Occupational therapy - does it matter which uni?

[crazycrofter]

Dd is looking at doing occupational therapy. Obviously it’s a vocational course, so I’m assuming the usual provisos about going for the best/RG uni you can get into don’t apply?

She’s at a grammar school where there’s a lot of focus on RG etc and she’s likely to be predicted 2xAs and 1 A*. She’s a little swayed by the RG snobbery, but that would leave only Southampton and Liverpool as options (Cardiff is probably out due to funding issues). She would really like to look at Plymouth and Oxford Brookes too. Should she just forget the academic league tables as they’re irrelevant?

RG isn’t snobby. The OT courses are not going to be much different to anywhere else.

Dsis is an OT. Trained at Salford but pre degree days. I would say the best advice is to ensure the course has a good range of placements. Therefore a decent sized city like Sheffield, Oxford or Southampton would be good as there are more opportunities I think. I would imagine jobs are no problem but working in a field you want might be easier to find in a bigger city.

Also, Liverpool university is most certainly not snobby. Not that many privately educated dc when compared to (eg) Bristol or Exeter.

Friends went to Oxford Brookes and Southampton and were quite different courses in that southampton you had "a body" and was more sciency. I really liked the sound of the Oxford Brookes one though - this was a long time ago though (feels old.) Both have been successful (friend with 4 As went to Oxford Brookes)

I'd choose which ever suits in terms of feel of the place/accomodation/town etc.

Have a look at destinations of students on the courses.

Hi, I'm an OT, in terms of career it doesn't matter. It's not something I would consider when recruiting staff. The different universities do provide different experiences so I would say it is worth visiting and getting a feel for the place. For example I trained alongside physiotherapists and had a very physical focused course but take students from universities that train alongside other disciplines like social workers and have a totally different experience. I didn't go to an RG university and have gone on to do a MSc and PhD and nobody has ever mentioned which uni I did my original training in.

Thanks all, that’s really helpful - especially hearing it first hand from an OT.

I wasn’t suggesting the RG unis themselves are snobby, just that in some circles people will look down their noses at ex polys and insist you aim for RG.

I think because there are relatively few universities offering OT as a degree that there isn't the same snobbery about going to the right uni. My friend is at Sheffield, my daughter went to Northampton and I know other people who have been to Derby. One of our friends trained at Sheffield in 1988 and has gone on to head a MH crisis service.

All different types of courses and teaching, but definitely look for the area that placements can cover because if your daughter doesn't have a car then a rural small hospital placement on a stroke ward will be quite tricky.

It's a rewarding career and opens so many doors afterwards.

I've had the good fortune to go to both a top 10 heavily research-oriented Uni & one of the Unis mentioned above for a vocational course. I would highly recommend going for the best vocational experience. These Unis are excellent at what they do. The course content will be a slightly different experience at the different places. I really rated my vocational degree, been very useful. 😁

No degrees in OT until the 90s. Dsis from Sheffield had to train in Salford in the 80s. But the former polys are good bets. It’s difficult to know which course is best though as all now include research. When you train in a larger metropolitan area there are more options for placements so, eventually, interests can be pursued.

I am fairly sure Bournemouth and Plymouth have got really good reps for healthcare, specifically OT crazy. We have discussed the difficult to get to UEA in our parallel universe!

Thanks @Piggywaspushed , that’s useful to know as she’s recently had a thing about south coast cities!

Yep, UEA looks like a nightmare to get to!

In which case , also (RG!) Southampton must appeal.

I’m hoping it will as it’s a bit nearer than Plymouth!

Has your dd looked at UWE in Bristol? My dd is starting her OT course there in September. Their Glenside campus caters for nursing, midwifery and physio too, I think. They offer a £5k bursary per year. Very much placement based. I think that the Cardiff course stipulates that you have to commit to working in Wales for two years after qualifying.

Thanks @gingergiraffe, weirdly I just looked at a video from UWE before coming here. She says she thinks she’ll rule out Cardiff, so we have Liverpool, Southampton, UEA, Oxford Brookes, Plymouth, maybe Bournemouth and UWE to look at.

There’s quite a big difference in the entry tariffa required. Plymouth seems a small place to run a course with a variety of placements.

Plymouth is the furthest from us so I’m hoping she’ll like some other places more! On the basis that people have been saying it doesn’t matter (from a prestige point of view) where you go, I’m guessing entry requirements don’t really matter either?

I get your point about variety of placements though.

Many years ago I worked with Occupational Therapists and you could see gaps in their knowledge depending on their training.

Exeter and Oxford are both comprehensively good courses with excellent delivery across the board. There are many others too.

I would recommend you get a feel for the delivery of the course, ask a lot of questions. Depending on your daughters area of interest you might choose a particular university.

Also bigger universities linked with main hospitals often have good quality placements. The placement consists of 1/3 of the degree course so it's important to get appropriate placements with good teaching.

Plymouth does and integrated masters with AAB entry requirements Percy.

Oxford Brookes and Occupational Therapy rang a bell for me somehow so I dug out my old student handbook in which I found this description.

"The most striking social phenomenon of recent years is the emergence of the students of the Dorset House School of Occupational Therapy [now part of Oxford Brookes] as an exciting, stimulating and remarkably well-connected group of people."

So there you have it - should point out this is from 1984 however!!! But I'm sure things are still the same.

Keep in mind accommodation/travel costs-it’s a while since I studied at uni, but we had to pay dual accommodation if our placements weren’t near to uni. I’m guessing a large city based course like Liverpool would have enough placements within commute that she’d only have to pay one lot of accommodation. I had to drive 1hr each way for some placements from my uni, so needed my own car.

Yes, that’s worth considering. All the cities she’s looking at are reasonably sized though - I think Norwich is the smallest, but we’re not talking Bangor or Aberystwyth. Having said that we’re hoping she’ll pass her test in the next year. Thanks for the 1984 quote @HPFA!

@Piggywaspushed
I was not saying Plymouth had low entry tariff, I said it might have fewer placement opportunities. However there is a difference in entry tariffs between the universities mentioned. It’s also worth looking to see if any courses go into clearing, or not.

I would think higher tariff courses would attract similarly qualified DC. If your DD gets her predicted grades she will have a wide choice so going where there are well known teaching hospitals and more choice makes sense to me.

In that case I would think only Norwich would be out? It’s the smallest place and there’s no medical school - oh, and Bournemouth too maybe? Plymouth is a much larger city and has a medical school and quite high entry standards. Oxford Brookes seems to have the lowest entry tariffs. I think we’ll focus on visiting the places as I’m sure she’ll have an opinion based on the feel of the area. I just wanted to be sure that she wouldn’t be seriously disadvantaging herself in future by going to say UWE as opposed to Liverpool.