Essex university

[DinkyDaisy]

Well, we are painfully reaching the end of the UCAS form experience.
4000, character personal statement has been so hard for ds to do as a wordy boy!
Now for last option on choices and we have stumbled upon Essex University.
It looks good for politics/ International Relations.
Anyone have experience of the university? There is a mini open day on Saturday we might attend.
Thanks all.

Which universities are not safe?

Any city university as there is not one main campus most students live on.

@RedWingBoots
What is your evidence for this? Students do leave a campus! What happens to city based students? My DDs were city based and were safe. Dc also need to learn how to look after themselves.

I think we all get a feel about places - rightly or wrongly...
Essex campus, yesterday, had a safe feel. I got a similar feeling with Bath and Surrey. It maybe coincidental that they are campus universities. My gut is not scientific!

When I was at university I was at a Hall half an hour walk from campus and near town. I also felt generally safe there.
I was nearer town than those on campus and went there a lot. Only 2 incidents spring to mind where I felt unsafe but those could happen when any student left campus. We are talking 80s here though!

Essex definitely had a reputation for unsafeness in the 80s. It was the army barracks proximity. I have not heard this for years.

Some cities are safer than others and it is is disingenuous to say they aren't - it is a factor in decisions, not usually the factor. DS2 and I discussed this when he was choosing between his offers. He chose the least safe city because other factors outweighed that one (although eh swapped course after 4 weeks : the irony!!)

There are various stats which rank order cities and universities by safety, of course.

How on earth can you judge “safe”? What factors are you talking about? Knife crime? Rapes? What, exactly? Bigger cities have more crime, eg London, Manchester, Birmingham. So that rules out LSE. UCL etc. Crime doesn’t translate into students not being safe. Rapes can happen on a university campus. It’s a gut feeling not backed up by evidence. If you don’t visit a city university you are not comparing fairly. Also universities have 1 year in halls! What about the next 2-3 years? They won’t be on campus!

Well, in the case of Essex it was a disproportionate number of rapes and sexual assaults which would have given me pause if I were a mother of daughters at the time.

The various rankings look at overall crime rates in postcodes and then break them down into crime types.

I'm not disagreeing with you. I said it was one factor. But it is not the case that your chance of being a victim of crime is the same in Bath as it is in Manchester or Nottingham. Of course that isn't true. And it's got nothing to do with campuses necessarily. Once off campus in York or Bath you remain safer than in , for example, Hull. You can also measure how safe people feel : on this measure big city Glasgow does well and Portsmouth fares badly.

I am sure you thought about the safety of an area before choosing to live there.

A family member went there and loved it.

Where else are they applying?

Actually I didn’t. I was born here. Neither did my DDs consider it when choosing a university. Nor where they live in London. Life has some risks and worrying about campus or not for one year based on perceived safety is weird in my view. It’s impossible to look at a whole range of issues which involve safety or feeling safe.

What about the issues at Warwick in the last few years? It’s just impossible to know what “safe” really means. As I said earlier, many people would not class London as “safe” and yet Imperial, LSE and UCL are very sought after. They have halls all over London. If everyone worried about choosing a university based on the perceived threats from others, no one would go to London.But students come in droves. You learn about staying safe. It’s about growing up and having antennae and your wits about you. Plus crime rates are not narrowed down to students. They include everyone and no campus is a gated community with no exits to a city. It really is a case of choosing the best course at the best university. The vast overwhelming majority of students stay safe.

I don't know why you always bite on one word in an OP's innocent post and run with it . It seems to happen because you don't approve a of a choice.

Lots of people consider a multiplicity of factors - it cannot be helped if they don't meet your approval. There are lots of good universities offering subjects students want , and then other factors are used to narrow them down. Campus or not wasn't a factor in my posts as I was extremely clear in saying : And it's got nothing to do with campuses necessarily.. You have a history of not sharing your disdain for campus unis - that is your choice and is not relevant to OP's DS. Weird is an unpleasant word.

And , yes, the situation at Warwick would have encouraged me to ask a DC (especially a DD) to consider looking elsewhere if history was their subject - and their applicant numbers did drop as it goes.

Good luck OP. It sounds like you had an interesting time.

I studied there, albeit in the 90s. I enjoyed the campus set up and we rarely went into town as had no need to. I stayed in the North Towers (William Morris) in my first year and loved it. Ok it's small and you have to share facilities but I got to know my housemates pretty quickly and I'm still in touch with a few 30 years later. I moved into a house share for the second and third years but still mainly socialised on campus as that's what everyone else did. It was far cheaper for a start.

@Piggywaspushed
I learned from posters on here! It’s what everyone does! None the less I stand by what I said. Safety cannot be assessed or quantified. I did also say choose the best course at the best university but you highlighted one word I wrote. I don’t know why you always bite on one word!???

Safety can be assessed and quantified . There are literally crime statistics and surveys. People consider these things when eg buying houses.

Safety is one criteria. One. People now also think about pastoral provision and mental health of students and ow they are cared for. This did not used to be a consideration and now it is . People move on.

I bit on weird because it's a bit rude to call someone weird when they consider the safety of their child. Obviously , crime can hit anywhere but there are places where you are disproportionately more likely to be a victim of crime. Forewarned is forearmed.

I think you also think people are odd for choosing based on distance @TizerorFizz or maybe I’ve remembered that wrong and it was someone else?

The thing is, everyone is different. Some may be nervous about safety or particularly vulnerable for one reason or another. Some students are influenced by how good the nightlife is, some want to avoid that altogether. Some students want to be near home, others want to be as far away as possible.

It’s best for people who know Essex to answer the OP’s questions. The rest of us know no more than she does!

Coming to this very late but just wanted to say how excellent the Politics/IR dept (Dept of Government) is. I did an MA there years ago (chose it because of its reputation - had the grades to go to any of the non-Oxbridge Russell group), and then stayed on for a PhD, teaching undergrads as a TA. The weird thing about Essex Dept of Govt is that it has always attracted world-class academics, PhDs and MAs who could go anywhere, but has struggled to attract undergrads. It's mad, because you won't get the same teaching quality in some other very competitive Pol/IR depts (LSE, for example).

And you get a paternoster lift in the library!

Thanks. Waiting for offers now. Had 2 but not Essex yet.
Really good to hear from someone who has experience of the department.

@EssexIRGrad
The truth is that LSE is a world brand and Essex isn’t. The other inconvenient truth is that no employer (outside academia) has any idea, or even cares, who taught you. Or didn’t because they were too busy writing a book or on a sabbatical!

Thanks for that insight 🙄
If your main criteria when applying to university is what a generic graduate employer cares about then yes, LSE is a top choice. But it has a long-standing reputation as an unhappy place to study Politics/IR because it's impersonal and many of the tenured staff are remote from students - it's something I've been hearing from my current and former students for at least 15 years. So if you want to enjoy your degree, and have proper pastoral support, you'd be well advised to go to any other top or mid-ranking UK university over LSE. (I should say that I've got some very good, conscientious colleagues at LSE too - it's just that the place seems to have an overall culture of moderate to severe twatishness.)

In any case, if you want to go into a specialist area, not a run-of-the-mill City/management consultancy job, the detail of your degree can absolutely matter. In my area, the specialist modules students take can make a big difference to their chances of getting a job.

Sadly, the politics students I know, even getting any grad job has been difficult. Even with a masters in a very relevant area (one would have thought). However I’m not sure where Maastricht stands as a politics/public policy uni! DD says it’s good time boozy! And cheap.

Units taken might matter for some jobs, but you are in academia and other jobs seem to be impossible to get. However I can assure few politics students in the wider world are ever asked who taught them. The interviewers would not have a clue. What they will probably do is test your skills to see if you meet their requirements. DH employed grad engineers all his life. Who taught them meant nothing. What they could do did.

It’s interesting that some students don’t like LSE. My DD always described it as marmite so I’m not entirely surprised some people don’t like it. LSE has a pretty low drop out rate though so it keeps plenty of students. London, and a very cosmopolitan university, doesn’t suit everyone. However it still opens lots more doors than Essex and is more competitive to get into.

I went to Essex in the '90s.from choice, I had 3 grade A 'A' levels from a technical college. Grade As were much less common then, only Oxbridge asked for them and that wasn't for every course.

I digress. It was tiny then, about 4,000 students. It suited me for various reasons - the diversity of the student body being one and the course another - but a few friends from London found it a bit too small.

Lived in Eddington tower first year, then house shares in Colchester and Wivenhoe.

I wouldn't discourage anyone from applying

Thank you all.
I am interested to hear views on Essex and politics in particular. Ds is carefully looking at course content, placement opportunities, contact hours, extra stuff like nerdy type clubs going on (clubbing not on radar - MUN, Board game clubs, etc, more his thing!!).
When all offers in he will look more deeply and go to some offer days.
He is Deferring a year and ticked that box on form. Going to try and earn some money!

@DinkyDaisy
Why does course content greatly matter? I do understand he wants to be happy but if it’s for future career, it’s a moot point. I’m struck by how relatively low grad prospects are, even at Oxford and Cambridge and LSE. So I would plot a career asap. Also universities rarely have placements for all students. There could be hundreds of placements needed. It’s just not possible and we know a young man who never got any placements, despite the university saying they were available. There were: a handful with hundreds of students applying. Ploughing your own furrow might be a better policy. Don’t rely on the university. What might be better is a year/semester at a university abroad.

Ds is at Essex at the moment not doing politics so can't comment on course however ds is loving uni life has made a lot of friends and his best friend from primary has joined him a year after.

Ds us currently on a placement year actually in the uni and is thriving pastoral care has been great and covid was dealt with well.

Course content matters because people want to enjoy the degree they are doing? It's not all about direct pathways to jobs - these degrees are more generalist.

Certainly , advice from UCAS, universities, schools , employers etc are that in arts and hums subjects there are major differences in modules and student drop out is lower, and degree success higher, where this has been considered. To gve an example, lots of students choose IR because it sounds glamorous, without looking at what this actually entails.

Some unis offer loads of choice in, for example English , social sciences and history, and some specialise , steer, or offer little choice. Some politics and sociology departments are great for feminism, others have more of a black experience leaning, or offer modules in European or UK economic and social history . Some focus a lot of the USA. Some have diaspora specialisms or offer South American or China modules, or terror studies.. Just examples!It's a really important thing to look at when looking at universities of similar calibre and entry requirements. Not sure how you choose otherwise! Pin in the map? Purely on the moveable feast of league tables??