Corona Cohort - Year 12 - 2021 - NO 'Self isolating' please.

[Oblomov20]

We just want our kids in school. Please. If at all possible.

And driving lessons. And good Mental Health. And happiness.

In-and-amongst all this Covid nightmare and lockdown debacle.

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I think it's the right time to start narrowing down the unis your teens may be interested in. Providing they've decided on the course they want to do already. We spent a lot of time going on open days with dd1 a few years ago. Obviously that's not possible at the moment. But some are doing online open days... with no students ☺️.
Hopefully we can all go on actual visits over the summer.

Dd1 wrote her personal statement over the summer holiday due to early application ( for vet. Med.). Dd2 is applying for architecture so the closing date for uni application will be later.
Any work experience needs to be set up for this summer ( if possible!).
Who knows how this year is going to pan out 🤷🏼. I do think as parents we need to encourage students to look forward & have something to aim for. Other than exams where the goalposts keep on moving.

I really don't think so @Wheresthebeach Dd will be putting in an early application as she is dead sure of her subject and is hopeful to be interviewed early to get it all out the way.

Thanks Teta and Orange. Quick question - so we can do an early application? Is that for any course or any Uni? Or do I need to go off and google...DD wants to do marine biology and I assumed all applications would be next year...

We had a virtual 18+ choices meeting last night and they were talking about early oxbridge or conservatoire applications. Not relevant to us!

UCAS normally opens Early Sept with deadline around 15 Jan (extended this year to 29th I think). Music, Oxbridge and early decision international applications are examples of earlier application requirements.

Summer hols is therefore a good time to get the prep done by, PS, essay prep, work placements etc so working backwards for our lot, any time ‘from’ now is good to get DC to start slowly thinking about what they may wish to apply for, and what, if any open days they may wish to log onto, in the absence of hopefully, real visits nearer summer time.

I didn’t go to uni @Wheresthebeach, so this is my own personal thought process on approaching this!

Cross post with ChistopherTracy

Thanks ealing. All sounds sensible. Christopher - neither of those apply to us either.
Right...now to give thought to work experience for marine biology!

Yes DS' school wanted them to have their pathway i.e. either uni or not decided by March and then to move on from there.

Oh and she's just announced she might be interested in Oxbridge.....! I know nothing about that process

Me neither @Seeline. Does your DD have any idea what she may want to study? I guess a good start point would be to get her onto the social media platforms used by both, see what type of competitions (essay writing, outreach or seminars etc they run for prospective students, reading lists, entrance test requirements, podcasts etc). This can help rule out, as well as in to hone their interests into courses they can see themselves applying for.

@JustHereWithMyPopcorn ds1 had predicted grades of ABB that was higher than he got in AS. So he put those on his entry forms. He didn't apply to any of the Russell group universities. He wanted to stay local. So he applied to UEA their offer was ABB and and Essex university their offer was BBC (if he chose them as firm) He almost took Essex up as his firm choice incase he got lower grades. He preferred UEA. Thankfully he went with them and got the grades he needed.

I Presume you all know about the student room? It was invaluable when dd1 was applying for Vet. Med. As it was such an arduous process that seemed to go on for ever.
Its useful for any question you could ever want to know about different unis, courses, accommodation etc.

Some universities will accept lower grades than their formal offer. Not the top ranking ones and it does depend on the course but there often is flexibility.

@ealingwestmum

Oh and she's just announced she might be interested in Oxbridge.....! I know nothing about that process

Me neither @Seeline. Does your DD have any idea what she may want to study? I guess a good start point would be to get her onto the social media platforms used by both, see what type of competitions (essay writing, outreach or seminars etc they run for prospective students, reading lists, entrance test requirements, podcasts etc). This can help rule out, as well as in to hone their interests into courses they can see themselves applying for.

There is always a helpful Oxbridge thread in the Higher Ed section here. As @teta studentroom has lots of useful info too. The HEPlus website is great too. Not sure what's happening with Summer schools and the like this year..worth investigating if online version available.

Thanks so much Orange. I have definitely found the last couple of years' Oxbridge thread useful. I am a little reluctant to frequent The Student Room forums, mainly because the site hurts my eyes so much (the layout, busy-ness etc!) and more trying to encourage DD to take up more of the research. Wishful thinking, but slowly slowly...

Thanks Ealing and orange - she has done a bit of research and really likes the look of the psychology course at Cambridge! Social Media is a great idea - I'm too old to automatically think of that. She's booked on to the Oxbridge Conference in March. I don't even have an idea of predicted grades ATM, although GCSE s were fab.

@icanbewhatiwant oh OK, that's fab though and sounds like the school knew him well then. DS wants to go to Nottingham for a competitive course so I'm worrying. Sadly it's in my nature to worry excessively.

I have looked up somethings on Student Room and it has been useful.

@ChristopherTracy there has just been a nice little report on BBC South today about more people choosing navy careers, increase in posts and a bit on HMS Collingwood. Don't know where you are but you maybe able to view online?

Student Room is very snooty though and quite sneering... you ahve to take it with a pinch of salt!

MN genuinely offers the best advice if you can just trawl through a few of its little peccadilloes...

DS's school is being v good: two online evenings for parents next week and lots of tutorial stuff for DS and links to webinars. It's a schol that RG type unis target for widening participation but it does make my schools look shameful.

I got very involved with student room, became friends with some of the adult advisors, my DSs made me a TSR mother's day card! It is brilliant for medicine.

For Cambridge, HE+ is all on line this year. DS is signed up for it, but probably won't end up applying there. Having been through 2 rounds of applications to Cambridge, the main thing they are looking for is genuine passion for the the subject. DS1 is a very high achiever from an average state school, but I think the reason he did not get an offer was that although he read a few books about medicine and being a doctor, he did not go out of his way to read up on research and other "super-curriculars" although he did wuntge local HE+ competition in his Y12. At school he did not want to be one of the "try hard"s, but those are the people Oxbridge want. I think it is a good thing he ended up at St Andrews, his cousin studied architecture at Cambridge and worked much harder than he would be willing to.

Lots of people still have no idea what they want to study at this stage, and that is fine for most subjects. People considering caring professions should probably already be volunteering, it is difficult to get volunteering experience in a care home now, but there are opportunities for phone support lines, including befriending older people on their own.

WheresTheBeach Not work experience but DS's xmas present last year was a day as a marine biologist at a Sealife Centre. He really enjoyed it, the highlight was feeding the rays and sharks. Lots of food prep and cleaning and he was shadowing a post grad all day so there was chat about his uni time.

Was looking at this before it was cancelled. www.ncl.ac.uk/nes/outreach/marine/schools/pathways/

Oh thanks sprouts

Had parents evening last night and saw all 4 of DD's teachers one after the other and was finished in 25 mins - a record in all the years of parents evenings and so easy.
All our teachers love her and she's doing well apart from losing a bit of confidence in one subject hence a lower grade but hopefully should regain once back to normal lessons. Her other two subjects she is predicted B for but both said she should aim for an A as she's doing great. I wondered if they will change the predicted grade as if next year goes as bad as this one and they go on predicted grades she won't get higher than a B (which personally I think is still an awesome grade).

She also received a prospectus in the post for a uni she did a virtual tour on so it seems they assume she's due to join this Sept. She's done another virtual tour with another uni and didn't get anything so it's odd. It is the Uni she most wants to go to so the prospectus is very useful to have. I'm wondering if we should do more as they seem to be evening and there's not much else to do at the moment.

That’s great AnneofCleavage, I enjoyed DS’s parents evening and would rather do future ones virtually.

I wonder if I could sell virtual tours to DS as a way to help him decide what he wants to do and something to break up the evenings. I think another month or two and college will start on them. He has a tutorial soon so think she might start on him then.

@AnneOfCleavage ds had spoken of Sussex university. So I thought I'd order a prospectus, but all I could find was an online prospectus to save on paper. Whether they just do that to prevent lots who aren't that interested ordering one...or whether there really isn't one, I don't know.