University life for 'freshers' (2019/20) - first year campus life suspended, sitting out/surviving the pandemic and staying on top of studying [Edited by MNHQ at OP's request]

[NewModelArmyMayhem18]

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What on earth would happen if you're a student at a university that does indeed go bankrupt?!!! I seem to recall that there were four or five mentioned on one of our previous threads...It doesn't bear thinking about....

I think in those circs there would be a very concerted effort to merge institutions to enable them to continue, or alternatively make arrangements for students to transfer elsewhere.

Does anyone know which institutions are likely to be affected?

DD just got details of her exams (social science). Will be essays as would have been if taken normally, must be handed in within 48 hours of being issued (to take into account different time zones) but strong guidance that they should be completed as far as possible within the 2/3 hours allowed. Open book (obvs) but no referencing etc required and strict word count limits. So message is don’t take forever to research answers and we will know if you have taken many hours etc. They have a no detriment policy in any event

Not sure which ones are immediately at risk but the table I referenced upthread (or maybe it was on the UEA one?) showed income vs expenditure for UK universities so you could probably work it out from which seem to be most in the red.

FWIW I was very surprised that UEA was in the top 10 in the black along with the usual suspect top flight universities (so Oxbridge, UCL, Imperial and the like).

But UEA is one of the most reliant on foreign students? Or did I dream that?!

Though that may be affected by how much income is usually from overseas students, particularly non EEA students who pay much higher fees - so it may not be possible to deduce too much about the future from the past (unless the table breaks that down - have to admit I don't want to look at it! am avoiding getting too much info at the moment....)

Is it @Tonyaster? Why would it be? A family member works at one which as lots of overseas students (it's quite STEM focused) but is nowhere near as in the black.

The table is quite simple so doesn't break the figures down beyond income vs expenditure.

This is interesting. UEA doesn't seem to be in the top 20 @Tonyaster...

has rather than 'as' lots of overseas students...

I must have dreamt it. I was interested becuase dd2 was thinking of it as a back up

Without wanting to 'diss' UEA (DS is there and really loving it) I just can't see why it would have super appeal to overseas students - being stuck on the outskirts of a smallish city in the middle of East Anglia. I cannot imagine it would really equate to what you'd be looking for as part of an expensive UK university experience. Of course, you could argue that Cambridge is similar but, of course, it's got about 900 years history, top 10 (in the world) university status and those very picturesque and historic (in the main) centre-city colleges over UEA.

Maybe it was the course your DD2 was looking at @Tonyaster?

Yes it was the course- we are uk! I remember thinking oh dear when I saw it on a table about unis and finance. Ignore me. I must have got it muddled up with somewhere else!

No surprises on that list : I'd like to see the next 20 or so, though, which I suspect might include places like NTU and also Strathclyde. DS says Lincoln has a large proportion of Chinese students. However, given where he grew up , that might be about 3!

Wishing everyone and their families a Happy ( if not different ) Easter .
Am lucky as a local supermarket delivered bags of eggs to work yesterday so I came home with a ‘giant ‘ creme egg containing 5 individual ones - so DD very happy / smile like a kid in a sweet shop as the expression goes .

Happy Easter everyone.

Sorry, but I loathe creme eggs

Me too gin

I can force one down @bengalcat

Happy Easter to you all - I'm in the creme eggs loathing camp too but hey at the moment you have to be grateful for small pleasures. Are you working today @bengalcat.

Just watched the Rev. Richard Cole on BBC Breakfast - I'm not religious but I did find his message very uplifting. I even watched the King's College Easter service on BBC2 yesterday evening - hoping it was filmed weeks ago since the choir certainly wasn't practising social distancing.

Happy Easter everyone

Bizarrely the only time I liked creme eggs was when I was pregnant. Couldn’t get enough of them!!

Due to sort an Easter egg hunt later - first one in years - but will put eggs out just before since we had a slug disaster a few years back .

Happy Easter everyone!

I LOVE a cream egg, I only wish they were twice the size as I can happily consume 3 in one sitting

Happy Easter! Is half an Easter egg for breakfast ok? It was 70% cocoa so that’s a superfood isn’t it?

Wouldn't that make you feel sick juicy?

I think the chocolate Cadbury's use for Easter eggs is different to normal chocolate. One year DD got loads of various types of Cadbury's Easter eggs from family members (she isn't a Cadbury's fan, neither are we). After a month or two of them sitting around untouched I decided to melt the chocolate and use the melted chocolate for baking. It just went into a horrible gloopy sludge, and ended up in the bin.

Disclaimer - we really aren't chocolate snobs, we just don't like Cadbury's as it isn't chocolatey enough.

@Ginfordinner didn't the recipe for Cadbury's chocolate famously change when Kraft became its parent company? Less cocoa and more palm oil?

Is that you on the half an Easter egg for breakfast as a super food or your DDs @Benjispruce? It's the type of thing my two would do (and probably will do once they eventually surface!).

Yes it did NewModelArmyMayhem18. It is so sickly sweet and just doesn't taste of chocolate any more (to me anyway). I'm not a huge chocolate fan anyway, but quite like Galaxy and M and S chocolate.