would accept as they wanted to re-offer to the first on the waitlist. He eventually heard a day before the acceptance deadline. One of his friends heard an hour before. DS did not get funding at Masters level, though part of his incentive for applying to Oxford is that they generally have more money, and a friend of his had received funding the year before.

I suspect many application deadlines will be coming up pretty soon, then you hear by Easter. Good references can be important. Oxford needed three. DS was pleased that he had regularly attended office hours so people knew who he was, and could write something a bit more personalised.

DD has got her intercalation application in (BSc not MSc) though will probably do a couple of last minute back up applications as well. I hope she gets it. It will be nice to have her home for a year.

[MarchingFrogs]

I don't think Masters outside integrated Masters are eligible for student loans.

They are, actually- it's a set amount (somewhere between £10 000 and £11 000 for the current year, I think), so will range from representing course fees plus some living costs, to just covering fees, to only partially covering fees, let alone feeding and clothing you.

[Needmoresleep]

Thanks.

I guess we decided it was the last year so we would just pay up. Luckily the course was so full on there was little need for spending money.

[Xenia]

On student loans and masters, I think place like BPP law school specifically have added a masters to their LPC (law post grad) course for solicitors which increases the fees if you do that option but you are then able to obtain a student loan as it includes a masters- as the student loan rules changed to make them more / available for masters.

On the gap year question there is no problem with gap years for barristers (or solicitors for that matter - my concern that if one of my twins has a gap year he will be doing new solicitor exams might be unfounded as the new exams may be delayed yet again or the new exams might be fine). I think the bar is changing its qualification route too but I don't think it has the same timing issues which I believe affect solicitors if potential solicitors do not start the GDL (or have started a law degree) before or in Sept 2020. www.barstandardsboard.org.uk/training-qualification/becoming-a-barrister/transitional-arrangements.html

Good luck to those applying for masters etc.

[Needmoresleep]

Judging from what a friend whose son is taking some form of post grad law conversion course with the aim of becoming a barrister, is telling me, getting a pupillage is incredibly competitive, and getting a place less than a year out of University is not common. Even very strong applicants may need to apply more than once.

Taking a gap year then adds a year to the process. However doing something interesting can only add breadth to your application. DD has extended the time she will take to qualify as a doctor by both taking a post A level gap year and by applying to intercalate. It is already clear that the first has given her a lot of softer skills. Working for a family ski company may mean you never want to specialise in paediatrics but does mean that you have a head start when communicating with the parents of patients. Better still has been the internship with a cookery school, which means she is able to bake really good brownies to thank colleagues at the end of each placement. She was doing this anyway, any excuse to bake, but I assume it does no harm when it comes getting help from nurses and other staff (people seem to have gone out of their way to introduce her to patients with interesting illnesses or who are willing to be questioned by a medical student). The second will give her a chance to discover whether she has an interest in medical research, and also improve her CV in relation to the area she wants to work in.

[Horsemad]

Thanks for the info re Masters courses. When I tried to discuss with DS at Christmas, he didn't want to chat about it (had lots of work on), so thought I'd ask here. 🙂

[Xenia]

Yes, law is very competitive - in fact some say do not do the LPC (the year after the law conversion course - GDL which is the same course for non law graduates whether they will be solicitors or barristers, which my son starts in Sept,) postgrad (for solicitors) unless you have your training contract with a law firm already secured for after the course and the law firm is paying your fees and maintenance on the LPC. I am not sure about the bar.

I am sure they will all end up with something they like at the end of the day .

[Haffdonga]

Be aware that the student loan situation for Masters doesn't work in the same way as for the undergrad degree.

The loan is a flat rate (max about 11k) and not based on parental income. Masters courses vary in cost unlike most undergrad degrees and some may be more than the loan available others much less. There is no separate maintenance loan on top, so if your fees eat up your loan you'll have to work out exactly how you plan to live and eat. Hello ds, want to think about this?


It's not added onto the under-grad loan so the student has to start paying it back at the same time as the undergrad loan but at a higher rate and lower starting income level. As the student loan all feels a bit like unreal monopoly money I think it will come as quite a shock to ds some when they find themselves paying back two loans on their first precious hard-earned salaries.

[Horsemad]

Interesting Haffdonga, I didn't know it wasn't tacked onto the undergrad loan. Will have to try and engage DS in a conversation about his thoughts.

[MarchingFrogs]

The postgraduate loan is repayable at a lower income threshold, but at 6% of the excess, vs 9% for the undergraduate loan. So if you are over the repayment threshold for your Plan 2 loan, you will pay 15% above £25 725.

From the gov.uk website:

If you have a Postgraduate Loan and a Plan 1 or Plan 2 loan

You pay back 6% of your income over the Postgraduate Loan threshold (£404 a week or £1,750 a month). In addition, you’ll pay back 9% of your income over the Plan 1 or Plan 2 threshold.

Example

You have a Postgraduate Loan and a Plan 2 loan.

Your annual income is £28,800 and you are paid a regular monthly wage. This means that each month your income is £2,400 (£28,800 divided by 12). This is over the Postgraduate Loan monthly threshold of £1,750 and the Plan 2 threshold of £2,143.

Your income is £650 over the Postgraduate Loan threshold (£2,400 minus £1,750) and £257 over the Plan 2 threshold (£2,400 minus £2,143).

You will pay back £39 (6% of £650) to your Postgraduate Loan and £23 (9% of £257) to your Plan 2 loan. So your total monthly repayment will be £62.

This bit is interesting, however:

If you have 2 or more jobs

If you’re employed, your repayments will be taken out of your salary. The repayments will be from the jobs where you earn over the minimum amount, not your combined income.

[latedecember1963]

It's really interesting reading all your points about next steps after this year.
We are going to visit DS2 in February and I'm going to take the opportunity to chat with him about long term plans.
His degree is International Law and Globalisation. He has talked about doing a Masters or possibly working for a few years and then going back to further study.
I don't think he wants to go down the solicitor/ barrister route. He's mentioned working for organisations such as The Red Cross or The World Health Organisation but I would imagine jobs with them are like hen's teeth.

[Needmoresleep]

We were surprised how different the application process is from UG. DS learned a lot about courses available within his university from staff and PG students, but there seemed to be relatively little 'marketing' to external students from other Universities. I understand this is starting to change a little as UK universities aim to compete with US Universities for top students with things like offer days for Would be PhD students.

In really marked contrast to the efforts they make at UG, Oxford was just a paper application, no interview. He was then asked which college he wanted (no idea) and then a questionnaire asking why he had rejected the offer. DH sat down with him and went through their list of academics (DS obviously knew a lot about the academics at his UG university and where his interests fitted but not much about Oxford, which does not offer economics a UG degree) and I suggested he either asked the University/college to look round so he could factor in other factors like living away from home and in a different town. I also have little idea why he did not seem to consider places like Cambridge, Warwick, Imperial or UCL, other than deciding that with no UCAS type process, 2 applications were enough.

In the end a lovely MNetter who had studied in both places kindly gave me the pros and cons by PM, and confirmed that for DS, LSE was the better option academically. (Though she maintained that Oxford was socially more fun!)

Ditto DD was given plenty of information about intercalation at her current university but little about options elsewhere. By chance I noticed that there were open days for two of the courses that interested her - none at the others. She went a year ago and wound up really enthused about one course and much less keen on the other, plus an idea of what they were looking for. Going a year early has given her the chance to prepare for her application, including getting permission to take a year out and organising referees. The application is in and fingers are crossed that she gets it.

These are, amongst other things, big career and investment decisions. It is strange. My view is that unless they want to stay on where they are, time spent googling options is very worthwhile.

[bigTillyMint]

DD is another one planning to do a Masters.

Interestingly, NMS, both she and her friend (who is intercalating) are staying in Bristol. I know they like it there, but I wonder if lack of info about what's on offer elsewhere is also a factor?

[Needmoresleep]

I suspect that is true for many. Partly why we encouraged DS to look more closely at Oxford, and then were surprised at how few opportunities there were to do so. (OK he could have been proactive and asked, but it is odd that they did not offer this especially to students they had already accepted.)

Universities will want to retain students and fees, so will be motivated to tell them about opportunities they have available. I guess that as well as via google, students could find out about other opportunities via the careers office, but there is no incentive for their current University to do so.

Its a bit easier with medicine, and I assume other sciences. Medical schools have different specialities, so Bristol is a good place to intercalate if you are interested in neurology or child development, but does not offer everything. DD was lucky in that the degree she was considering as an alternative to medicine is available as an intercalation, and so it has always been at the back of her mind. She briefly flirted with some of the more glamorous options: sports medicine or air ambulance (can't remember the title of the course) but both the competition and career realities put her off. She is less likely to apply to the obvious fall back, as they did not offer an open day and the internet does not offer enough description, and slightly suggests a focus away from her main area of interest.

I assume Masters courses have smaller numbers so marketing budgets are lower, even though fees for some of the "City career path" courses in London and Oxbridge are huge. Doing some research is important. Even Cambridge seem to offer what might be termed as "vanity" courses which allow people, for a price, to put the Cambridge name on their CVs but which don't offer a route through to, say, academia.

[Needmoresleep]

The silver lining is that it looks as if a number of us will be around next year!

[ErrolTheDragon]

The loans situation is presumably one of the reasons that the number of integrated Masters seems to be increasing. It's been the norm for engineering for quite a while, I think (for students of sufficient ability) but now becoming much more widespread in sciences. Back in the day, the only 4 year chemistry course I was aware of was oxford - (MA, I'd never heard MChem till quite recently).

[Haffdonga]

Yes Errol. I'm sure keeping bums on seats is the reason so many unis offer integrated masters now. The loan system helps by making an integrated masters much more affordable then a separate course.

Ds1 very much wanted to change unis after the 3 years undergrad part of his course and do a different masters somewhere else, but he found himself almost tied in (financially) to complete his integrated MChem.

Ds2 has just written his intercalation masters application but it felt a bit a weak to me. To be fair it's hard to write reasons for wanting to study an area of medicine that he hasn't had any experience in yet. I think he's relying on having been told that masters courses are a buyers' market.

He's doing psychiatry this month and finding it fascinating. He's met some patients with some mind-blowing (literally) tales to tell.

[Needmoresleep]

Haff, DD was assured by her referees that it is a buyer's market and that she will get her place. She is not so sure, as the course sounds really interesting and she assumes others will think the same. Not helped by the application being very long and required to give examples of 'work' experience and reasons why she wanted to do the course. She suspects that it was their standard PG application form, not tweaked for medics.

Psychiatry was the area DD has found the most difficult. Horses for courses! She is practical and wants to see solutions. Seeing young people with seemingly unresolvable MH issues, made her feel ineffective.

[HarrietWimsey]

Hello and Happy New Starr all. Christmas seems a while ago now. Good to hear things went well with everyone. We had a good time and a wonderful NewYear in Scandinavia. DS went back today and I feel a bit gloomy. He is already on a Masters course, as long as he achieves a 2:1 or above again this year, so hopefully all is going to go according to plan. He had a personal 'upset' last term so hoping this term will be an improvement for him and proves a good one for all of yours too.