Uni of Bath open day this weekend- no booking

[GYo]

We’ve had this Open day in the diary but failed to make a booking. Has anyone turned up without a booking and being turned away?

I don’t want to waste time with the journey But equally, don’t want wait till the next one in the autumn…

So it’s fully booked?

Have they closed bookings? That would be unusual.

I run open days for my university and we don’t close bookings and are more than happy for people to just turn up on the day.

We didn't risk it with Bath. I've been to other open days and they did check that you'd booked for sessions before you entered.

Are you wanting to wander round or are you wanting to go to subject sessions?

IIRC, we went on the first possible bus from the park and ride and queued for sessions and they let in extra people once all the booked ones had turned up/a few mins before - don't expect to go in as a parent though!

If you haven’t booked, you probably won’t be able to attend any of the talks, campus tours or look around accommodation. If you’re not bothered about that, then you can probably go and look around the campus, library and local area to get a feel for it. Personally, I wouldn’t bother going without a booking though as you won’t get the most out of it, especially if you’re travelling a long way.

Talks and lectures etc can’t be booked and are on a first come first served basis. I believe you do need a booking for the open day itself but I’m not sure how that’s monitored in practice especially as they say you can bring as many people as you like. Just the student and one visitor to the talks though so maybe they check for entry at those?

they let in extra people once all the booked ones had turned up/a few mins before - don't expect to go in as a parent though!

Yes, I think if you don't insist on going into subject talks until it's clear there is room, once all intending applicants have been seated safely, then it'd be fine. Please be reasonable about this - I still remember being shouted at by pushy parents when I asked that potential applicants be seated first, and parents should wait outside until we could see we had room for them, or could squeeze in more chairs. Unlike television/films about universities, most universities don't actually have many huge auditoria-style lecture theatres!

At my place's Open Days, we have stalls for each of the departments/disciplines, and people are free to wander in & talk to the academic staff & current students doing Open Day duties. If there's an opportunity, I recommend you let your potential applicant talk to students about the degree programme (my students are brilliant at this!), and you talk to the academics about stuff you're concerned with. Let your DC do the talking & ask the questions about the course!

No one checks who's wandering around.
Tickets are for talks and were checked for some and not others. Probably varies by department, this was engineering.

This wasn't true at the last round - we definitely booked talks and they ran several times through the day and the ticket was timed and had a QR on my phone. Not all of them asked to see it though.

I live just down the hill from the Uni. Traffic/congestion-wise, Bath is going to be wild on Saturday! Bath Rugby is playing home to Exeter for the semis and the council is busy digging up a lot of central Bath (so buses are re- routed etc).

Unless you are hoping to firm up Uni choices, I would wait until Autumn open days.

Yes - see screenshot.

We went to this last year - we did book but you don't need to book to access most of the open day. We didn't check in or anything, and we parked easily onsite (but got there early because we stayed overnight). You don't need any bookings for accommodation - you just turn up at the accommodation that is open and they take off small groups at a time to look at it. My son booked a subject talk for a certain time but in reality we went to an earlier one instead so that we could leave earlier and got in no problem - they will let in ticket holders first but there is likely to be space for others as well.

@Madcatsyes, why oh why do the uni schedule the open day on the same day as the Prem rugby semi final?! I know it’s unknown whether Bath will qualify, or whether it will be a home game in advance, but it has been for the last 3 years I think. Wasn’t one of the open days last year the same day as a rugby match AND the Robbie Williams concert?

I love Bath, but it’s busy enough on an ordinary Saturday, this week could be interesting 😬

We went last year and the QR codes were checked for all of the talks that DS wanted to go to.

If you just want to look around campus / buildings and accommodation you’d be fine. But bear in mind that the more people who do this, the less worthwhile the day will be as they allow bookings for the amount that they know they can cater for.

why oh why do the uni schedule the open day on the same day as the Prem rugby semi final?

Oh come on! How does a university know when/where a totally unrelated sporting event will be held. Open Days are scheduled internally at least a year ahead: staff have to volunteered (or be required) to work on weekends in the middle of a busy teaching term, student helpers have to be recruited & trained, venues prepared to open for the weekend, catering booked in. It's a huge logistical operation, which we do throughout the year.

why oh why do the uni schedule the open day on the same day as the Prem rugby semi final?

Also Bath has to be aware of when others schedule their open days.

Exactly! Not to mention having to schedule it around internal events such as graduation and exams while being mindful to the recruitment cycle!
These dates aren’t just plucked out of thin air!

I would still go and get in line early to queue for the talks you are interested in. They usually have a separate line for people without bookings and let you in at the end if there is space.

Bath has an open campus and no one will stop you from turning up and looking around. However all the talks and tours will have limited numbers and you won't be able to get into any of them without a booking and those are no longer available. Some universities even over-book each talk/tour/event by as much as 50% to allow for no-shows so your booking smallprint says that your booking isn't a guarantee that you can actually attend a specific talk, it's actually first-come-first-served within those who actually booked.

Yes, I’d turn up as you can get a good feel for the place and talk to students. As others have said, the subject specific talks are likely to be fully booked but they sometimes let people who haven’t booked in. You could always go again in September just for the talks.

U of Bath is a very popular university and there are likely to be few 'no shows'. One of my children went to an Open Day two years ago and said it was very crowded. They said they got most value from talking to staff and students at the subject stands in the main hall. They also caught the bus up and down the hill to get a sense of the practicalities if allocated city centre accommodation on first year and living off campus in subsequent years.

They visited separately in the summer on one of the bookable campus tours (engineering post grads guided theirs) and gleaned other information from online subject-specific sessions. My advice would be give the upcoming Open Day a swerve, take a campus tour in the summer and, if still interested, remember to get booked on for the Autumn Open Day.

As are the rugby Prem dates incidentally. The 2027 dates are already decided. As defending champions, Bath were always likely.to reach the final 4 and for the third year running this will entail a home semi-final, it shouldn't really have been beyond the wit of someone to check this out...

Of course as PPs have said, it's possible that this was the only available date regardless, but @northernplatform isn't being unreasonable.to ask the question.

If you don’t mind that you might not get into everything, I’d still go. You can wander around, talk to students etc.

some proportion of people who have booked won’t turn up, so it’s worth going along to talks and seeing if there is space. I’ve been at open days before where (booked) parents gave up their talk places so that (unbooked) students could attend.

went last year no one checks who is wondering around - talks different better to book in but I think you can take a friend in? or line up incase space after the booked people go in

We went last year and honestly cant remember if they checked tickets, but do remember some talks were students only and parents waited outside. SOMe things were clearly open events such as the psychology department had an open door and you could go in and get involved with some of the studies that the students were doing.. really interesting and great to chat to the students. There was also a main arena where you got to go to the different stands and chat to students on all the different courses. And of course you can look round accommodation. I think you will be able to go to more talks than you might think