Universities with lowest entry requirements

[Umbrellasaregood]

Where can we start?
DS wants to go to Uni but is dyslexic and predicted Ds (or Cs at a big push). Looking at humanity/ social science type courses, possibly with a view to teach or social work.
Yes, it's vague but we would rather find a course that would accept him and compromise a bit on the subject than face rejections.

I never read anything about low entrance universities.
Everything is Oxbridge or Russell Group.

Hope this makes sense.

@Umbrellasaregood we have found UWE to have fantastic support, pastoral and academic as well as financial for disabled students.

My DD was also offered the chance to do a foundation year ahead of her degree if her results weren't good enough which really relieved the pressure and in the event she managed to get enough for the full course

I think your view is quite old fashioned @TizerorFizz I think many universities offer
much more practical based courses these days. It’s a lot more about developing the skills of the young person. I think there a lot more recognition now that people don’t develop at the same speed and some can flourish after school so we shouldn’t shut off routes for HE to them. My son is actually at a RG but got there through clearing. He was predicted CCC but managed BBC and is flourishing in an academic subject that is his passion. It would have been very short sighted to have linked him into a “vocational course” because of his grades in Year 12. Luckily we believed in him. So I believe in keeping an open mind and a growth mindset.

(although quite frankly who would want to be a lawyer in the City anyway- great pay but no time to spend any of it or see family!! And I know a few current and past.)

@radrado
I agree about young people developing at differing speeds . I was one of them. However I didn’t expect to go to university at 18. I was lucky and did day release with my employer. I got professional qualifications but decided against a degree. This is what we need to return to. I am also talking about really low grades at A level and it’s questionable that A levels are always the best option too. We seem to like vocational courses at university level but shy away from vocational pre qualifications where DC might do better.

As your DS didn’t choose a university ranked 80 it’s a bit difficult to quantify your support for the. 80th ranked university. Or lower. I actually went to a poly (part time). This route is far more sensible and employers need to give more support to 18 year olds to work and study. So apprenticeships (non degree) are a very good way for C/D grade students to learn skills and study. Work up to a degree. . Skills learned at work are immensely important and they differ from skills learned at university. Eg speaking to clients, presentation skills, time management, working accurately at a certain pace, critical thinking and problem solving, working in a pressured environment etc.

I know not everyone wants a city job. However not all Dc understand that choice of university matters for some high paying jobs. Research clearly shows this. Along with other factors. DH employs engineers. Someone with DDD at A level would be unlikely to be considered even if they had scraped onto a degree course.

Remeber that there are only 24 universities in RG out of around 140 HE establishments in the UK, and it’s nothing more than a marketing tool. Therefore, the majority of students go to non RG universities and are successful. Some courses lead to better jobs than others and that’s probably what you should focus on - so a degree in engineering from any university will probably earn you more money than a degree in history of art. I know that on Mumsnet it seems that if your kid doesn’t get into an RG you need to take them out the back and shoot them because their life is over anyway, but in the real world that’s not the case at all. Visit a few unis, ask about their SEN provision, and see what you son likes and what fits him.

I know that on Mumsnet it seems that if your kid doesn’t get into an RG you need to take them out the back and shoot them because their life is over anyway

😀😀love this. We were told when DD2 went to a not very good Secondary Modern that her life was over as she'd never achieve anything academically. In fact she got almost all A grades in exactly the same range of academic subjects her grammar-school siblings took at GCSE. Fast forward a few years and she now has a first-class Masters in a very academic STEM subject from a university ranked above every university in the UK bar Oxford. So much of this RG love is totally ill-informed.

@thing47
Its not overhyped. Where DDs Masters from? RG? I also think you consistently undersell The Amershsm School. I know hugely successful DC who went to secondary moderns and even managed RG! No one ever said they could not achieve very highly. It’s all about belief and good teaching. Secondary modern schools in Bucks have excellent results in leafy lane areas. Amersham is 100 per cent leafy. It’s a great school and I bet no one from there ever said her life was over. I know that’s a total exaggeration. I would also bet you didn’t think it was over either and this school gets way better results than lots of comps. So please be honest. She was not disadvantaged and more than my friends’ DC have been at other Bucks secondaries.

Every report snd study that looks at RG finds their alumni earn more. In some professions, non RG grads are pretty much a tiny minority. It’s not just about marketing. If this was the case, how come the elite RG universities are world renown? Is Bucks New world renown? Or what about Derby? There is a pecking order and of course it includes St Andrew’s, Bath, Lancaster and Loughborough, plus a few more. The evidence strongly suggests RG grads earn a premium. This is driven by the very high earnings of some grads from some degrees. Mainly jobs where less highly acclaimed university grads don’t get much of a look in. Scientists earn well enough but not in the same league as some economists, lawyers and bankers plus a few more areas of employment.

Of course those jobs are not what everyone wants but we still have many people in top jobs from a few top universities. It hasn’t changed much even with all sorts of new universities and widening participation. There are great universities for many subjects and vocations, but the elite ones still give an edge. They are nearly all RG. They also select the best and are hugely over subscribed. Why would anyone bother if it’s just marketing and there is no advantage?

OMG what a lot of snobbery on here and ignorance about dyslexia and apprenticeships in fact.

just because the OP’s child is dyslexic doesn’t mean he isn’t intellectually able. It is a SPECIFIC learning disability. On the right course and in the right university he has the potential to thrive. A levels assessed with terminal exams are vicious for dyslexics, even with extra time, often leading to underperformance.

Going to RG and becoming a barrister, surgeon or hedge fund manager is not the only route to a happy, successful life!

Apprenticeships combine day release study with working and this can actually be quite a demanding juggle to get to higher level qualifications and take a long time. My dyslexic DC dropped out of 6th form, got a great apprenticeship, did BTEC then HNC then uni. They are now in final year of MEng having loved being there. Hopefully the real life work experience plus degree will help with job hunting.

Anyway, we’ve had good experiences of UWE with a different dyslexic DC. Aberystwyth was fantastically positive about dyslexia at an open day with a clear commitment to matching assessment methods to strengths.

I went to non RG by accident. First in my family to go to university, I liked the sound of the course. I’ve had a very successful career and I’m super senior in a super competitive area.

@HannahDefoesTrenchcoat
As I said, not everyone wants those jobs!

Sorry, but this really is pure snobbery.

It's absolutely OK if you don't want to go to an RG or you can't get into one.

You ain't the cream of the crop if you did. You're really not.

Except studies of the “cream of the crop” in working life shows RG wins out. So you might not be correct there. Obviously there’s notable exceptions and notable non RG universities. The courses that are competitive are mostly at RG universities. Why is that?

I agree - there is a massive cost to attending uni these days, and at that end of the scale it's unlikely to boost his employment prospects.

What about something like this? a foundation year helps get the grades up to do a good undergraduate. Way better support in uni and like you said he gets the experience and chance to improve his marks before deciding what to do.

www.kingston.ac.uk/undergraduate/courses/foundation-year-social-sciences/#:~:text=The%20Foundation%20year%20in%20Social,in%20preparation%20for%20your%20degree.

We looked at Lampeter for DS who is going to pick it as his insurance. It screens all new students for learning disabilities/ASD as so many students have them - the pastoral care there is superb.

Class sizes are small (12 ish) so interaction and learning is spot on - but downsides are it's small, it's v far away (from us) and it's a teeny town really quite far from big cities. As we live in London it would be a massive culture shock - and travel there and back is tricky (best is coach from Camarthen)

Choice of subjects is amazing though, if of a Humanities bent, and many of their students then go onto Camarthen to study PGCE

Definitely worth a look

Everyone's slating all these lower universities, claiming that job prospects are not great from them but I would argue the opposite.

I went to NTU after getting AAC in A levels so I didn't get accepted to my uni of choice. I got a first in Chemistry and then trained as a teacher. A PP posted that they went to Oxford and became a teacher of Physics.

My friend studied pharmaceutical sciences at DMU and got a 2:1. She now works for a pharmacy sales company that has its HQ in Germany. She gets paid VERY well, has a brand new company car (BMW 1 series) and gets to travel abroad.

I would argue it's the degree itself and the grade they get, rather than the actual university that determines their success in getting a good job.

Why oh why are people banging on about RG and top earners on a thread very specifically about lower tariff courses?
Spectacularly unhelpful and insensitive.

Some great advice here from people with experience of successful routes. Even in the lower tariff group some courses have better employability and a reputation for good teaching and student experience.

That’s the sort of information the OP is asking for, not RG/Oxbridge giving students an edge when she said her DS is looking at Cs and Ds.

Mumsnet sometimes 🤬

Why do folk assume teaching and social work are appropriate careers for those with the lowest academic capacity?

PS I work for the RG uni many have mentioned/alluded to on here - I wouldn't want any oft my own children to go there as it's not was the best fit for them - it only suits a v small minority and the amount of mental ill health due to children coming to suit parental expectations rather than their own desires is off the scale.

Do what is best for your child at this moment - and ignore those talking about future earning potential - that is only a small part of a much bigger picture.

RG universities may well be better represented in professions such as law, banking and other City-based financial jobs (although one could argue that says more about those professions than it does about the university…) but that's quite a small number of graduates and as @TizerorFizz says not everyone wants that sort of job, and thank goodness for that as I'm not sure the world needs tons more lawyers or bankers, personally.

DH and I both work in professional jobs where RG isn't a thing at all. So does my sis, my SIL and her DH, my PILs… But none of us is particularly money-oriented so as @Matchingcollarandcuffs says, future earning potential isn't a major consideration in my family.

@Hobbi as I have posted on another thread, studies indicate that great teachers are the single biggest factor in DCs educational achievement. So we should pay the really good ones far more! (and no, no one in my family is a teacher, this is an objective comment 😀)

@HannahDefoesTrenchcoat
Its now a very important consideration about what jobs grads get. Unless you are rich and don’t need a house. Many people really do need to think about employment. Mum and Dad might indulge young people and say they don’t need to worry, but the truth is that huge numbers of grads don’t get grad work and are stuck at earning less than £20,000. Only the successful ever post on MN! There’s other opportunities besides university for DC who don’t feel they are academic enough. It’s important to consider them.

NTU is a former poly. It’s hardly the bottom of the ladder. You need to look at low ranking universities with high drop out rates, poor access to better jobs and then evaluate value for money. Some universities are not producing grads who will achieve more than non grads. Research shows this. So why bother? Science is wholly different. We need those people. We don’t need so many with degrees in sociology, media studies or theatre. Never mind arts. We do need some of course but parents pay a lot for DC to follow dreams.

106 universities offer Law. Does anyone seriously think the bottom ranked universities get many students into the legal profession?

@thing47
Living where you do, with the average house price at £784,000, you really must care about earnings! How will DC afford to live there without high earnings? Or maybe DC in that area should not expect to live there? The younger generation really will not afford to live in some places unless they earn well or have rich parents!

The top 1% of income tax payers, pay 29% of all income tax. We really DO need high earners. It’s incorrect to think the “not money minded” pay enough for the nhs, education, armed forces etc. They simply don’t. We have a huge proportion that pay no income tax at all. We actually need grads and others to earn highly. Thank God some want to.

@thing47 I know, I am one! 😉

The argument is that if we actually tax the highest earners loads, that's actually an incentive to do the more worthwhile medium pay jobs. Read Utopia for Realists .

future earning potential isn't a major consideration in my family.

Isn't the main reason for working to earn a living?

The UK doesn't tax high earners very much. In some European countries top tax rates are over 50%!

Yes, that's the point in the book!