London Uni as insurance option - sensible or not?

[Teriyakieverything]

Hi there. DD trying to decide between 1st and insurance unis round about nowish.

Just wondering, would it be practical or sensible to have a London uni as the insurance option, given that they only guarantee 1st year accommodation if you have them as the 1st choice?

Anyone's DC been through this process of accepting a London uni insurance offer, then having to find accommodation within short notice? Is it mission impossible?

Not London but another large city with student accommodation issues and I would definitely not recommend it. The worst week of my life trying to find student accommodation with 400+ students on lists everywhere. Lucked out in the end but he’s ended up sharing in private halls with people at 3 different unis, second/third years and a postgrad! Nothing wrong with any of that per se, especially as he’s a sociable lad and has worked hard to get freshers mates but it’s not been easy.

my DD is much shyer so I am going to ensure we are as safe as possible wrt accommodation and her insurance choice.

Many universities struggle with first choice, let alone insurance. Best to have realistic first choice! Depends which London university too! There’s a lot in London! However if they don’t guarantee insurance accommodation, it’s a big lottery!

Thanks for both for your inputs.

Thing is her first choice is Oxbridge, she actually has a offer, so it's not a case of giving up the offer and being 'realistic with her first choice'. The other London unis she is waiting to hear from are Imperial and UCL, and I don't know whether those would be sensible given the London accommodation situation.

@Teriyakieverything
I understand about Oxford. DD was in the same position but didn’t want London. Imperial and UCL obviously will cost more but DD will get more. Won’t imperial want stellar grades too? I doubt they will be insurance. UCL could be equal to Oxford too. Until she gets offers, you just don’t know. I assume she has 2 others which are likely to be below the Oxford offer? Don’t choose purely on money either. Choose the best place to be.

@TizerorFizz thats the thing, until we see the offer conditions for imperial and UCL , we don’t know. But the C offer is challenging at A star for further maths (not just maths) , and also specific about the A star in chemistry. Although they are achievable , she needs a plan B. Even if the others are Astar Astar A, if they are non specific , they would still be an insurance choice.

Sorry. Cambridge. I think she has to wait and see. However it could be risky if it’s pretty similar for grades but just different subjects at A star!

I'm not sure London is that harder than other places, once you are not eligible for student accommodation. We always found a room within a week for work, but I have struggled in smaller places like e.g. St Andrews. If your dd is shy and quiet, she might just be happy to be a lodger in someone's spare room, rather than move into a student flat. Students in London tend to be an international bunch anyway, so are often much older than UK school leavers. How far away from London do you live? Could she go in by train for a while in worst case scenario?

@NellyBarney
I would not commute unless it’s fairly close. I’ve seen Dc do this and they feel on the periphery of nights out. It’s best to make friends in halls if you can. Imperial has high numbers of foreign students and some will be rich. However there are others who will be standard students with standard money. I think imperial is a bit marmite so you really have to want London and what it offers. However as a specialist university many feel it’s unrivalled.

I don't think the accommodation stuff should stop her if she is happy to go to one of the London Unis if it doesn't work out with C. It is tight every year but things move around plenty and it's doable even if stressful. But being a student is an entirely different experience from other places even if you are in halls because once past the first year the social activity is not campus-based at all generally. I would try to consider the whole 3/4 year experience rather than the intense results and first few months stage when making a decision.

Many city universities are not campus based and knowing enough people to socialise with is important if you live further out. You don’t want to be by yourself in a room with no mates nearby. So hall, then house share makes more sense. As it does in most city universities. The only issue is that the house might be further out from the university and not in a student area. UCL is more concentrated north of the university.

Tizer, I think your DDs experience was with UAL, which from what you have previously said sounds pretty awful, with sites spread out across London and no dedicated University accommodation.

UCL and Imperial have been building a lot of accommodation and as a fall back there is the private sector if you are prepared to pay a bit more. I am not aware of students having the problems they have at Bristol and elsewhere

Socially both UCL and Imperial can be good. Unlike, say, Bristol where just about no one goes to the SU, the campuses are busy well into the evening with societies and other activities. Imperial has good sports facilities whilst UCL has ULU round the corner. Imperial also has a good, and well used bar, and there is quite a lot of using facilities at other colleges. DS at LSE joined an Imperial sports soc, whilst his Imperial friend used to go to the LSE Friday night disco. Sports in the more casual teams are good as you play other London Universities. Better than DDs Bristol experience where she saw most of Wales and one weekend trotted off to Brighton for a fixture.

There is a MN thing about foreign students. London Universities are hugely diverse, but equally students are bright and motivated. If you are into your subject and happy to accept people for who they are, you should have no problem creating an international, cosmopolitan group of friends. And you have London on your doorstep.

Tizer, Cambridge can be pretty brutal with offer grades. We knew several who had 4xA* offers. Imperial are odd and can ask for different grades to pupils from the same school for the same subject, presumably dependent on interview performance.

I was talking about 2nd year being spread out when students leave halls. Imperial is in a very expensive area. The students do have friends from abroad but often these students are well off and stay in their bubble of money. As indeed do poorer students. They don’t necessarily all mix in cheaper houses 20 minutes away by tube. So it is sensible to consider how London is different from many other university cities.

UAL has nothing to do with it and dd lived in our flat after y1.

@Teriyakieverything DD is in a similar position. She has an offer from Cambridge and waiting on UCL and Durham but would expect them to have similar offers so she is likely to pull out - but something is holding her back on the ‘what if’ it is lower and one could be her insurance. She has two lower offers from other Universities.

For us however UCL would mean her living at home for the whole duration as even if she were to have it first they don’t guarantee students in London Boroughs accommodation (even if only just in London) . When she applied we were under the impression they gave all first years accommodation where possible and thought they would be a compromise to then be at home for subsequent years. This seems to have changed to exclude localish students which I understand the reasoning of if accommodation is short. However it also means for some London outer borough students the idea of attending a London Uni is less likely if they can’t get at least one year of time away from home. There will always be exceptions including students who live in London and happy to stay at home and attend a London Uni.

Tizer I think you are being too negative. The fact that your dd chose to live at home with you in your flat, presumably with a commute, is one experience. DS at LSE was in a flat share of an ex council flat in Bloomsbury. A friend's son at Imperial rented in Acton. Lots of UCL students seem to live in Camden. DD when at Imperial, was living at home but was able to keep up with friends by meeting on campus, in pubs often in Hammersmith or in flats not that much further out, or over sport. But then they had no problem keeping up a social life with London school friends who were equally scattered.

The other thing to remember is that STEM courses at Imperial and UCL are very full on. There is a lot of teaching time and a lot of group project work. DS at LSE essentially kept (long) office hours in the library, though one day when DD followed him in (one tip for those needing to study during vacations is to register to use the library of your local university) and suggested that a good proportion of these long days were social. As I suggested before these tend to be bright, motivated students. Common ground tended to be subject and aspirations, not where a student came from.

Petts Wood, it's a shame about the change in UCL policy. There is always some shuffling around at the start of term and some exchange students leave at Christmas, so still scope to get in. Halls however, in our experience, were not as important as they can be elsewhere. You do though need to get stuck in with societies. The upside is that you don't get the claustrophobia you can get elsewhere where social life is determined by who is allocated to your first year student flat.

@PettsWoodParadise Yes very similar with the offers scenario. DD has 2 lower offers from Bham and Bath, both fantastic universities, but C and London are her 'dream' uni's iyswim. So she is waiting to see what comes through from Imperial and UCL, so that she has full information before making a decision on her insurance. I have a theory that some of these uni s conscious strategy is to make later offers, after the Oxbridge people have withdrawn their applications to them, so that the unis have a more realistic number of applicants who want them for firm choice before making offers, as they don't want to make offers to applicants who likely to decline them, which is very understandable from their pov.

Does anyone know if UCAS system allows you to accept the firm offer first, and the insurance offer later? Or if you accept the firm offer, do they other 4 know that they are not the 1st choice, and therefore not make you an offer at all with that in mind?

Commuting in by public transport to either would not be feasible. Whenever we've gone into London by train or car, it' s been a day out sort of scenario and not easy logistically, not something you could do twice a day on a daily basis.

Guess I better start looking into London accommodation now. Wish the other unis would hurry up with their offer decisions already.

@Teriyakieverything
All the universities have halls of residence. Imperial has a brand new one at North Acton for example. I would not particularly recommend that area though. I would try and find out where students go in their second year onwards because that’s a bigger issue. There are residences that will be £1000 a month but you have to factor in that rents are high in London. So where do students prefer and how much do they pay?

Personally I would put down what she wants down on form and work it out if the situation hits.

Last summer my DN had one London Uni firmed with accommodation booked but didn't make the grades and via clearing got a place another London Uni and there was accommodation available at a different hall (inter collegiate).

She couldn't stay with her first choice accommodation as that was linked to the Uni she didn't make the grades for. I think there is quite a lot of movement on results day but clearly there are risks involved.

Does anyone know if UCAS system allows you to accept the firm offer first, and the insurance offer later? Or if you accept the firm offer, do they other 4 know that they are not the 1st choice, and therefore not make you an offer at all with that in mind?

Your DD may already have found this put from the UCAS website or from whomever is her advisor at school, but in order to enter her firm and insurance decisions, she either had to have had a response from all the universities applied to, or have withdrawn her application to any which have not yet responded. And no, she can't enter the firm now and her insirance choice later.

www.ucas.com/connect/blogs/replying-offers-%E2%80%93-your-questions-answered

@MarchingFrogs Thank you. That’s clear. In that case I think dd will wait for the other two before making a decision.

@PettsWoodParadise I am not sure that you are right about London residents not having guaranteed accommodation at UCL. It certainly wasn’t the case when my now 2nd year applied

looking at the website, applicants who have previously attended university in Greater London are excluded - might you have misread this?

The only thing against the wonderful London universities is the accommodation and travel. Dd1 did an MSc at King's which is where I did my first degree. She was out in Brixton, I spent my time in Camberwell and Peckham, quite a long way out, particularly after first year in halls which is all very straightforward.

BUT. London is just the most wonderful place. My friend's son is finishing a PhD at UCL and has managed to find decent accommodation in and around Camden since he was an undergraduate - close and lots going on.

Fingers crossed for Cambridge (where I went for my PG - loved it) so no accommodation problems to deal with.