Liberal Arts recommendations please

[HappyTwo]

Hello

I was wondering if anyone can recommend a Liberal Arts programme their child has been happy with. Especially if their child has anxiety / SEN needs.

My daughter has not yet had her predicted grades but I think they will be an A+, A and either an A or B. Although my daughter is very happy to consider all Liberal Arts programmes.

Thank you

My daughter took Liberal Arts with a year abroad at Bristol. She loved her course and had a great time there. I’m afraid I don’t know how much help they give to students with anxiety but my daughter has a physical disability and found them to be pretty accommodating to her needs.

Thanks that's very helpful - we'll put Bristol on the list!

I was tempted by LA for my somewhat SEN DC, but was a bit concerned about whether it all involved more organisation by the student than a standard degree. I suspect unis vary as to how much there really is a LA support / infrastructure

So sorry but what does LA stand for please? Thank you

@HappyTwo LA is liberal arts.

U of Birmingham has a dedicated Liberal Arts and Natural Sciences (LANS) department which ensures those in the department have at least some modules each year exclusively for the LANS cohort in recognition that, otherwise, students can have very individual and slightly atomised course experiences.

That said, when I had a DC look at this (for the NatSci side), whilst student satisfaction stats on enjoyment of the course were high, they were less so for how well organised the course - and posters on other, related threads have sometimes flagged that students have to be proactive in sorting out or working around clashes across a multi disciplinary degree.

Thinking laterally, has your DC considered Lancaster? It does not run a liberal arts degree as such, but all degrees allow a first year minor. Some arts and humanities degrees effectively allow two minors in the first year and often the flexibility to shift degree focus to different joint degrees in subsequent years than originally considered at the outset. Combined with the fact it has a college system (breaks down social units to a more manageable level) and a good supply of relatively cheap on-campus accommodation, it might be worth a look if not too far from where you live.

My DD has just started at Birmingham- slightly shaky start with modules chosen which clashed so needed a rethink... It did throw her a bit but now sorted & happy.

My DS did a multi disciplinary degree (also Birmingham) and an ex student did Lib Arts there. Both said it was a bit disorganised and the oversight was chaotic. The Lib Arts student is still going and enjoying second year but DS swapped to history after 4 weeks.

I don't think these are Birmingham specific experiences.

DS doesn't have diagnosed SEN but is a huge over worker , routine driven perfectionist and could not tolerate the disorganisation and lack of support.

My dc had a similar experience as dc of Piggywaspushed on the LANS course at Birmingham - loved the idea of taking a major (STEM) subject but mixing it with some minors from different schools, and liked the idea of the cross-curricular project too, but in reality found multiple clashes with lab times and core modules, and found the course admin not to be that cohesive, and the subject choices weren’t as flexible as they’d thought. They ended up switching to an integrated masters course for their STEM subject, also at Birmingham. Now in their second year and very happy with their decision.

KCL has a Liberal Arts programme, and there is a Department of Interdisciplinary Humanities, which means dedicated modules for those on the LA course as well as modules from participating departments.

A close friend's DS took Liberal Arts at Nottingham and loved it - was very much able to shift the course to his interests as he went along

https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/studywithus/ugstudy/courses/UG/Liberal-Arts-BA-Hons-U6ULARTS.html#:~:text=Course%20overview&text=Liberal%20Arts%20at%20Nottingham%20is,develop%20advanced%20problem%2Dsolving%20skills

Dd does a combined degree and is dyslexic. She found it really hard at the beginning due to the organisation needed and the clashes and timetabling etc. I helped her a bit with module checking. She's now in her third year and loving it, but the university wellbeing dept is absolutely brilliant. She's at Exeter. There's a good Liberal Arts degree there.

thanks that's good to know - Exeter is prob her first or second choice.

thanks that's good to know I have also heard good things about Nottingham.

Like @3peassuit my dd is studying MLibArts at Bristol. She is currently in her their year and abroad. She loves the uni and loves the course with her focus being languages and literature. She ruled out Birmingham because of the natural sciences element. Liberal arts is great for her because she has no idea what she wants to do in the future.
It does mean that she doesn't have a huge cohort all studying the same thing every day so had to be organised on where to be and when. It's really developed her confidence by doing this, so much so that she's happy to study in another country for a year.
Feel free to pm.