Any parents of Y12 DCs up for a support thread?

[cardibach]

to get us through AS and university Open Days etc.?

One of my daughters BA (Hons) courses is available as a 'fast track' over two years. They will only allow this after consideration of where the student is in terms of ability but it shows these courses are starting to become available.

I do sometimes think DS is heading for the wrong course. We stumbled into the Civil Engineering dept by accident and he was fascinated by the film they were showing on how pathogens spread in hospitals, and spent a lot of the day taking photos of the buildings and thinking of ways to stop bottlenecks when there were lots of people in one place etc
It was a visit to JET that decided him on ME with nuclear.

Kez100 I could have done my course in 2 years BUT I would have missed out on a lot of extra-curricular which has helped me get a job after uni. If uni is about furthering your career (rather than the academics), which for a lot of people it is, then by doing the extra-curricular which I had time to do by doing it in 3 years rather than 2 then it makes sense to have 3 years with less official contact teaching time

Earl, my daughter will be looking at Bristol, but UWE and Bower Ashton Campus, not the main University. I know there isn't any halls at Bower Ashton but I think there may be some in Bristol with a free or cheap Uni bus. Do you know anything about this set up at all?

Kez100 I have a vague idea of how it's set up but having just looked up the Bower Ashton Campus I don't know as much abotu it as Frenchay (main champus).

This thread on The Student Room is really helpful and although it's from 2 years ago I've had a skim through it and things haven't really changed that much. www.thestudentroom.co.uk/showthread.php?t=1619112

Ta! That's really interesting.

DD liked UWE. She visited Glenside Campus for Health courses. I don't know about any of the other sites. The course and the approach if the staff were both good.

prettydaisies Well much to my surprise DS did not like Durham. He says his opinions are based entirely on the Maths department and he doesn't mind about the other stuff. The Maths course and the talk by the Maths department didn't inspire him anything like as much as Warwick, he thought it was too prescriptive.
Unfortunately DS doesn't do extra curricular. Maths is the only thing that excites him (I think he was a changeling ).
We have Lancaster booked for the end of August and Nottingham for September but I think he needs to see some others. He's gone off on a summer schol for the rest of this week. Poor boy, two 5am starts.

secretscwirrels your son is clearly aiming for the best though. Warwick IS the bees knees for maths. It is number one and known for it!

TheEarlOf It's all new to me and until recently I hadn't even heard of Warwick uni but I gather you are right.

A friend's daughter is reading maths at Lancaster and loving it.

Girls doing Maths seem to be in a minority. In his class at college there are 2 girls and 17 boys.
We are going to the Lancaster open day on 28th August, that will be the first one I get to visit and I think it will be an overnight stay. It's another campus one, he's not keen on big cities, won't even look at any in London / Manchester. We do live in a village population c75.

My Mum would be depressed to hear that. She was the only girl doing maths in the 6th form when she was at school, but that was in the 1940s!!!

DD's the only girl in her maths set and was the only girl who went to Cern. She is the exception that proves the rule according to the boys in her maths class!

Well, I've got day of work tomorrow ( yaay!) to go up to Newcastle with DS to the open day.

I'm only going as it's a bloody long way and will have to be a 2 nighter with Nottingham on the " way back" on Saturday.

Terribly torn. DS very keen on it. It's a terrible long way though. we'd be pushed, for instance to take him and his stuff then drive back same day. DD1 is at Nottingham which is IMHO a perfect distance- far enough for us to be out of her hair, but near enough to pop up for concerts and generally do what parents do ( take her out for dinner and bring stuff!) .

DS went to Birmingham and liked it loads, not only his chosen course but the other similar " fall back" type choices. There was only one devastating drawback as he said " It's in Birmingham!"

(I totally see why he'd not want to go to uni where it is possibly nearer to home than his current school, but we would kick him into hall! Shame though)

Theas18 I know exactly what you mean. I was so relieved when DS ruled out Bristol and Bath.
prettydaisies your DD sounds like my DS's kind of girl. He would love to go to Cern. Is she thinking of doing Maths or Physics? Let us know what she thinks of Durham.

We went to Brunel yesterday and DS has now ruled it out. We are in Herts but it still took 2 hours to get there by train and tube. Didnt get the nice feeling we had about Leeds. Also they seemed very heavy on the aeronautics and automotive engineering and hardly any mention of the other mechanical engineering disciplines. No explanation of the courses and nobody to talk to about it really.

I did find manage to embarrass ds by falling asleep on the tube and snoring

DH and DS off to Nottingham today and Durham tomorrow.

I think these visits are worthwhile if only to rule them out. It helps to clarify what they are looking for. I'm wishing we had a few more lined up now rather than in September but there were so many clashing dates.

It's interesting, it turns out a friend of a friend was at Brunel yesterday's as well. They were there to see automotive but came out underwhelmed as well.

Well for better or worse he lives Newcastle.he's slightly daunted by the fact that most accommodation is self catered though.

the city ifs great. we are at the jazz cafe at the sage at the moment and its great ( and the rain has stopped).

Well see. threshold for even getting an interview is, as expected hugely high.

Nottingham tomorrow. We know lots already as dd is there. Just the subject specifics really.

trying to help him look at all the pros and cons is fun though.

Well, DD has departed today to stay with her Dad for work experience. She'll be away for a week. It's odd - I'm used to her going there in the holidays, but it seems odd that I will be going to work and coming home without her :( An idea of things to come. I'm slightly freaked out.

cardibach DS was away on a summer school last week. DH asked me whether I was missing him and I said I was practising for when he leaves next year..
On the other hand it's amazing how everything in the house stays tidy when they are not there.

We took DD on a mammoth trip to Durham yesterday. DD liked the university well enough, but has been put off the course a bit. In fact, I don't think she really knows what course she now wants to do.
She also wants to go and look at Edinburgh and York which are all on the same train line, so think she maybe doing the same journey twice more.
secretscwirrels she thought she wanted wanted to physical geography, but wants to know why things work as they do, so she is also looking at earth sciences. Natural sciences at Durham looked a possibility.

She has another week at school and then is going to Southampton for a Headstart course on geophysics, so that might help her make up her mind a bit.

prettydaisies DS just back from his HS course. It was a disappointment. There was very little actual maths on it, and rather too much social stuff. While I appreciate they wanted to inject some fun into it it was not the academic week that he had hoped for. Most of the students weren't really interested and had just done it for their CV.
I'm a bit miffed as it was expensive for both the course and his rail fares.

Thats a shame secretsscwirrels

DS is off to imperial tomorrow for his HS which is engineering but the timetable does seem to have quite a lot in it.

Prettydaisies DS was at Durham yesterday and loved everything about it. He also liked Nottingham but the courses are very different. Nottingham seems more hands on ie you make all your own components, where as at Durham you do the design and get the components made, although DH says that's more like real life. Durham doesnt seems more academic and seem to have less connection with industry.