Applying for uni 2020 :3: Decisions and revision.

[MillicentMartha]

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Old thread
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/higher_education/3721248-Applying-for-Uni-2020-2-Offers-arriving?pg=40

@fabtab, - are all the Unis about the same distance from home?

@oneteen on the train there’s no material difference

What about price (I've just been quoted, £212.80 for a day return for an under 150 mile round trip, so feeling a little price sensitive!)

Dd2 has had her interview on Weds at Manchester changed to online questions, still an open day though.
Finally got an offer from Manchester Met through.
Then Edinburgh in Easter Holidays.

Still waiting on Heriot-Watt

@Hoghgyni good point! There is a big variation in price but the cheapest travel has the most expensive accommodation. So without knowing how often he’d be coming home it’s not clear which would win on cost.

@TheDrsDocMartens I hadn’t heard of unis doing online interviews. Good luck to your Dd.

FabTab I’d assume minimal home visits! DS1 came home twice in first term, once in second and then never again in term time! I did visit him, though for lunch out and supermarket shopping.

oneteen in DS1’s experience, the en-suite halls were much more popular and oversubscribed than shared bathrooms at Warwick.

I'm clinging to York as an insurance place. Nothing beats a nice weekend away there.

Ok, if we’re being purely selfish, should I be pushing Manchester or Newcastle as an insurance, based on parental visiting pleasure?

Never been to either properly, unless a night in Manchester for a Police gig counts. Which has the best cake shops?

@hoghgyni the shops in Manchester are generally better. Not sure about cake shops specifically. Both are really interesting cities but not necessarily stereotype city break destinations.

@KingscoteStaff

Newcastle and stay up on the coast for a few days - Bamburgh - Alnwick - but you can do these both from Durham too...

@KingscoteStaff - I am sure he won't need his insurance place so also treat yourself to a night at Lumley Castle when you go up to visit (or if he gets to play Cricket at Riverside).

I'm fully intending on having coffee and cuddles with DD on a regular basis either in Warwick or Norwich - thankfully I have maneuvered work so I cover both areas now.

@MillicentMartha in DS1’s experience, the en-suite halls were much more popular and oversubscribed than shared bathrooms at Warwick

Yes, its a bit of a dilemma - She knows if she puts Bluebell down she will most probably get it given the costs. Bluebell is probably the best-situated accommodation for the Gibbets Hill Campus but I'm not sure its the right accommodation for DD ( we have been told it attracts the wealthy students). She likes Arthur Vick and John Martin and if she has to share a bathroom she likes Claycroft. Its a year so I am sure she will manage whatever accommodation she is allocated.

oneteen DS1 found ‘his people’ 🤮 in his hall. It can be that the busier kitchens allow for more choice of friends than the smaller ones.

Hoghgyni Just back from a visit to Manchester to see DS1. It’s a really great city, everything you could want, really, from hipster one-off cafés to every large chain going. And trams!

York is really pretty, though. I remember liking The Shambles.

I don’t know Newcastle at all, though, Kingscote.

@MillicentMartha sorry to Butt in, but would comment that DS spent his his first year in Sherborne Halls. Really lovely halls, great communal space with huge windows so felt very bright and airy. I think there were around a dozen students sharing the kitchen and they all got on so well together.
At that time Arthur Vick definitely had a reputation as the halls for the wealthy international students.

We were in Newcastle for an offer holder's day on Wednesday. I really like the city, I would describe it as majestic, elegant old buildings and sweeping wide streets. The 185 year old indoor market is great, good for cheap student food shopping. My daughter likes the city she also likes that it is a city campus uni and that you can walk everywhere. It's large enough to have good and varied nightlife.The course content is what she is looking for. She has another 4 offer holder's days to go, however, Newcastle is looking likely to be
her firm.

Thanks @errorofjudgement. We looked at Sherborne Halls on open day but they are at the other end of the campus from Gibbet Hill so a bit of a trek... Nice in summer but not great in winter... Arthur Vick is still popular but the wealthy students are now mainly in Bluebell. DD would ideally like to be in different accommodation to her two friends who will in the same Life Science lectures in Yr1... So she can spread her wings... Not an easy situation.

@FabTab York Maths has a very low added value score. How did you find this out please? DD not doing maths but would be interested for her subject choice at York and also other universities. Thanks!

&snowglobes it was on the guardian ranking of universities

You can pick any survey & get a different result though.

@hoghgyni I haven’t drilled down into the methodology but it should be possible for this to be objective given A levels results are known as are degree results.

Each league table weights things differently, so the overall rankings can be all over the place, it's true. But something like value added should be consistent, I'd have thought. Quite often higher ranked universities (and indeed selective schools,) can struggle with value added if they start with high performing students, by making their entry criteria high. Interesting, though. Hoghgyni, York may be better on courses other than maths for value added.

The Maths York Admissions Tutor explained that it hadn’t succumbed to the pressure for grade inflation. Whilst I’m sympathetic to this if other similar universities or departments at the same university have then how are future employers supposed to realise a York maths 2:2 might have been a 2:1 elsewhere?

There is grade inflation, obviously. We visited Leicester on an open day for maths and they said that over 80% got a 2:1 or a first. And that was with offers of ABB or BBB. It was more like 30% 'in my day!'

75% of students get a 2:1 or a first overall, these days, so how your uni is perceived by employers (rather more than how it's actually ranked) is actually quite important to distinguish students.