Leicester & Lancaster unis

[flusterbluff]

Do people have any knowledge of the demographics of these two Uni's? I don't know much about them. I wanted to know are they heavily populated with any demographic? Private vs state schooled, ethnic group, socioeconomic background etc or are they both quite a mixed bag

Both Very mixed for SES & ethnicity, but more state than private schooled I suppose, compared to other pre92 Uni avg.

DD was at Leicester on a clearing place but I was so impressed in so many ways, no idea why it wasn't on our radar originally.

Her time at uni was fragmented through Covid and illness but she still had a good experience.

Very very mixed ethnically - walking down university road with her which I did a few times, pretty much everyone you see is a student I imagine (not me hahaha) and you could easily count the white faces - a lot more non-white students than white. Same in her seminar groups (Eng lit). I found this refreshing after my own uni exp of never once seeing a single non-white student in three years (in the 1980s).

I also think the people she knew were not so much from private schools tho I am sure there were plenty of rich people there, as at any uni, and more and more so sadly.

The pastoral support for her was excellent - staff were all really supportive and helpful. Ofc I don't know about any other dept.

@flusterbluff

Lancaster 10% from private school; 11% grammar

Leicester just over 6% private school, 11% grammar

To put that into wider context Durham has 39% from private school; Oxford just over 30%; Newcastle 22%; Nottingham 18%; York 14%; Sheffield about the same as Lancaster

Leicester a lot more diverse (c65%) than Lancaster (c27%)

Leicester slightly higher first gen students at 39%; Lancaster 33%

Both very similar low participation area rates; Lancaster 9%; Leicester 11%

Good intel there @boys3 - bears out my highly unscientific hypothesis about racial diversity at Leicester.

indeed @clary 😄

Although I think the ethnicity figs may just relate to UK Students.

27% undergrads at Lancaster are international students (as compared with 16.5% at Leicester). So Lancaster as suggested by another pp likely more diverse than the initial figs indicated, although still less so than Leicester.

@flusterbluff breakdown of where the UK undergrads at each of the unis come from.

@boys3 thank you for the data! I love data!!

@clary sounds like you and your dd were very happy with her uni

Lancaster is always a puzzle. It appears high in league tables but seems under the radar. I wondered if it was under the radar around where we are down south but maybe firmly on the radar in other parts of the UK

Any idea why a uni so high on the leagues is no spoken about so much?

Simply because it isn’t Russell Group. It is however a fantastic university.

@flusterbluff out of sight = out of mind

A generalisation of course but:

• A disproportionate amount of students come from London and the South-East.

• Alongside a level of regionalisation / attending a uni maybe within 100 miles of home. 45% of students from London go to a London Uni; another 25% to one in either the South East or East of England. Just 3.3% to the North West. For students from the South East 64% go a uni in one of London, South East or South West; another 19% go to East or West Mids or East of England unis. 4% to North West unis. 62% of students from the North West go to a uni in the North West, just 6% to one in either London or South East.

• for those who want more of a city experience huge range of choice in the northern parts of England. Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Newcastle, Sheffield as examples.

• if Lancaster was in Leicestershire rather than Lancashire I think it would have a far greater draw. As Loughborough (in Leicestershire) does.

• The Russell Group is of course hyped up, not that most of those who go on about the RG could likely name the 24 constituent unis, or realise that York, Durham and Exeter only joined in 2012. Lancaster not in RG, and maybe less on the radar of those unable to see through the RG marketing hype. Which probably benefits those who are more discerning as it is an excellent Uni.

if you like data you can fill yer boots at www.hesa.ac.uk

Far more succinctly put. 😀

Yeh it was really good. Overall her experience wasn’t the best, but it was much better than if she had gone elsewhere. Her PT was so amazing when dd was struggling.

Agree - Lancaster and Leicester and to some extent Bath and Lboro fly under the radar as they are not RG.

@clary see I find Bath and L'boro along with St Andrews although not RG are well discussed and in the good uni narrative. It's L&L that seem strangely under the radar.

Interestingly the above for mentioned are popular with private schools whereas L&L not so much. I wonder if this is why we hear so much more about the former. More prestige due to private school approval?

But Bath, L'boro, st Andrew's are also non RG yet are always mentioned as great unis. They don't suffer any lack of being seen as aspirational unis despite being non RG
Conversely Queen Mary's and Queens Belfast don't benefit particularly from being RG. These two are rarely mentioned as places to aspire to go to.

Leicester isn’t mentioned because it’s not nearly as highly rated. Lancaster is known to be a top ten university. Leicester isn’t anywhere near.

I think there’s a very big difference between Lancaster and Leicester. Leicester would be sitting with universities like Sussex, Kent etc. perfectly good universities but not near the top.

I used to teach at the other Leicester university, and would agree with @boys3 on the demographics of U of Leicester. (We also had a lot of overseas students from India/Pakistan or their diasporas. Those of my students I talked to about this (I had several students of Indian descent from the UAE, for instance, in my classes), said their parents had liked the idea of them being somewhere where familiar cuisines, temples/mosques etc were readily available.)

If your child is considering U of Leicester, I should say that I lived in Leicester for eight years and found it very depressing — a generic, run-down city centre (some spectacularly bad urban planning), not much going on culturally, a sense of a prosperous Victorian manufacturing city that didn’t really know what it was now. Student life at U of L may be very different, obviously, but a lot of my students were local and lived at home, and seemed to have limited engagement with student nightlife/activities, and for some of my female students from more conservative communities it was normal to be dropped off and picked up after classes by a brother/cousin. It might suit some students who are not interested in a drinking culture being the norm.

Again, my experience is not U of L, obviously.

Leicester has a very good additional needs department and excels in certain subjects. It has very specific issues re league tables due to how they are calculated, with emphasis on "graduate" jobs whereas many of dds friends went to work for family businesses. Another plus point for those with social anxiety issues, is that housing is relatively cheap so getting a studio/1 bed flat is more doable than in pricier areas. Last year £140 a week incl. bills got a one bed flat in private sector 5 mins from university.

Friends son was at Lancaster which he loved too but found a bit boring town wise

True. But why is Lancaster then not spoken with the same aspirational tone as Bath, St Andrews, L'boro etc which are also not RG

I don't know what the other university is in Leicester. Sorry for my geographical ignorance.

Why doesn't your university have the same ethnic demographics as UofL if it benefits from the same cultural offerings ?

I went to Leicester, although this was in the 90s so very out of date info! However, it had a very down to earth feel even then, which I liked. I only knew one girl who'd been to private school. We went round it recently for dd and really liked it. The halls at Oadby village are lovely and in my opinion, the city centre is no worse than Nottingham where dd ended up (because RG of course 😫). I can't imagine she would have had worse pastoral care at Leicester than she has at Nottingham, where it's been appalling. One of her friends is doing Midwifery at Leicester and seems to have settled in well and the housing is so much cheaper than in Birmingham, Nottingham etc. There's enough nightlife for those who want it...

@flusterbluff de Montfort.

we are in the East Mids but in fact dd found v few peers were local. Most from away, London, north etc.

yyy also v cheap housing for later years

It’s De Montfort University, and ranks far lower (with some highly-regarded courses) so will broadly get students on lower grades than the much higher-ranked U of L. I didn’t say it doesn’t have the same demographics, and my information is out of date now, as I stopped working there some years ago, but my department’s entry requirements when I taught there were considerably lower than the same degree at U of L, so I imagine fewer students would be likely to travel from other parts of the country to study there, suggesting a more local demographic. We did have a huge foreign student intake for some degrees.

My daughter went to Lancaster and loved it.

OP I understand what you mean. My son studied Ecology and Environmental science at Lancaster .Its a fantastic Uni with the college system and always scores highly in rankings and yet you never get the impression that other people consider it a great Uni. Am guessing it’s because it’s not a RG Uni.

@clary I don’t mean to have a go but that is nothing more than an anecdote that is completely detached from the objective, and published, reality.

1 in 5, ie 20% of UK undergrads at the University of Leicester have a home domicile in either Leicester itself or Leicestershire.

Just by way of contrast head not far up the MI to Nottingham. The city of Nottingham provides just under 2% of Nottingham Uni uk undergrads and including Nottinghamshire the total just gets past 5%, or 1 in 20.

Back to Leicester nearer 1 in 3 are from just the East Midlands.

another near 55% come from London, east of England (direct rail link from Peterborough); West Mids and South East.

around 1 in 10 from the three north of England regions combined.

conversely the housing anecdote is completely reflective of reality. 😀

as far as Leicester De Montfort goes half uk students from the East Mids overall. 21% from city of Leicester, 13% from Leicestershire. 7% of the total from the three north of England regions. 1.2% of De Montfort Uk undergrads come from private schools.

That would match my rough sense of the stats among my department’s students when I worked there, @boys3, though I imagine considerable internal variation between courses.

There was a massive spate of building student accommodation, and I think the market was glutted, so prices dropped, there not being much call for eight-bedroom flats with shared kitchens in the rest of the population…