York, Durham, Exeter

[GodessOfThunder]

These universities seem feature in a disproportionate amount of discussion on Mumsnet as institutions commenters see as desirable for their DC to attend. Obviously they are well regarded universities, but why do they attract more discussion here than other Russell group universities, especially those in northern and midlands post-industrial cities such as Manchester, Sheffield, Leeds, Liverpool, Nottingham and Birmingham?

A few possible reasons were suggested by DH:

• They enjoy an undue level of perceived prestige due to being in smaller old cities/towns like Oxbridge
• The Mumsnet user base is skewed towards the SE and biased against post-industrial cities. Mumsnetters are less likely to be familiar with them and hold “grim up north” perceptions.
• There is a “showing off” factor in starting threads and commenting that DC has applied for, or attends, these institutions - the same goes for the “Oxbridge support” threads, the like of which you never see for red bricks.

Does anyone agree, or are there other explanatory factors?

A fair few because 2 of my closest relatives are in general recruitment, and all my DCs and their school friendship groups have graduated in the past 5 years, so I have talked to them about it. Obviously it's only a personal snapshot but it's quite a wide-ranging one. The only one I know who was asked about A levels, didn't go to university – it's different then because those are the most recent academic qualifications recruiters have to go by.

This.

I live in London with ambitious, clued up parents. Warwick is very much on the radar. Whether, maths, stem, econ, it’s seen as an aspirational choice

Same amongst (similar) parents at our school. Bristol, Durham and Warwick tend to be lumped into one group.

Yes but hers aren’t particularly maths or STEM. That’s the point really. You wouldn’t go there unless it was the course you wanted. Exeter is a desirable choice that you might look at first and chose the course second.

I think DC do choose Exeter as a first choice and fit themselves into courses.m, eg ancient history instead of history. I’ve known this for Newcastle too!

It will also depend on the teenager - some will want a particular university and not so bothered about the subject. Others will have subject as top of list.

Given the high level of anxiety/mental health issues there seem to be amongst young students these days I'd say that choosing a university where they feel they will be happy, meet like-minded people and make friends is not a bad starting point. The course detail for some specialist subjects and STEM subjects /medicine etc may be an important factor, but for a lot of humanities subjects courses can be quite similar.
Moreover, it can be dangerous to choose a course ONLY based on specific academic tutors or modules offered as these can change rapidly from year to year, and students don't even always get their first choice of modules anyway. DS2 has only got his first choices 50% of the time so far in his two years of a humanities subject.

We've had DC at unis over the last five years, and in my experience a happy, content student with friends and a social life and at least a moderately interesting course will be much more successful than a lonely, anxious student pursuing the 'top' academic course at the 'best' university which their parents convinced them to go to. (Of course it's not always an 'either/or' and many students have a fab time and combine social life/ friends and top academics).

Regarding York's popularity, I'd suggest part of this is because when you drill down into the numbers it punches 'above its weight' on Graduate Prospects for a lot of its courses, so for example in Computer Science it's ranked 18th overall, but 4th for Graduate Prospects/ Employment. This is probably because York has a highly developed 'Year in Industry' programme for many of its courses which really helps students get their first job. This is the metric that a lot of middle-class parents will be looking at, rather than student satisfaction etc.

CS makes for interesting reading @NormaSnorks

Graduate Outcomes

Joint 1st (100%) Imperial and Surrey

3rd (98%) Birmingham

Joint 4th (97%) York, along with Durham, UEA, Liverpool Hope, and Cambridge.

Joint 9th (96%) Aberystwyth; Oxford; Cardiff and Edinburgh

Joint 13th (95% Loughborough, King, and Canterbury Christ Church

Exeter than joint 16th (94%)

110 unis shown in total for CS. The upper quartile cut off scores 90%, median 80%, third quartile 70%, whilst propping the table up is a figure of 53%

The metric itself covers both "graduate" employment or further study, so not necessarily all that it seems at first glance

Graduate Prospects On Track: A measure of the proportion of graduates who agree that their activity is on track with their future plans

Top (96%) Oxford

Joint 2nd (94%) Liverpool Hope and UEA

4th Birmingham (93%

5th Durham (91%)

Joint 6th includes Imperial (90%); Joint 11th (88%) has both Surrey and Cambridge

York joint 32nd along with Loughborough with 83%; Exeter joint 41st on 81%.

Upper quartile score 84%, median 78%; third quartile 70%; with Wolverhampton having the lowest score with 48%.

@boys3 - yes, interesting stats. The grad prospects data is taken 15 months after graduation, and given that many students start working 'for real' at the companies they did their year in industry at, it could be that after over two years in total they already have their eye on their next role?

Family member who got a 1st in CS from York is currently the highest earner out of all his CS/Maths friends, except one from Cambridge who went into the city. Others from Durham, Bristol, Southampton, Bath, Manchester so clearly no perceived disadvantage from having been at York.

Except that more than the degree might account for this. No two students are the same. What has happened regarding jobs can only really be evaluated if they all applied to the same employer. Presumably they didn’t. In DD1s job, she does better financially than some Oxbridge grads. She doesn’t have a first. But: other attributes snd skills make up for it. It’s a complicated picture.

May be what they are earning at age 30 would be useful as perhaps it over time rather than first job out of university that counts, although for women if they have had a baby that warps the picture later for some.

Maternity leave definitely affects career progression. My colleague had her three boys within a five year period. As she was off work for three of those five years on maternity leave she dropped back in her career.

There are also big differences in salary depending upon where you are employed. Plus what work you actually want. Salaries in cheaper housing areas are often less. Employers take local Dc from the local uni. Dc might want live at home after uni snd take a lower salary to save up with no rent to pay. In other areas suitable jobs are not available so Dc move. University attended can be a small cog in these scenarios. Someone choosing to go to London and getting a very well paid job cannot be compared to someone working in a deprived area even though they might both have been to Oxbridge and done the same degree. Or York.

Someone choosing to go to London and getting a very well paid job cannot be compared to someone working in a deprived area even though they might both have been to Oxbridge and done the same degree. Or York.

What figure do you consider as being very well paid @TizerorFizz ?

@lastdayatschool Difficult question. Look at the IFS data on economics grads. Starting salary circa/above £45,000 for London. £19,000 in lower paid areas. Same degree. Different universities, and that makes a huge difference. However a big discrepancies in starting salaries Possibly better prospects with higher starting salary job too. This is not to criticise. It’s just reality and the choices people make.

For law: very well paid after a few years - £150,000 plus. Others will have differing views I imagine.

Well paid for graduates after a few years I would say £100k assuming someone has high A level grades and went to a decent university.

Average graduate salary by sector, 2023
Sector Salary(GBP)

Accounting 26,884
Advertising & PR 24,923
Architecture & Construction 24,400
Arts & Design 26,531
Banking 29,803
Buying & Merchandising 29,088
Charities 25,887
Computing & IT 28,383
Consultancy 27,605
Customer Service 27,524
Distribution & Logistics 26,650
Education & Teaching 20,906
Energy & Utilities 27,611
Engineering 27,345
Environmental 27,911
Finance 27,423
Food & Drink & Catering 25,870
Health 28,982
Human Resources 25,702
Insurance 28,071
Internet & Digital Media 29,737
Languages 29,007
Legal & Law 25,427
Management 29,729
Manufacturing & Production 27,056
Marketing 28,718
Media 31,175
Military & Defence 29,033
Property 24,258
Public Sector 25,066
Recruitment 26,691
Research & Analysis 28,110
Retail 28,113
Sales 28,277
Science & Technology 28,774
Secretarial & Business Admin 25,612
Sports & Recreation 22,240
Telecommunications 24,305
Training 26,483

https://www.savethestudent.org/graduates/this-is-how-much-your-degree-will-earn-you-in-10-years.html

Some of those salary figures - esp the 10 year ones - look very low to me.

34k for someone with a CS degree is especially low. Most people I know in NI in the software sector will be on at least twice that

So, according to those figures, the people who earn the most are on strike. I think this is a right-wing think tank that wants degrees culled. The IFS study was more realistic because they looked at the various uni groups. That makes a huge difference!

Those salaries look a bit low.

Both of those sources do look low. I earned more than that in my first year of accountancy in a big four firm in 1996. Salaries must have risen in 25 years.

And those that went into (investment) banking were earning well into six figure bonuses at the 5 year mark.

Which of the big 4, or 6 at the time, was that @grass321 ?

I started work for Andersens in 1995, and salaries were around 19k, so 25k seems a big jump.

Re the figures, I do believe they look low - but then I guess they are an average, which is one of the poorest statistical measures you can use.