My son wants to go to open days alone/with friends

[Mathsmother]

My son in year 12 wants to go to uni open days alone and not with me or my husband. He may go with friends to a couple where they also interested in applying.

We are totally fine about it and rather admire his initiative but when I posted such on Facebook I was told that most students take parents along with them to open days and I really should go. I just wondered why? Surely it is the student’s choice not the parent’s and it is much cheaper for one train ticket (on a young person’s railcard) than two or three tix? The only downside I can see of my son travelling alone at age 17 is that he won’t be able to book a hotel room for the one far-flung uni he had on his list (Edinburgh). Thoughts and experiences welcome xx

Because some parents take over and ask all the questions. The students just sit there and they don’t get much of a chance. Parents take up space in subject talks and have to be ejected because students are left outside.

We went to a lot of Open Days (DD has particular needs and we wanted to be sure they could be met) and this was not our experience at any. Generally there was more time available than questions asked. In some cases if parents didn't ask questions, then there would have been none. Speakers giving the talks pretty much always asked prospective students first for their questions. Where there was limited space in subject talks the university clearly specified (and enforced) that it was one parent per student or only students. I think this view of parents taking over and students not getting a look in is somewhat anecdotal.

@redskydarknight

I can assure you that elite ones do do this. The University of York (to pick one at random that sticks in my mind) must have had a huge marketing budget for their Open Day. There was an enormous number of people and resources involved; I imagine it takes the whole year to plan.

Whilst York is highly rated, I'd not class it as "elite" in the same was as Oxford, Cambridge, StAndrews, Durham, etc.

It's "competitive" as it's competing with the likes of Lancaster, Leeds, and Warwick, but they're not "elite", just within the top 10/20.

My son went to visit Oxford with his school and Cambridge on his own, and we went with him to Durham. It was very noticeable that they put a lot less "effort" into their open days than the likes of York, Leeds, Warwick and Lancaster who went to town on their open day facilities, tours, talks, etc.

It was abundantly clear that Oxford, Cambridge and Durham made less effort, simply because they don't need to. York, Leeds and Lancaster are basically competing against each other for the same "kind" of student, in terms of locality, entry requirements, league table places, etc., hence why they put so much effort in to get the best applicants that they can. Oxbridge, Durham and St Andrews are in a different league!

I don't think the financial contribution by parents has changed all that much? Whereas the financial contribution of the students themselves clearly has.

I attended University in the early 1990s. Tuition was free. My parents' income (teachers, so not super rich) meant I did not qualify for any maintenance grant and the newly introduced maintenance loan was absolutely tiny. So my parents paid my entire maintenance costs. Just checked inflation etc and the real value of what they gave me then is more than the amount I give my kids now (they get minimum maintenance loan). So I'm not sure the "greater financial stake" of parents argument holds. Unless parents are paying fees.

Of course, parents might be concerned about the student debt that their children are taking on.

@redskydarknight

We went to a lot of Open Days (DD has particular needs and we wanted to be sure they could be met) and this was not our experience at any. Generally there was more time available than questions asked. In some cases if parents didn't ask questions, then there would have been none. Speakers giving the talks pretty much always asked prospective students first for their questions. Where there was limited space in subject talks the university clearly specified (and enforced) that it was one parent per student or only students. I think this view of parents taking over and students not getting a look in is somewhat anecdotal.

I agree with that. I never saw that parents "took over" at all. In most subject talks, it was the students themselves that were asking the questions generally, maybe they were a little "shy" at first, and maybe a parent asked the first question, but once the Q&A at the end was in full flow, it was predominantly students. The difference was in the talks about funding, accommodation, etc., where it was mostly parents asking the questions, but you'd expect "older heads" to be thinking of practical matters. The tours of labs and subject buildings were also mainly aimed at students with the people leading the tours often talking directly to individual students or telling students to come to the front for a better view, leaving the accompanying adults further back.

There was only one Uni where the talks were so full that adults were asked to step outside when there were students unable to get in. At a couple (I can't remember which), students were asked to enter the lecture theatre first and sit down, and then adults were admitted afterwards to fill the spare seats, but usually there were enough seats for everyone.

One, again, I can't remember which, seemed to go way over the top telling people to "book" their slots for talks etc in advance and had "full up" notices for many on their website/app. But when the day came, it was a free for all, they weren't checking "tickets" and people just went in anyway whether booked or not. I presume that was just to try to control numbers, but it did look a little stupid to make such an effort to tell people to book online, have a booking system set up, and then not actually use it!

I'm not sure you're comparing like with like here.

Oxford and Cambridge are collegiate and a large part of the Open Days there is college based. Most students will only go to a couple of colleges, but the total time/money investment over all the colleges in total is huge, before you even start to consider the individual department events and centralised information sessions.
I very much doubt that they make "less effort" than other universities though I can see how it is more spread out and therefore might appear so to individuals.

I went to Uni 89-92 and didn’t have a penny from my parents/mother for university - there was a grant and then the student loans in my final year. I did seasonal jobs at the post office at Xmas/summer to supplement but few of my friends got any money from parents. As it was free and there was plenty of very cheap student owned halls you could manage on the grant and an overdraft. I left uni with £500 debt cleared within a few months of my new job. I don’t recall how it was assessed so I accept that the system may have required more wealthy parents to top up to the tune of a few thousand a year.

Now, if one of you earns over £70k, the maintenance load is capped at £6k, whilst accommodation alone is as much as £12kpa in many cities, before bills, food, transport etc, so parents have to subsidise. Every single adult I know, from lawyers to policemen, nurses to childminders ALL paid for their kids accommodation/or supplemented to the tune of £10k pa on average because their children are already looking at a debt of £50k. As a result, they were very invested in where their kids go and all advised/encouraged kids to look at unis with lower rental. This is especially the case where there is less than a 3 year age gap between siblings and courses overlap - or where they are doing intensive courses, such as nursing/medicine, where PT work has to be kept to a minimum.

So, on balance, I think the onus on parents to contribute is considerable now and the amounts needed are tens of thousands more than in the 1990s. I’ve lost count of the threads on MN and the FB WIWIKAU boards where parents are worried sick because they just cannot find the money (single parents, etc) and their kids are having to take years out to work and save in order to be able to go. Abolishing fees, as in Scot/Wales, would help - but that’s a whole other thread!

Oxbridge, Durham and St Andrews are in a different league!

Durham isn't. There's barely anything between Durham and Warwick or Lancaster in the league tables. And York, while accepting lower A level grades, otherwise matches up pretty well (its Student Satisfaction score is the same and its Research Quality is higher than Durham).

People think Durham is elite and because of that its Graduate Prospects are excellent but it that view isn't really supported by the data.

We went to the open days with all three of our girls at their requests, between fifteen and eight years ago.
Made it a weekend away for the majority as none of them were really a day trip. We separated for the specific parent talks , but the girls all wanted our input on the areas, accommodation and help to weigh up the pros and cons. They made the decision based on what they wanted from the course in the end, research and discussions

Read the thread. Not just me, as others have confirmed. Exeter and Oxford are two. No misguided assumptions.

York isn’t particularly elite. How many courses does it have in clearing? Plus budget doesn’t need to be huge for elite unis. Of course the most suited students attend but so do parents, in huge numbers. The bigger issue is taking time by parents asking questions and, as another poster eloquently says, not knowing when to SRFU. Nothing has changed because parents go in ever increasing numbers.

I went to Uni 89-92 and didn’t have a penny from my parents/mother for university - there was a grant

You got in just under the wire. Just before 1993 (forget exact year) students got housing benefit to pay for digs (but not halls) and unemployment benefit in the holidays too, as well as grants. That changed in the early 1990s so from that point the costs, aside from fees, were likely comparable to now.

It was abundantly clear that Oxford, Cambridge and Durham made less effort, simply because they don't need to. York, Leeds and Lancaster are basically competing against each other for the same "kind" of student, in terms of locality, entry requirements, league table places, etc., hence why they put so much effort in to get the best applicants that they can. Oxbridge, Durham and St Andrews are in a different league!

For a university ‘in a different league’ who put in less effort simply because they don’t need to, St Andrews put in a lot of effort with our local schools. And we are not exactly on the doorstep either. Big open day too.

Effort and hard sell are absolutely not the same thing! Well organised is good. Some are not because, as has been noted, it’s a free for all. That’s not fair to the students. I would say the prospective students are a little dull if they cannot find anything to ask.

I went to Uni 89-92 and didn’t have a penny from my parents/mother for university - there was a grant and then the student loans in my final year. I did seasonal jobs at the post office at Xmas/summer to supplement but few of my friends got any money from parents. As it was free and there was plenty of very cheap student owned halls you could manage on the grant and an overdraft. I left uni with £500 debt cleared within a few months of my new job. I don’t recall how it was assessed so I accept that the system may have required more wealthy parents to top up to the tune of a few thousand a year.

I went to Uni 1990-93. My parents were both teachers so higher household income than average but not that high, and I got no maintenance grant at all (I think a very very small loan?). Whereas now everyone gets a loan of about 5k. In the last 3-4 years I've given my own DD and DS about 5k a year which has been enough. Apart from the last year when I increased that quite a bit for my DD as she moved to full-year accommodation from term time only accommodation. But still nowhere near 10k. I don't think most students need 10k on top of their maintenance loan and I don't think most parents give this. I think for many (not all) parents the cost is no higher today than in the early 90s. That's certainly true for us today versus my parents then. They gave me £2400 a year. That's worth £6500-£7000 now. In both cases, just enough to get by on given the level of student loans.

In my (highly rated, RG STEM) School, we have been restricting the YP attending Open Day talks to one guest each since my second year as admissions tutor some time ago.

The reason is that during my first year entire families were crowding in, sometimes up to six or seven people over three generations making a day of it. The YP who should have been the focus of the day were unable to benefit.

Perhaps times have not changed all that much, or all that recently

Certain subjects including mine discourage the show off type of question. Those who keep up enough to ask really informed questions are mostly likely in our profession and do not need the cheap ego boost

No. I recognise the names of a number of participants on this board who work in HE. Frequently we are the only respondents to a mum whose student DC has an unusual problem and we put a lot of effort into helping the pair of them.

We are not here for a quiet life. If you mean, do we reject attempts by parents to interfere in the education of legal adults, to circumvent Mitigating Circumstances Procedures, etc then my answer is of course.

If you’ve had a bad experience with your DC’s HE then I’m sorry but there is no call to overgeneralise. Perhaps the academics on this board could have helped

I encouraged my kids to go alone. Your son can stay in a youth hostel.

If you mean, do we reject attempts by parents to interfere in the education of legal adults

The vast majority of potential candidates attending open days will be legally children still. As will some first years, especially in Scotland.

‘Open day’ is really the wrong name. Open days suggest they are open to anyone to pop along and see what happens at the university. In terms of local population there is a benefit to that approach - they will be a large local employer and their students will have a significant impact on the local population and economy. So building good relations between town and gown is helpful. But really these days should be labelled ‘potential candidate information days’.

The context for that comment was university studies, as the PP was saying how academics will do anything for a quiet life.

I am in England where very few first years are under 18. I appreciate your point about Scotland

We must be talking at cross purposes. I am only referring to Open Days and over-generalisations by some posters about pushy parents at Open Days. My ds has not had any encounter with university admin because he is still in sixth form (and a child at 17) so no bad experiences to report about HE.

Thanks for your support to parents with children who are uni students.

A level maths teacher here. There is no right answer, I'd say my year 13s are are 50:50 split about who goes with parents, especially to the first couple, and those who don't.

I'd just double check he really wants to go with his mates (rather than not wanting to be the one who has to tell his mates he wants to go with his parents) and then go along with it.

Lots of parents who went to uni in the 80s and 90s will look back nostalgically to road trips with their friends.
I went to two open days with friends (who were applying for different subjects). One place I hated the feel, and ended up not applying to. The other I did apply to, but didn’t go there.
I remember absolutely nothing now about the course at either institution, just a general impression of the buildings and atmosphere.

If Dd wants me to come, that’s fine, but I do feel that most of the information you would get at an open day could be gained from the website. I’d be equally happy to drive her, leave her to look round at her leisure and meet her for lunch afterwards, I don’t think I need to go to any talks myself.

Really the open day is just about if you like the place and can see yourself there for 3 or 4 years. That’s really all you need to physically be there in person for. No reason you can’t make that decision with your friends rather than your parents, or even on your own.

Tbh if open days are as busy and overwhelming as people seem to be suggesting, maybe they are often best avoided anyway.

Thanks for the clarification

@blueshoes If you have not been to open days, you might not appreciate what @poetryandwine is talking about regarding multi generations of families attending. The reasons unis like hers restrict parents is to enable prospective students to get the most out of sessions. There is an issue with some clever cloggs parents too.

Im not sure open days are used by local firms but they can, and do, have very good relationships with many unis.

As for harking back to “free “ uni education: it’s a non starter with over 100 universities. This is 4 times what we had in 1960. We had a problem funding the expansion in the 60s onwards and with the explosion in the 90s, we had to change the funding model. In Scotland, some desirable courses don’t have many Scottish students on them. They don’t “pay” enough.

The fees charged now, aren't enough. Not sure how universities will cope as costs increase but funding doesn't. But there is only so much you can charge students