Should parents or dc contact the universities?

[Watermelon999]

…… regarding admissions information, course information or general enquiries, eg about accommodation?

I have tried to ask this on the WIWIKAU facebook page but it has been rejected, not entirely sure why!

I have been advising dd to contact them herself (being nearly an adult) but it seems many parents do it for their dc? Obviously I may be able to explain things more clearly, which could be more productive in the long term, and I don’t want dd to be disadvantaged. But on the other hand, I want to promote independence.

does it seem a bit odd if parents do it for them or do universities expect this?

Yes, it was the accommodation that put my dc off Nottingham. Shame as everything else was very positive there.

I think my DC just aren’t picky. So many DC are in all sorts of ways. My DC can put up with indifferent food for a year but Nottingham has lots of self catered halls @RampantIvy and a quick glance at the web site shows this. So why would anyone rule out a uni due to food in a hall they don’t need to live in?

My DDs didn’t need every minute detail about the course either. I think most info is on web sites to allow most to make an informed choice. I think unis should listen to students when they are there and parents over heath but otherwise DC should take responsibility,

Because when we looked and were given a tour we were told that all first years went into catered, and when she asked about self catering was told that only post grads got self catered. Also, DD didn't like the course she was offered.

DS is at Uni and I don't remember him having to email at all. Most of the info is on the websites and you usually have the opportunity to ask questions at Open Days and Offer Holder Days.

We did give him some guidance on what he might want you to look for and some questions he might like to ask and we did go with him to Open Days.

@RampantIvy Did you not look at their accommodation web site? Ok, she didn’t like the course but not reading up on halls is a bit odd. Even I knew Nottingham had self catered and I’ve never been there. DDs friend self catered there.

The communication would be driven by the student. Parents might pose extra question to their teen but I think it is good for the uni student to handle most queries.

Obviously they would be discussing finances and travel dates etc with their parents if the parents were assisting with accommodation and fees payments and transport to uni, open days or inspections.

No, because she wasn't fussed about Nottingham anyway. The student who showed us around seemed to think that Broadgate Park was for post grads and didn't seem keen to show us around there, so DD didn't bother following up.

We got the impression that the student was thinking "why on earth would you want to self cater?" No doubt DD was thinking was thinking "why would you put up with indifferent food for 9 months when home cooked food is nicer?"

Being able to self cater was as important to DD as sports facilities are for other students. It's her down time, and cooking is of particular interest to her.

Given that other universities were of more interest to her Nottingham was off the list pretty much straight away.

Maybe not believe what a student rep says?

DD wasn't 18 until the end of August 2023 and had accepted her halls offer in June when she was still 17 and not legally able to enter into a contract. As we are in Scotland, some of the students are even younger - one of the girls in her flat won't be 18 until summer 2024.

This isn't accurate.

Your DD had full legal capacity at 16. See the Age of Legal Capacity (Scotland) Act 1991, s. 1.

Even children can enter into contracts (otherwise no child would be able to buy anything in a shop). Whether a child can enter into a contract depends on whether it's a contract of the type that people of a certain age tend to enter into. (Section 2 of the above Act).

That’s really quite unusual. Do you and your daughter not normally communicate?

I am not allowed to get involved even if I wanted. Both my kids have been determined that they don’t want any help at all. They seem to think that if they get help, then whatever they achieve won’t be their credit to take. It is an odd mentality when applied to situations where this doesn’t matter. Anyway, it worked out fine.

My only bugbear is when they were struggling with the word counts on their personal statements. I absolutely love reducing the number of words in a document and think I have a special skill for it 😂But nope, I wasn’t allowed to help with that either.

My DD did her whole application herself, but she kept me informed. She went to open days herself or with friends but knew I’d quite like to see my Alma mater so that was the one Uni visit we did together plus the offer holder day for her firm choice.

When shortlisting we discussed over family meals and she made up her mind based on input. Quite unusually she seems to value our experience and input. She also wanted to take into account her father’s cancer treatment and being around or not, she put a local uni on the application as it helped her feel she had a choice to be nearby if she wanted, we didn’t want her to take it into account but she did, in the end it wasn’t needed.

DD had one issue with her registration for interviews and she contacted that uni directly to explain the error that came through to her. I think they respected her clear questions and realised they had messed up but no one else had had the guts to ask, everyone else got an updated email, I like to think thanks to DD, and she was seen in a good light. No way would that have happened if I had intervened.

Ultimately it is my daughter’s journey. She is happy and part way through Y1. I might nudge her to raise an issue if she has a problem such as no hot water but the ball of her education, comfort and finances is all in her court. I am visiting this weekend at DD’s invitation and taking some of her dad’s best cooking…they will always be your child however capable and grown up they become.

On the UCAS application my son filled in the bit giving me permission to deal with his application if necessary. Which has been useful as he's been ill and there have been some things to sort out quickly this week.

I've allowed / sometimes encouraged him to delegate some admin tasks to me as he has been easily overwhelmed by all the emails.

Some can do it all at 18. Others still struggle at 19 like him. I'm not going to stand by and watch his MH decline for want of a bit of help. Or see him wreck it all because he's missed an email.

I wanna make sure he actually leaves home in September!

We communicate a lot. She had always said she didn’t want to go to university, and was working and travelling abroad by herself the year after sixth form and wasn’t living at home. She had top A levels. She applied on the closing date of the following year after leaving school, but we didn’t know at that point. She also sorted all the student finances and student accommodation herself. We had no input into the personal statement at all or into where she applied

I don't know why you keep labouring the point. DD wasn't sufficiently interested in Nottingham to bother checking whether there were SC halls there.

Given that you regularly eat at michelin star restaurants I'm surprised that you think it odd that some students prefer to cook their own (better) meals than eat indiffernt food in catered halls.

I do not think it remotely odd she wants to cook @RampantIvy Im querying rejecting a uni based on erroneous info from a student and believing all accommodation at Nottingham was catered, which is not true. However I’ll leave it there. Where I eat is of no interest to anyone, bar me. I have no doubt it beats student veggie cooking though!

The reason we may need to make contact is that dd has an offer but it is one grade higher than the entry requirement on the website. Eg website entry requirement is ABB offer is AAB and we are not sure if we should query this. This is the midling choice for dd, which is the most realistic offer, having picked 2 aspirational and 2 lower more safe bets. ABB is absolutely achievable, AAB is probably best case scenario and matches predicted grades.

In an ideal world your yp would do EVERYTHING themselves.

But children and young adults develop different skills at different rates. This will partly due to their own capability/experiences and partly down to parenting.

There will be a some people who will tell you they should be doing it themselves, and implying they or you are a failure if they won't/can't.

If you are still working towards independence and yours still needs a bit of support why not? If they find it hard it will be better to mentor, guide them to contact the uni, talk about what they need to find out and what questions the uni might ask and get them to do it themselves rather than do it for them. Give them some privacy, make them feel responsible for finding out what they need to know and don't hover while they do it. Remember the unis are experienced in dealing with a wide range of yp and will help them.

The kid should do the contacting obvs. What are you going to do when she starts work? Ring up the boss? Jeez

@Watermelon999 It’s not an entry requirement. It’s a typical offer. So offers to individuals can be above or below the grades mentioned. I would not bother asking anything. It might just mean they have had more applicants so the typical offer this year is higher. It’s just how it works.

I think in this case, your dc contacts them, but discuss what to say beforehand, and perhaps be there so they can ask you something, if needed, during the phone call. Ie. Be there to support them, but let them do the contacting etc.

I think in this case, your dc contacts them, but discuss what to say beforehand, and perhaps be there so they can ask you something, if needed, during the phone call. Ie. Be there to support them, but let them do the contacting etc.

Or email... they can write what they want to ask clearly and then get thinking time rather than perhaps being flustered if the conversation doesn't go as they might anticipate.

It's dealt with on the apps and applications for accommodation vary by uni. Don't leave it too late.

Actually the admissions team prefer email. It can be dealt with more thoughtfully. If the offer was anomalous or mistaken, the email can be routed to the tutor who made it. In these cases a first phone call will not result in anything substantive anyway. It will either start a game of phone tag or lead to an email (or both).

But children and young adults develop different skills at different rates. This will partly due to their own capability/experiences and partly down to parenting.

I agree @NoTouch. DD needed a gap year to gain more confidence. She got used to travelling to visit friends at university and changing trains at multiple stations, she worked, she volunteered and gained so many soft skills that by the time September came she was more than ready to go to university.

There will be a some people who will tell you they should be doing it themselves, and implying they or you are a failure if they won't/can't.

Yes, and some of them are on this thread because they don't understand your first point. I often feel that I have to defend why I went to university open days with DD. Firstly none of her friends were interested in the same unversities or courses and she didn't want to go on her own, secondly getting to them was tricky timewise on public transport and thirdly getting to them then became impossible because our local rail service went on strike every Saturday for three months.