Exeter University - Any insight, good or bad, tips, accomodation etc

[Baaaahhhhh]

Inspired by another thread for Year 12's unable to go to open days. Perhaps we can set up different threads for different uni's?

So, MN's, what are your DC's experience of Exeter main campus, and have you any wise words of wisdom, or just useful tips for accomodation etc.

Also is there anyone at all who has studied at the Falmouth campus?

I agree about Durham fifthtimelucky and that is exactly what is putting DD off. Exeter has a happier vibe and is for people who really want to be there.

DD has just finished at Durham and honestly it's brilliant. She totally wanted to be there! College system means you can get involved in loads if stuff. And many of its courses are way more demanding than Exeter's. I'm looking at you, Maths

Quite a sweeping generalisation there!

I had always heard the the demanding maths courses were the COWI group - Cambridge, Oxford, Warwick and Imperial

DD's not going to study maths so completely irrelevant for her and similar scores with Durham for her subject.

I never understand how people are able to write things like "And many of its courses are way more demanding than Exeter's", I mean how could you know unless you have attended both courses at both institutions in each subject you are commenting about? I have a degree in Economics & Maths, DH a degree in economics and together we had problems understanding and comparing the content in different economics courses for DS. And I certainly don't feel competent to judge how demanding each economics course at every university would be without sitting the exams.

Dd had a ball at Exeter, was in catered in Birks but it was a building site all year! Don't choose accommodation on sweeping views.... I was worried at first about the upper class rep and indeed a princess was in HH that year🤣 but she made lovely friends from all over the world. She left Exeter after her masters because as far as cities go it is quite provincial but now heading for 30 the vibe suits her and she's heading back to live.

I have no idea how Durham and Exeter compare in terms of individual courses. Without checking I would probably assume Durham is slightly higher up the league tables in most cases, but that might not be right. Durham can trade a bit too much on its name I think (though I suspect the same can also be said of Oxford and Cambridge)!

In any event, both Durham and Exeter are easily 'good enough' I think, so much will depend on personal preference. My older daughter didn't consider Exeter as it didn't offer her subject. The younger one didn't consider Durham as she was very keen on a campus university.

@errorofjudgement you're quite right about COWI. But having attended open days for both maths and English at Exeter I know they they publicly admit when questioned that they let students in post results on lower offers. Not something I heard up north. I'm just saying Exeter gives wriggle room. In practice again and again. Something to consider?

Well we are not looking at Durham (or York) at all, which is sad I suppose as a lovely unis, but just too far North, and too cold! DD's furthest North is Warwick , so we are very much limited to "the South".

Falmouth seems like a lovely place to be if you just think 'oh Cornwall, how lovely' and it is all relative to where you are from (so it wouldn't seem far away if you were Cornish or from parts of Devon!) but my main experience is every kid (this is only three, mind) that has gone there from my school in the last few years has dropped out.

Two of them were students with MH issues who, I think, should have reflected more on distance from home but one was a solid chap with lots of confidence . He just found it all a bit insular and isolated.

He is now at NTU, iirc.

There are obviously lots of students who choose Durham and haven’t applied to Oxbridge at all! Some who don’t get into Oxbridge actually go to Exeter!

Also there are league tables of courses so no parent has to plough through the syllabus checking on it. Both universities have strengths and weaknesses regarding their courses. So it would depend on what course you were doing. What is the OPs DC doing? Have I missed that?

I think the friends from school sticking together shows lack of maturity. Exeter has always been viewed as a giant boarding school on a hill! There are many excellent universities to choose from so I think students should have the confidence to start afresh and courses at a single university rarely suit everyone in a group of friends. Going with mates is a safety blanket.

OP are you SE? Because of horrendous traffic it takes longer to get to Falmouth than it would to York, or even Durham. Won't make them warmer though! Although both are drier...

Looking at DS1's school university destinations about 60% of boys go on to the same six universities each year. This is the list and the number attending for the last 2 years:

Oxford 27/28
Durham 21/29
UCL 22/19
Bristol 23/14
Exeter 14/20
Cambridge 16/13

If I added in Bath, Imperial, Warwick and Edinburgh it would account for 90% of their destinations. I don't think chosing the same university as others in your year group is anything to do with confidence it is about finding the best course. I work part time in fin serv and I am often called in to help with interviews for grad recruitment and I am very aware of why these unis are so poular with London school pupils. I looked at the St Pauls list and again 90% would be going to the same top ten with their top six being as follows:

Oxford 35
Cambridge 18
UCL 14
Bristol 13
Imperial 11
Exeter 10

I wasn’t referring to St Paul’s or schools with anything like those stellar destinations. It’s just seems an Exeter thing where I am. It’s not about courses or where is best. They choose the university and move in as a group! The next phase of the friendships.

@cakeisalwaystheanswer - very interesting comment about graduate recruitment. I was a banker back in the day and we recruited from a painfully short list of universities and I am keen to know which institutions are target ones now. I am so out of touch that I am not sure the milk round even exists any more, but the impression I get is that the list is a little longer than it used to be.

DS is intending to apply for history and whist it is of course important that he enjoys the course, he has no intention of being a historian, so I find some of the insistence in uni chat that the quality of course is the paramount criterion a bit of a red herring. If you are likely to seek employment as a banker / lawyer/ consultant etc, being at an institution respected and sought after by those recruiters has to be an important factor, and league tables aren't wildly helpful with that.

@michealahpurple - take the ten named above, add LSE, Nottingham and Manchester and that seems to be the main recruiting grounds for banking nowadays. London schools know this because of having well connected parents and old boys. Law may be different but Zenia would be the person to ask.

My DD is a barrister and it’s the same for that career pretty much. Her boyfriend is also a barrister and he did History at Durham. Exeter isn’t that hot for wannabe barristers. However Oxbridge is still the best option by a long way. I believe around 36 % of new barrister pupils are Oxbridge and a further 28% are RG. So 2/3 are from a small number of universities. BSB research is invaluable. Not sure if bankers analyse their trainees in the same way.

The most recent research from the BSB states that academic/intellectual ability is a prime focus of recruiters in Chambers. I think lots of high flying jobs would look for similar profiles.

You are definitely better looking at university, and not course content that interests you, for high flying jobs after graduation. The 10 above plus Nottingham. Unless you want to be a historian it’s unlikely the content of your degree will be analysed by any employer. Your ability to do well on a challenging course is what matters. If you need to talk about anything, at university it’s perseverance and doing things outside your comfort zone.

think the friends from school sticking together shows lack of maturity

Or possibly lacking the confidence to do your own thing in the face of your school's 'university advice'? I'm sure I read on here a year or so back of someone whose DD was going to be one of way more than a tutor group's worth of girls going to Exeter from her school partly, it appeared, because there was only a very restricted list (not even the whole of the flippin' RG, but presumably with St Andrew's as a bolt-on) that the school would approve. I still rather hope I misread that one...

A lawyer friend of mine said the selection process for graduates included a top-ten university for the subject - there was no generic top-ten university list. It changed, depending what was studied.

@myomy and @cakeisalwaytheanswer I am curious whether St Andrew's would crop up on the recruiting rounds. It doesn't seem to pop up on either of my boys' schools frequent lists (well, one school provides lots of data, the other none but after begging they scraped up a little) but more generally seems to be high on people's lists.

I do remember @Xenia sources DNR some good intel on the universities popular for law recruitment, but can't track it down.

@daisypond, would that be the top ten list for the subject for the year of graduation, the year of entry, or some kind of calculation involving number of years in the top ten whilst the candidate was an undergraduate? Would someone be penalised for not having transferred to a top ten university mid-course, should the top ten university one started off at fall from grace ?

Scots Law is discrete and different, so that may be why. Otherwise, St Andrews, Glasgow and Edinburgh are always very highly regarded universities. If your school doesn't have a tradition of sending to Scottish unis they may not even think to put it on their lists.

@MarchingFrogs
I don’t know the exact details, and it might not be a cut and dried number. This is only one London law firm that my friend worked for at that time, but they were involved in the selection process for graduates. I was also told this was a few years ago, and of course things may be different now. Other things they liked were fluency in a foreign language and three As at A level- this was before the introduction of the A* grade.
My friend went to York.

My DD did MFL. A friend of ours is a magic circle lawyer and did a MFL at Cambridge. MFL is no barrier to a legal career. Around 45% of legal trainees and barristers didn’t do law as an undergrad. As long as a student picks a solid academic subject as an undergrad, you are not disadvantaged. History, Classics, English, PPE, etc are fine.

Lawyers in the uk who studied Scottish law would have to do the conversion course, I believe. This makes qualification Unnecessarily expensive.

It’s also worth remembering that top grads can do the MLaw at Cambridge. Often this is done after academic qualification to become a barrister but before the newly qualified barrister starts pupilage . This enhances the number of Oxbridge grads.

This is interesting data.