Open Day Question

[tulippa]

DD is about to start going to a few university open days. She's expecting me and DH to go round the universities with her on the days.
I thought we'd drop her off and meet her when it was finished as this is what happened on my open days (or I got the train on my own a couple of times and just took myself there). I do appreciate that was 25 years ago and don't know if things have changed since then.
DD says her friend went to one a few weeks ago and her mum accompanied her the whole way round. What does everyone do now? Don't want to abandon DD is everyone else's parents are going to be there and equally don't want to embarrass her if we're the only parents tagging along.

We did a mixture. Sometimes there are separate parent/student talks or very subject specific sessions. So we might go but separate for a while. Mostly we went along on the day but it varied.

One parent going along

Ok thanks - glad I checked.

Parents going is definitely the norm now.

We went along, but then sent DD (then DS) off on their own - so we could have a nose round ourselves, but the DCs could look round independently, ask their own questions and actually try to imagine if they might like to go there. Then we would meet up and compare notes with a possible final look together at any bits they wanted to show us.

We went with our daughter to hers....she wanted us to and we wanted to go with her
There were lots of parents in the groups we were in ...not sure if I saw a young person not with an adult..

I went to one with my Dd on Saturday, all prospective students appeared to be with at least one parent. Dd went to one without me a couple of weeks ago at our local uni, as I was unavailable and took a friend along too as she didn't want to go alone, but I think they weren't very prepared & missed out on quite a bit of the less obvious stuff.

That's decided then - I'll be going with DD next weekend. Thanks all! 😊

Don't want to abandon DD is everyone else's parents are going to be there and equally don't want to embarrass her if we're the only parents tagging along.

Everybody else’s parents won’t be there but most will have at least one parent. Some bring their extended family. You won’t embarrass her by tagging along.

@tulippa I quite like the open days. We make a thing of it. She plans everything what she wants to see, eateries, what accommodation.

Common questions I've heard people ask including myself on an open day.
How many to a flat?
Can you come back for second year? (halls)
Study abroad programmes, trips abroad.
How many options can you choose in your degree.
Transport links to the centre of town/city (unis like lancaster/reading)
What are the societies like?
Internship opportunities

Parents embarrassing themselves moments (not me or DH😀):

Male parent (tour of library at Birmingham and yes, he was being serious): What'sthe point of all this? Surely they just access everything from their rooms online these days?
(Tour guide - actually, the new library building was something that students wanted).

Another male parent (accommodation tour, student village, Leicester):
The cleaner has a key?? I don't like the idea of the cleaner having access to the flat.
(Rest of us - Great, there's a cleaner).

Just don't be that parent...

PMSL @MarchingFrogs . I can verify that the cleaners in the Leicester student village are both lovely and efficient. DD has spent 4 terms at Oadby and enjoyed most of it, apart from the noisy freshers when she was operating on Japanese time trying to do lectures at 2am.

Mostly a parent goes along. Mine did a couple of post-offer days too and for those we sent them on their own, to get more of a feel for the places without us there.

DS1 did six open days and a campus tour with an appointment to speak to an academic afterwards (UEA). DH snd I split the trips between us as we had younger DD and DS2 to look after.

Ditched one on the day (Sussex) and Leicester also didn't make the cut, but more in a, well, if I could apply to 6, it would be in, sort of way - nothing to do with fears re cleaners' designs on his property / body. Got offers from all five, at which point, DH and I swapped and he went along to the offer holder days where I had been to the open day and vice versa.

DD looked at loads of places, either on her own (taster day at Greenwich, just for the sake of a day off school, really) or with me tagging along, since DH now didn't have the time and anyway was less keen on mini holidays spent traipsing around university campuses and random towns an cities. I made him go with her to the Leeds offer holder day, though, because he'd never been to Leeds.We dragged DS2 along to a few, mainly to get him out of his bedroom. Being a 2021 entrant, his own open day schedule was curtailed, but by then, he had seen Birmingham(yes), Exeter (no), Sussex (yes) KCL (no) Leeds (maybe) and UEA (Fell in love on the spot🙂). He has just finished a very enjoyable first year at UEA.

I actually loved traipsing off to the various universities and cities that all 3 have looked at, although my general plan was to push the actual applicant off to their activities and toddle off to find a coffee / gallery / nice walk round the vicinity, if possible giving any 'talks for parents' a wide berth after the first one or two.