Views on Reading University?

[Arthurianna]

DS starting to get organised with researching universities.

Reading looks interesting, hard to Google though as you just get lots of hits about reading subjects at university.

DS is looking at modern languages.

Does anyone have recent experience of the course and university?

Specifically things like numbers on the modern languages course, support for the year abroad etc.
The website doesn't say much (lots of others seem to specify partner units abroad - is lack of these partnerships a bad sign??)

OP - although DD went to York for her MFL her other offer was from St Andrews. DD decided that St Andrews was too remote for her and in the end York was a good choice for her socially and academically. Her other offers were from non U.K. Unis.

Lancaster is good for more or less everything!

www.thecompleteuniversityguide.co.uk/league-tables/rankings

If I may offer a tip for googling: try including “Whiteknights”, which is the name of the main campus site.

A lot of the brightest kids from my hometown (north - not a prosperous part) go to Lancaster as their first choice or first choice after Oxbridge. Seems to get good feedback which encourages the next years students to apply.

Always looked a rather small out of the way town to me - possibly a place to visit and see if it might suit?

Jayritchie, DS is planning to have a look at both Lancaster and York with his friend who is considering studying engineering or robotics or something.

I think both places are quite popular choices at his school, (we are northern too), I have never actually been to Lancaster though, agree it seems quite out of the way.

He potentially has a couple of friends from his French class to visit Leicester with too, but he can't find anyone else who is thinking about Reading.

Yeah, Xenia is wrong. Lancaster always ranks higher than York and frequently ranks higher than Exeter. No dog in this fight as I didn't go to any of those 3.

That said, one should always take university league tables with a pinch of salt, they're only really worthwhile if you use all of them (including the student satisfaction one) and drill down into the details of specific courses/departments.

Does depend on subject ,really, but Lancaster, overall is higher indeed.

Reading just had an online open day. Some of their webinars may be available on line if you missed it. I think they are also have a language taster session on 8 July.

@Arthurianna

Thank you, that's really helpful. Good to know Reading has been supportive during Covid.

York, Lancaster, Nottingham and Leicester are all on his list too, I think. I think the other one is Aberystwyth, - or it might have been Aberdeen.

York is his favourite at the moment, as he knows the city a bit, but not sure if the offer grades are a tiny bit too high, he can be very erratic.

He is taking his school's advice to find a spread of offer grades very seriously, but most of them seem to be the same offer.

Hi My DD2 is interested in Reading for zoology (although shes currently about to start year 12, so she wants to visit on open day) and I have to say it looks really nice from what i've seen online :)

York, Lancaster and Leicester I've been too on open day with my DD1. She currently studies particle physics and cosmology at Lancaster and just finished first year and has adapted well to online learning and in person labs.
Lancaster and York was on a par with each other subject wise and facilities wise; but Lancaster beat York due to the accommodation we felt was much better quality and cheaper too. York's city I would say is better than Lancaster due to its size and has more clubs. Lancaster has a couple of clubs but copious amount of bars. Lancaster is about an hour on the bus to Morecambe if you want a piece of the sea side. She's living in the city next year and its about 15 mins on a very regular bus to uni.
Leicester was nice, and oadby student village was lovely, but she wanted that halls experience than one of the old houses that was there. She did like the pavillions halls at oadby, and opal court on leicester campus. The library was great and the student union was one of the best we seen.
What subject is he interested in?

just seen post. modern languages :)

I'm at Reading at the moment, doing a PG degree as a very mature student.

I love the place. My department has been so warm and welcoming and have worked their socks off to support students (esp. the undergrads) throughout Covid. It's a lovely campus, lots of greenery and space and the lake, botanic garden and wilderness areas are beautiful.

I have been very impressed with the teaching. Lots of the tutors in my department are Oxbridge graduates and world class experts in there fields. Look into your particular department, it's research and staff. Some departments (in my opinion) are a much higher standard than the overall rating of the university.