Study in the time of COVID-19 (2019/20 intake): lockdown restrictions, relaxation of rules and repeat... And will the Grinch government cancel Christmas?

[NewModelArmyMayhem18]

Carrying on from our previous thread.

I believe these threads have probably been running since the summer/autumn of when our DC were about to start/in Year 13 (so 2018)?

DD wanted to come home on 5th anyway, largely because she is hoping to see her boyfriend. We've booked a B&b for the night so we can break the journey, assuming it's allowed by then. She's found a house already for next year but based only on photos/videos so I really hope it is okay! 10 of them in a house - apparently has a huge kitchen with 2 ovens and 3 fridges!

DS and his flat seem to be resigned to following the party line. They bought a Christmas tree yesterday and are planning a weekend of festivities.

DD says she is going to stay longer as she has an exam on the 10th. Her one remaining friend at home is moving away so she doesn't have much to come home for apart from us. All her friends are in Newcastle.

DS has exams after the 9th too but he’s assuming they’ll change them or he’ll be asked to do them at home.

Quote DD this morning:

I think I'll just come home whenever I want

'In other new, Selly Oak resident will probably decide to go away for a couple of weeks sometime over the Christmas period, not yet made definite plans'. I would expect her 'indigenous', working neighbours possibly to be doing likewise, except in their case, it may be, can we afford a few nights in a hotel near to Mum and Dad's, since we're not actually allowed to bunk up in their spare room.

Unless universities are suddenly going to come up with some kind of generalised reverse of the Cambridge residency requirement, I seriously can't see how they can demand that any students, other than those in university managed halls of residence (which, presumably, they could just declare closed and inaccessible between x and y dates?) actually move away from the vicinity of the university. Not to set foot on campus would be something else, of course.

DD came home last week as she's been struggling with lack of structure, company, sitting in a cold flat with no lounge and not much to do (was in Scotland and even prior to lockdown places weren't happy about letting a group of flat mates book a table together!). She spoke to her tutor about this on her return who advised her to speak to student welfare, so it's been ongoing. She needed to come home end November anyway, as she has work lined up and wanted to isolate before starting that (not sure how that would have worked out now).

She decided to decorate her bedroom here to keep busy. Also enquired if she can start her xmas job early, and they've just given her 29 hours next week, so on top of uni work she's going to be very busy. It's probably a bit too much, but hopefully it'll do her good.

@MarchingFrogs ‘ I think I’ll just come home whenever I want ‘ - quite - I expect my DD will take that view too

Quick call from DD to tell me she’s probably coming home around 18/19th. They’ve got Christmas dinner plans and secret santa going on.

That sounds good @ifonly4

Totally agree with “I’ll just come home when I want” If they are adults paying rent 365 days a year for a private house then surely they are entitled to live there?!

Swansea broken cover to say they cannot possibly test all their students in that time frame.

DD reckons the mass exodus is mainly aimed at students in halls.

I think Swansea, as all the Welsh universities, have to test all students twice, making the task even more onerous. Honest of them to admit it can't be done.

My DS is planning on staying till end of term on 18th .. de we will pick him up that weekend .. I don't see how anyone can insist they leave a private rented house .. I think it's more for halls ..

I have posted this on the Christmas thread as well:

wonkhe.com/blogs/a-christmas-miracle-dfe-guidance-on-student-travel/

Apparently planning to turn an event naturally staggered over two or three weeks into one condensed into a single one being just one of the issues.

DS said last night he will come back some time after term finishes on 11th.

Completely agree that it is aimed at students in halls, cannot be enforced, is a logistical nightmare for unis to admin and is surely worse that students leave en masse than in staggered dribs and drabs

The only slight niggle is that they will say that where mixing of households indoors, staying overnight in a different household etc is not permitted under the general conditions prevailing at the time, but an exception is made for anyone labelled 'Student', it will only apply if the movement into that situation for the student and receiving household concerned is undertaken within a specific time period.

No one knows yet if we'll be allowed to mix with another household over Christmas, but it occurred to me if students come home close to Xmas, they might be considered the second household. I think most of us would rather have them home than see others though.

I hope no-one minds me posting this, but the death of Peter Sutcliffe takes me back to my student days in Leeds, and the fear that we might be his next victim. Suffice to say my student life was go to college, work then go home. All evening social life came to a full stop when he murdered his last victim.

The university and the polytechnic had to rearrange lectures and seminars so that they didn't finish too late. We did have a couple of half days a week so our social life was finding somewhere nice (and cheap) to go to for lunch on those half days. Luckily one of my friends was Chinese and we ate pretty adventurously at various Chinese restaurants.

Is anyone still listening to the so called guidelines? Do they even make any sense? My DC will come home somewhere between when they want to, and when we can pick them up, regardless of any rules. They are not cutting short their time in accommodation for which they have paid if they want or need to stay there. The foreign student in DS's flat will have to spend Christmas there alone as it is, so I'm sure he will appreciate the company for as long as possible.

Since the beginning of the pandemic DH and I have kept ourselves to ourselves, allow no one in our house other than our own children, and make them scrub like surgeons if they have been out anywhere. We are not having any visitors over Christmas, there are none of the traditional village festivities taking place, nothing other than a tree indoors to make it different from any weekend, so if my DC want to go out and meet their friends, taking precautions that have now become second nature, I am not going to stop them just because they might be a group of 7 rather than 6, for example. They are only likely to be meeting outdoors, other than DS whose gf has her family's permission to have him at their house, bearing in mind that he has had covid. We have to find a way to live with this virus until a vaccine has been administered to a significant percentage of the population and that is probably going to take the whole of next year.

We are the most elderly people my DC mix with, and do consider ourselves somewhat vulnerable, DH especially, so we keep a low profile and will allow our DC to make decisions for themselves. Rant over.

Gin that is chilling how it affected so many at the time and good of the uni/poly.
I must admit I saw the headlines today about Sutcliffe dying, then Cummings going and then Joe Wicks just about to finish 24hours of exercise for charity (actually tuned in to see the end of that) and remarked to Dh that it’s the first good news day in ages.

@Ginfordinner that must have been super scary.

refundstudents.org

@Ginfordinner My Dd is at Leeds & I worry about the fact that the rate of sexual assault is still very high there, certainly compared to where we live.

Goodness, that sounds worrying @Decorhate.

It was this article I saw recently. I was quite shocked at the numbers

thetab.com/uk/leeds/2020/10/30/there-have-been-4622-violence-and-sexual-offences-in-leeds-student-areas-since-oct-2019-52834