Oxford and Cambridge current students discussion thread

[sandybayley]

Starting a new one as we filled it up!

Can't believe DS1 will be home in 2 weeks. Must remember to adjust the Ocado shop for when he's back. I suspect we may end up with a few days of his favourite meals 😊

@malbecfan. Did I refer to you and your circumstances? I live in a small rural village but have fibre, are you aware that superfast broadband is available to 95 percent of UK homes but obviously not yours! Whilst we are on about rudeness both yourself and @goodbyestranger were jumping up and down about second home owners visiting your coastal town at Christmas.. (you wanted to report them for breaking rules). Yet some people on this thread obviously think its OK for 5 to 7k of students to travel from all over the UK to Cambridge (plus the same to Oxford) or maybe it should just be the chosen few with lack of study space, poor WiFi or family problems (probably a lot of students fall into this category because they are after all 18-22yr olds). Most of this age group are Asymptomatic and maybe travelling on public transport (especially from London).

There are however cases where its impossible for some students to study at home. My dd is behind with the number of her labs but it will get sorted and she's more fortunate than most because she did have a few labs and f2f during her first term.

@goodbyestranger.. My good friend is a GP Practice Manager working on the front line(not in a hospital)she is begging people just to follow rules (she had 8 positive cases out of 31 tested last Thursday - those are the ones who bothered to get tested) so I'm sure your DC who are working in hospitals would actually say the same otherwise all the hours they are working putting their life's at risk is worthless. In her words we have had a painful 9 months, why throw this all away when touch wood in 6 months time we will see the light...or in the case of students delay there return for 2 weeks.

I'm not a regular poster but I found it unbelievable to see a wife of a GP and the mother of two medics clearly wanting their Dc to ignore the advice there students have been given. Yes the government have been changing messages and struggling to handle the pandemic but just look at the cases and the recent spread it speaks for itself.

I did think twice about posting but I'm glad I did! I'll leave you all to it now!

Frazzled you need to read MN posts with a little more care.

Yes I found it slightly annoying that the very well off Londoners thought it was ok to ignore the Tier 4 restrictions and come our way. However I never said I had the slightest intention of reporting. That said, reporting wouldn't have been 'rude', had I done it. Further, my DC didn't come home from Tier 4 so no rules were flouted by any member of my family. The Tier 4 rules for London made sense.

As far as the uni thing goes, my exasperation comes from the wholesale lack of logic in deferring then staggering the students' return, given the widespread testing in place. All that's required is to make testing mandatory and if any student objects to that then they have the option of staying at home.

I just saw this on a BBC page. Perhaps we should do the same

1. Timetable an argument

One Woman’s Hour listener suggested putting an argument in the diary.

“My husband and I have solved the problem of bickering in lockdown by designating Wednesday as ‘Row Day’,” she said.

“Any disagreements are scheduled to be fought over on Wednesday. By the time Wednesday comes around, we’ve forgotten what we were unhappy about, or, it has become insignificant! Often we forget about it until Thursday, and by then it’s too late!”

I lost track of this thread till malbec's @ ... yes, my DD had about 3 months here in the summer but we shan't see her now till next summer. She opted for 39 week contracts in yrs 2 and 3 too. It's fine - she works better there, is among friends and we have long phone calls.

Sorry that there's uncertainty and probably disappointment for some of the DC.

Oxbridge undergrads account for a tiny number of the student cohort. The majority of students are free to travel - and are travelling - back to cities and towns all over the UK. The return date for at least one Welsh uni is still Jan 11th.

I am hoping to selfishly take DS to Oxford for the start of term. For those who are worried that this will risk lives, you may be reassured to know that his removal from our household will actually be making it safer for my nonagenarian MIL who lives with us. In a circular twist, it is her near-constant shouting that is the main thing that makes it hard for DS to work here (or any of us for that matter).

Frazzled has really upset me. Of course I am aware that 95% of people are meant to have fibre broadband. We don't, despite BoJo's and Openreach's promises. As well as rubbish broadband and no mobile phone signal, there is no public transport either so I have no choice but to take my DDs back to their universities. We go in my car. We don't stop unless there is an emergency. My car can do each round trip on one tank of diesel, I use the DDs' en suite toilets when I get there and take my own food & drink. In any case, whilst there is breath in my body, I will not expose my kids to any more danger than strictly necessary. I was not "jumping up and down" about people coming here. Everyone was told NOT to travel, especially from tier 4 areas, with the exception of students going home; when I collected DD from C, she was going from tier 2 to tier 2. My 2nd home-owning neighbours who live in tier 4 have just turned up. They are selling up so have told everyone it was "an essential journey". It is thoughtless and selfish actions like these which are causing the current issues.

@SnapSnapDragon, you have expressed it much better than I could. Thank you.

@Malbecfan - take no notice. One of the weird things about this pandemic is what it has revealed about individuals and their thought processes. There are those who are obsessed with the 'rules' and are quick to judge anyone who doesn't slavishly follow them to the letter. This works both ways, my own family (then in Tier 2) were permitted to mix households on Christmas Day and insisted that because it was 'allowed' they would do it even though I suggested it would have been wiser to not. I was quite pleased my decision was made for me by being in Tier 4 but if we'd been in Tier 2 I'd still have said no.

And there are others (like you) who weigh it all up and take a thought through approach based on your own circumstances and analysis of risk.

DS1 isn't pleased about staying at home but his ability to return to Oxford us determined by his college's decision about whether to allow him back into his college room. So we just have to wait and see - although his department have just sent an email suggesting labs start on 17 January!

Take no notice @Malbecfan. You have to really wonder about the motivation of someone coming on to a thread like this to lecture parents who are clearly following the letter and spirit of the law. Said poster doesn’t even read the thread properly; one of her assumptions about my DH is wrong but hey ho.

The majority now having access to decent broadband and/or 4G makes things worse for those who don't because of the assumptions that are made as to what's doable. Even places with ostensibly good service can be problematic eg virgin media in some places overloaded their systems or something so people who'd previously had fantastic speeds suddenly found it was really flaky.

I know a bloke who does Internet provision mostly in the Lake District - satellite or (i think) things like running cables over fields to put a receiver somewhere 4G reaches. Obviously that sort of individual solution is at a price but he's been super busy this year.

I don't think DD would have come home at all this year if we hadn't had decent broadband! Actually, she couldn't have done her summer job without it. Fortunately I've worked from home since we moved here in 1995 and one of our house hunting criteria was 'must be within 3 miles of an exchange and able to get an ASDL line installed'....

Well I'd quarrel ever so slightly with the description of a GP Practice Manager as working 'on the front line', with respect.

@Malbecfan please don't be upset. It's crystal clear that you are looking out for your children whilst also being considerate of others. I think that deserves a nice glass of red..

Malbec don't worry, some people are venting their own anxieties and upsets without regard for fallout.

Our internet has been really flaky recently. As I'm shielding we've a real dilemma - do we let an engineer in at the moment, or try to cope? It affects all of us and it's doing our collective heads in.

We are awaiting college guidance, but if she does go back she is practically zero risk - none of us have seen a soul for weeks other than the occasional delivery driver from a distance.

It's flipping lonely here.

Oh Kitten, I hope there is light at the end of the isolation tunnel very soon 💐. I also appreciate your wise words to @malbecfan.
I am incredibly fortunate to be living in a relatively large and lively household. The downside is that we are all now back to wfh and the wifi battles have begun. DH spends a huge amount of time on calls across different time zones so we have to shut him away in a cupboard to get any peace at all for the rest of us.

Is it definitely a provider problem Kitten? There are quite a few troubleshooting guides which can help you improve your router performance or switch internet channels. Ours nearly had me in tears of frustration many times in the spring.

Thank you Often. I appreciate that :) wifi wars are awful!

I think it is an equipment issue Hoghgnyi, but with the providers equipment. Wifi is strong across the house. The internet just blips out at random moments. Including during a work meeting this morning. Argh. I can hotspot from my phone, but it takes up a lot of data.

Think we will need an engineer in, it's that or lose money and any remaining sanity.

D1 had an email from college - don't come back unless you are an international student who has already booked travel, await further info. She had booked train tickets which I'm not sure she'll be able to get a refund on.

@JulesJules, I hope D1 isn’t too despondent? Apologies, but I don’t remember if her college is O or C?

DD had a very similar email from O. DS still waiting to hear more from C but I suspect it will be a much clearer “don’t come back” message than the last email.

Yes, ds has also had an email from college (O) saying much the same. He is being very good about it but clearly a bit despondent. I really hope they can get back before the end of Jan. He keeps making very bad jokes along the line of 'at this rate I'll be graduating via zoom'...

Thanks people, I really appreciate it. There are some really nice people on here.

I am really stressed out by work. Things are a little clearer today but I need to go into school and will be doing live lessons remotely in one school. At least the wifi there is better (mostly) and it frees up some bandwidth for the DDs to use before they go back. In my primary school, I normally cross bubbles which is now a no-no. So I'm spending one afternoon as a TA and the other teaching reception and year 1 - I am a secondary specialist so it'll be interesting! Tomorrow is remote work only, so I just post up instructions from the secondary school, they work, then I stick around online if they need help and also look after the key worker/vulnerable kids. From Wednesday, I will still have key worker & vulnerable people in the classroom with me, but I also need to teach live too. Well, that's the plan for now, but who knows after 8pm?

@ofteninaspin I like your description of your DH. Mine works in the workshop in the garage but it's bloody freezing. @OhYouBadBadKitten I really hope you can sort it. I would google to see if there is a reset or something you can do yourself first.

Better go & finish my audio clips for year 13. Normally I use YouTube but I think it's blocked on student devices (so more work for me).

There seems to be a difference between colleges in their approach. DS college has said if you are due back in college you are welcome and no need to change travel plans. Although perhaps that will change after 8pm tonight.....

She's at Oxford, @ofteninaspin - seems fairly sanguine, no Bod is a bit of a concern, but most refs are available online, chapters of books can be ordered as scanned copies from the Bod and she can order £60 worth of books and charge it to the faculty apparently. Fingers crossed she'll get her travel costs back and that they will get back to college at some point - after mid Feb? D2 is in GCSE year so implications for her too.

It is looking like mid Feb I suppose. Really sorry for all our disappointed DC.

It seems a bit better today, I only crashed once during a meeting.

I did get dd a graphics tablet so she can write more easily during online supervisions. Maths is a bugger to type by hand quickly. She's been using it with one note to create revision notes.

Much of her stuff is in college still.

We ended up getting 2 ISP - one broadband and the other mobile. When one dies the other works.

We are becoming one of the smaller college annexes until at least Feb.