Open Days

[LittleGreenDuck]

DS is in year 12 and is starting to look at booking into a few uni open days. A couple of them have dates available in early July or October / November. I’m assuming most students will have left for the summer by July, so I’m wondering if he’d be better waiting for the autumn dates to see the uni “in action” as it were.

Does it make any difference to the open day experience if there are fewer students on site, or should he just go for the soonest date?

Not Oxbridge or medicine etc. by the way, so no immediate rush to get his application in early.

Thanks

We didn’t tbh but I think it’s a good idea. We did so many with DD in such a short time (I mean only 5 or 6) that we got open day overload. Spreading them is a great idea.

Your local one as a pp says is a good one for “this is what a university is like” as it’s near (obvs) even if no plan to go there.

We never wasted time with a local one. Didn’t do subjects and bottom 10% in league tables. Why waste your time. It is not what a good university looks like either. No comparison.

I guess it depends eh? Ours is Nottingham so it's not a waste for us. In fact ds2 applied there.

I think the local one is not far so may be easier for a first trip.

Definitely depends! I think we have the opposite issue to that poster. Our local is a RG university very near the top of the league tables for DS’s chosen subject and, realistically, likely to be a bit too much of a stretch. However, we won’t discount going along for a nosey.

Depends what you consider a waste of time. It gives you an idea of what to expect from university and what sort of questions you might like to ask. It also allows you a comparison point (how do you know what a good university looks like, if you've only ever experienced one?)

In this day and age, considering commuting to the local university, even if it's not at the top of league tables, is also a way of making it more financially viable.

We managed to work that out without visiting a local uni which didn’t offer the subjects! Were we supposed to ask why they didn’t offer them? Obviously no faculty or lecturers to talk to so cannot see any benefit at all.

If you might go to the local top 20 one fine, our nearest top 20 would be Oxford. We don’t all live near suitable universities and DDs had a reasonable take on what it would be like as they boarded at school.

Some Universities don’t have any/many accommodation options available to view during term time so visiting during the holidays can be beneficial.

It’s definitely a good idea to start visiting in Year 12, preferably as early as possible. Some of the summer open days clashed with my son’s Year 12 exams & it was tricky trying to fit everything in. Plus, academic pressures really increase in Year 13.

Well clearly if the most local uni to you is one that doesn't offer the course you want to do then it’s not much use. You’re not "supposed" to do anything – it's just a suggestion.

But obviously lots of people do live near a uni that might be worth considering. We actually live within about 45 mins by car or train of at least five excellent universities. I guess I could rephrase: if your local uni is a good one and offers the course your YP is interested in, it might be an easy win for a first visit. My point is that it won't be very far away and you might have local intel on where to park, making the day a bit easier as a first pass.

When DD was looking at universities we looked at a few in the summer of year 12 and a few in the autumn of year 13. Then when she was unsuccessful in her medicine application we looked at a few more in the autumn of her gap year.

We doubled up on some of the visits over a couple of weekends - doing Newcastle and York one weekend and Nottingham and Leicester on another weekend.

IMO the open days were worth it as DD really disliked the campus universities as she felt that they were too isolated.

None on our train line either! Just Oxford. That does DD1s subjects but not DD2. I would agree that rephrasing is necessary. I ageee if uni matches aspiration and subject but just looking round because dc doesn’t know what a uni is bewilders me. The local one is nothing like the ones they eventually applied to. City people get choice. People in the country don’t. We don’t get to any university city in 45 mins. We could get to Uxbridge, Oxford, Luton and High Wycombe. All of which have limitations!

Lots of good advice so far, but something else we did that was quite useful is go to DS's preferred choice on a normal day. He'd been to an open day on a glorious Summer day and been wooed by the presentations and freebies but I was a bit worried that as it was the first place he'd visited he'd maybe got a bit swept away with enthusiasm. I'd been in hospital at the timeand never visited so was quite keen to see the place before he applied and he was happy to have a second look. We deliberately picked the day with the worst weather forecast in October half term and decided to use public transport for the journey, to get a more realistic idea of what travel might be like and DS found instructions for a self guided tour. Obviously we couldn't go inside many buildings but the weather was obligingly dreadful and we got the idea of things like what's the walk from the halls to lectures going to be like in the pouring rain, just how far away is the nearest Aldi, how long does it take to walk from the railway station and what do the campus and the city feel like on a regular working day?
He came away just as enthusiastic and I was reassured that he could see himself livinhg there on a freezing cold, wet Wednesday in October away from all the glitz of an Open Day. I appreciate that not everyone has the luxury of being able to make multiple visits, but if you can, I think you get a useful additional angle on a place on an ordinary day.

@MrsAvocet I do think that’s a good use of time. Getting to know logistics and what it feels like on a working day gives much more info to weigh up
options.

That was the difference vetween summer open days when exams were over, the weather was nice and there was a bit of a carnival atmosphere, and autumn open days which were very much business as usual.

Never went to Autumn ones. Too many were mid week! Plus DDs had school events at weekends so we just did summer and only 3 each.

All the open days we went to were at weekends.
No weekend activities at DD's state school.

DS (applying for Medicine) did a few open days in the autumn of year 12 which felt like the right time to start. He then visited one or two more in the summer of year 12 and another couple at the start of year 13. So about 6 in total including our local one.

I agree with the advice above that if you have a suitable university nearby then that's a good place to start, so you have something to compare others against. It's useful to hear the subject talks, see accommodation and facilities and just get an idea of what a university open day entails without hours of travelling.

Early is better as they can begin to hone their views on what they want.

if any parents of year 11’s are reading if your dc have never been to a university I actually recommend visiting a fairly local university in the July ish of year 11 to get an idea of what they are like, the sort of courses on offer etc. We went to the local university open day which did open the eyes of DD’s friends who I gave a lift to, whereas dd was blaze as her dad worked there