Languages at St Andrews

[Tenpastseven]

Does anyone have any experience of a languages degree (likely French and Spanish post A level) at St Andrews?

We had a look online and the information offered on the course looks far more sparse than on other Uni sites. Unless I’m just not looking properly.

It’s also worth finding out sizes of language groups. My goddaughter has just graduated from Bristol, where she was in a group of 30 for language, which is a huge group. Most MFL students would be in much smaller groups for written language - say 16-18. (Fairly sure it wouldn’t have been 30 for oral classes - I’ll ask her.) overall she did not feel very well looked after there.

Durham asks for AAA and is v competitive. Add to this the lower chances of getting As and above in MFL subjects and it's a good idea to have a lower insurance.

The staff to student ratios on The Guardian league tables are quite interesting.

Indeed they are, but they don’t give the full picture. Some places will protect research time by creating large groups where students are taught by PTAs (who are often very good) but not be more experienced staff, who will be writing their books. They’ll still appear in the staff student ratios though.

Interesting! Thanks!

I think DD found class sizes generally fine at Bristol but it’s a course where self study is important and you have to do it. It’s not a hand holding course in the way some students might value. Also teaching quality varies according to which language you take. I don’t think overall 30 is a problem if everyone is on the same page, so to speak, and has put the work in. It’s not the same as A level teaching and DD did notice how some students didn’t prepare for lectures and were behind where they should have been and held up the class. Maybe streaming in y2 would help? It is up to the student to prepare and catch up - certainly the ab initio students.

There are other benefits to MFL degrees that are not purely language acquisition. Variety and quality of options for a start. Quality and expertise of lecturers.

Agree with all you say re independent study at uni. Bristol is right not to pander to that. But 30 in a language group is very big, and doesn’t really allow for individual discussion/ queries. iIt is where the quieter, more self-effacing students risk being overlooked.

But I’m not sure the lecturers will hand hold like this at university and the staff are available via email. Students certainly can and do ask for help but it’s not like school teaching. The quiet ones are not likely to be specially coached. However everyone is told how to seek help and discuss progress. Few seem to fail at Bristol!

Individual discussion in class isn’t handholding. It’s the basis of a healthy, robust seminar with lots of discussion. I’m not suggesting quiet ones need special coaching, just that a classroom environment might be more comfortable with 16 rather than 30 for teaching that is small group based. No, not many fail in Bristol, but you wouldn’t expect them to as they are so highly selected. But a good student experience should be more than that.

Thanks for all this information! So helpful.

@NiamCinnOir I think we may become firm Mumsnet friends through this process. It's good to have someone alongside. How is your DD getting on with UCAS application? Any other people here with DC applying for 2021 MFL/MML entry?

I'd forgotten UCL and Sheffield - sorry - mainly because we live in Sheffield so have disregarded (DS wants to get FAR away) and he isn't keen on living in London for a first degree. But of course they should be on there.

I thought a group of 30 referred to language acquisition as opposed to seminars for options. I think DD chose less popular options.

There are so many great options for MFL degrees and of course it’s not necessary to go to London. I also think 17 year olds don’t really know what they want to study re options. DD went to an open day and came away not ever wanting to go near medieval French. Wind forward 4 years and she loved it. Ditto anything to do with Art! This is why not necessarily choosing courses based on their limited experience of life isn’t always the best policy.

Durham might have upped their tariff to AAA but it might not mean they get it. AAB for Bristol is hardly putting their grads at a disadvantage. Very few universities want AAA.

@Tenpastseven, yes i think we‘ll definitely be MFL friends . I don’t know anyone else IRL applying for languages, so it’s great to have company on the rocky ride. Dd has just submitted a first draft of her personal statement to her sixth form tutor today, and is still trying to decide on her uni choices for UCAS. She doesn’t want to go to London either, but is probably going to apply to Oxford, Bristol and St Andrews, with the other two still to be decided. How is your DS doing? Is he still planning to apply to Cambridge? Has he narrowed down his other choices yet?

@bigbradford agree that it’s really hard for 17 year olds to know what modules they might enjoy. I did a linguistics paper as part of my degree many years ago, but picked it without having the first clue what linguistics was, and ended up loving it.

I think that demonstrates not closing ones mind to anything. Quite a few posters will say their 17 year olds don’t want this or that and are not interested in aspects of some courses but I truly believe they are too young to know what they want snd they haven’t actually studied the subject yet. Schools don’t ask for detailed study of literature but that doesn’t mean it’s something to be afraid of. Often being scared of the unknown makes for poor decision making. After 2/3 years of study minds get expanded and students do try new avenues they might not have considered before.

Anyway - good luck to dc applying. It’s a rocky ride at times but they do find their course eventually.

Those are really good points @NiamCinnOir and @bigbradford. DS is so easily impressionable because he’s making these decisions based on the unknown and the unseen. So when ‘someone’ at school says Newcastle is good, he comes home and says Newcastle is good, I’ll put that down. And he’s done very little literature at school, yes.

Luckily he went to a Cambridge Masterclass in November ‘19 feeling quite sceptical but came back loving it. So at least we know that’s based on his own research and gut feeling.

School seem to be leaving PS late to me, not looking till 3rd week September and he hasn’t had any input yet. I’ve tried to help a bit but frankly it’s like the blind leading the blind. He’s due to get some input soon as he was offered a place on a Cambridge outreach programme where he gets some support from a current student 🤞🏻.

Is anyone's DC considering a gap year? Doesn't it make sense for MFL students to spend some time out in the foreign countries before starting university? Or do people feel that that's stetching things out too much?

• An issue with St Andrew's (and Glasgow too I think) is that the degree lasts 5 years. Is anyone thinking of applying to start at St Andrews in the 2nd year, bypassing the 1st year?
• Final thought - I'm wondering about the 3 language option at St Andrew's. DC is keen on her 3 languages (French, Spanish and German) and is considering becoming a languages teacher. If she spends time in all 3 countries, I wonder whether doing a triple language degree might make sense in her case? I can see the 3rd language being forgotten otherwise, and it might come in handy and give her an advantage when applying for jobs, especially if she wants to teach in the private sector?

@tantamountto DS has thought about it a bit but decided with a year out on the cards anyway as part of a MFL degree considered alongside potential limits on travel/immersion experiences for the gap year, especially if we crash out of Europe, he would go for 2021 entry. Having said that, if for example at Cambridge, they encouraged deferral given there may be less places after this year's debacle, then he would likely take it should it mean more chance of a place. Am I making sense?

Yes, of course. I'm not sure what effect a no deal Brexit will have. I think we're heading for being allowed to go on holiday for up to 3 months in the EU, either way, but I may be wrong. I don't think there'll be a right to work, either way? I'm hoping that there will at least be a right to be an aupair, though it's much more hassle for a non-EU person to become one which will be off-putting to families. They also tend to expect an English aupair to speak English all the time, in addition to childcare and housework, which is annoying and a bit cheeky.

tantamountto - when we did the rounds last year all six of the ML admissions tutors ds spoke to said they actively encouraged gap years and one even went so far as to say that impossible though it was, they wished they could make it a course requirement.

@tantamountto pretty sure direct entry into second year is only available in the science faculty not for humanities.

That's useful - thanks! A 5 year course is just so long, even bearing in mind that it includes a year out (though what is done in the year out will be a lot more limited now, due to Brexit, even assuming no pandemic problems).

This is a really useful thread thanks. My DS looking to do Spanish (post A level) and French (ab initio) and wants to go somewhere in NW/N England. Hadn't really looked at Newcastle until now but impressed with the clarity of the info on their website. Some unis are terrible - you really have to hunt it down if you want to do 2 languages.

Are you DC potentially applying for 2021 @tantamountto @RainBow725? Wanna join our very small gang?

My understanding was it was very hard to do French ab-initio? When I was looking through my impression was that not many Unis offered it.

Yes please! And yes to 2021 entry. We have found plenty of French ab initio courses. I'm sure it's really hard though - but any language would be!

Bristol was the only one we found out of ds's limited choices that didn't let you do French ab initio.

Newcastle will let you do all manner of things - they feel languages are really important for everyone so if you are a medic or studying Eng Lit or Chemistry and you want to do a couple of terms of a language, you get the credits for it. The language building is amazing - it's the whole of the old university library on the old quad and very beautiful.

This may have changed but the languages people weren't as gloomy about the possible loss of Erasmus as you might suppose. Most of them have links that they were already hoping to extend. I suppose like much else it's either all going to come out in the wash or go down the plughole.

More and more unis are offering French an initio to compensate for 5he decline of languages in schools. They tend to move pretty quickly. Most places will put those with a GCSE onto ab initio.