push's 90 second guide:
choosing a university
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On this page we'll look at some of the factors to help you chose which uni to go to.
The goal is to make a shortlist of universities that match your needs – The UCAS search tool is a great place to do this. You can then review them in detail, using their prospectuses and other resources to determine which will be your chosen ones. But before you can make a shortlist you have to think about what your needs are... |
Push university guide
Is it time to start thinking about which university you might want to go to?
Well fear no more!
We’ve had a go at making a handy map for you that outlines as many universities in the UK that we could throw our hat at.
Click here to have a look at the list of universities on offer with links to their location, websites and a little of our honest Push info too.
If you’re part of a university or college that isn’t on the map and would like to be included. Please email at [email protected] and we can get it added to the map.
Well fear no more!
We’ve had a go at making a handy map for you that outlines as many universities in the UK that we could throw our hat at.
Click here to have a look at the list of universities on offer with links to their location, websites and a little of our honest Push info too.
If you’re part of a university or college that isn’t on the map and would like to be included. Please email at [email protected] and we can get it added to the map.
every uk university in 5 minutes
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It may seem a little daunting how many universities there is in the country so we've tried our best to get them all in one video for you.
Here's our presenter team with every university (as of Jan 2019) in the country in 5 minutes! |
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WHAT really matters?
As we've said elsewhere, three-quarters of university applicants start by thinking about what course they want to study. You have to start somewhere and the course is a big part of student life — one in which applicants feel like they can exercise some choice.
However, you don’t have to start with the course. You shouldn’t rule yourself out of being the one in four that doesn’t. After all, as we’ve already seen — what’s on offer as far as courses are concerned isn’t entirely straightforward.
Instead of what they want to study, the one in four start by thinking about where. They may think, for example, that to keep the debts down they’ll live at home. That makes the choice a matter of geography (not the course...).
But there’s more to it than that. They may have a particular idea in their head about student life. Punting, sipping Pimms, sharing strawberries with a teddy bear and reading poetry with a chum. Or, maybe, living in a shared squat with a beer in one hand and a can of beans in the other. Or perhaps studious hours in the library and the lab, inching towards a moment of sublime discovery.
Whatever your vision of student life and whether you want to seek it out or avoid it like the plague, your choice of university matters. Not every university offers the same lifestyle.
Sure, within limits, there’s room for different types, but in some places the parameters are wider than in others and it might be that in some places you just don’t fit in. It’s rarely a matter of unfriendliness — more often just a case of what clicks. It has to be right for you. If you have no idea about your course, then why not tackle the ‘Which university?’ decision from the other end? Start with the whole list of universities and pare it down to your favourites — then see what interesting courses those universities have on offer.
Student life is about a lot more than the course. In fact, once you’re at university, what makes a difference to the quality of your life is more down-to-earth.
Issues like, will the cash machine let you have another tenner? Will the damp patch on the wall freeze if the landlord doesn’t fix the heating? What’s my chance of pulling at the club tonight? Can I be bothered to walk all the way to the library? Can I wear these underpants four days running? How the hell am I going to get back to my flat at 3 am? Is this supposed to be edible? Where’s my change from that pint?... and a million more like them.
The fact is, depending on which university you choose, you might find yourself with more money or less, having heaps of fun or none, working your socks off or slacking like a bag of porridge.
This is going to be where you live for the next three, four, even six or seven years. How much it feels like home may end up being a lot more important to you than whether your next lecture is on the Law Lords or Bosnian warlords.
The challenge — because that’s what it is, more than a problem — is to work out which university offers a complete package that suits you.
You might want to do an initial round of eliminations based on which universities do your course and their entry requirements (then again, you might not), but, after that, consider what you’ll be doing for the 70% of the time — at least — that you’re not actively studying.
Increasingly, students are referred to as ‘the customers’ of higher education. Sure enough, with the recent funding changes, the process is likely to cost you enough to dump you in £40-50k of debt. So applicants have every right to act like customers.
Would you spend forty grand on anything else without knowing as much as possible about it? Would you buy a car, say, without looking under the hood and taking it for a test drive? Of course not.
Acting like a customer involves asking questions to check that you’re getting the product you want, to check that you’re getting value for money and to check that you couldn’t do better elsewhere. With over 400 places in the UK where you can do a degree, most of which would be willing to accept any decent applicants, you can afford to be a bit picky, to demand your consumer rights.
No two universities are the same and it’s not a case of which will take you, but rather of which is offering you the most.
Make them sell themselves to you. Find out all you want to know to stretch your £40,000 investment as far as it will go and to make sure you’re getting what you — as an individual — want.
If you want punting and Pimms, don’t accept anything less. If you want a dingy squat, don’t bother about promises of plush student halls. And if you want long hours of study, don’t choose somewhere where propping up the bar is considered hard work.
The next few sections look at that side of life — everything about being a student that’s non-academic, extracurricular, necessary and unnecessary, a pain in the butt and just plain fun. They’ll give the low-down on why you should care how many students per counsellor a university has, what facilities the students’ union lays on or what difference it makes to you if a university’s big or small, old or new, in a town or out on a limb.
Education and careers specialist (and Push founder) Johnny Rich has some wise words on how you choose the best university for you.
A few questions to consider:
However, you don’t have to start with the course. You shouldn’t rule yourself out of being the one in four that doesn’t. After all, as we’ve already seen — what’s on offer as far as courses are concerned isn’t entirely straightforward.
Instead of what they want to study, the one in four start by thinking about where. They may think, for example, that to keep the debts down they’ll live at home. That makes the choice a matter of geography (not the course...).
But there’s more to it than that. They may have a particular idea in their head about student life. Punting, sipping Pimms, sharing strawberries with a teddy bear and reading poetry with a chum. Or, maybe, living in a shared squat with a beer in one hand and a can of beans in the other. Or perhaps studious hours in the library and the lab, inching towards a moment of sublime discovery.
Whatever your vision of student life and whether you want to seek it out or avoid it like the plague, your choice of university matters. Not every university offers the same lifestyle.
Sure, within limits, there’s room for different types, but in some places the parameters are wider than in others and it might be that in some places you just don’t fit in. It’s rarely a matter of unfriendliness — more often just a case of what clicks. It has to be right for you. If you have no idea about your course, then why not tackle the ‘Which university?’ decision from the other end? Start with the whole list of universities and pare it down to your favourites — then see what interesting courses those universities have on offer.
Student life is about a lot more than the course. In fact, once you’re at university, what makes a difference to the quality of your life is more down-to-earth.
Issues like, will the cash machine let you have another tenner? Will the damp patch on the wall freeze if the landlord doesn’t fix the heating? What’s my chance of pulling at the club tonight? Can I be bothered to walk all the way to the library? Can I wear these underpants four days running? How the hell am I going to get back to my flat at 3 am? Is this supposed to be edible? Where’s my change from that pint?... and a million more like them.
The fact is, depending on which university you choose, you might find yourself with more money or less, having heaps of fun or none, working your socks off or slacking like a bag of porridge.
This is going to be where you live for the next three, four, even six or seven years. How much it feels like home may end up being a lot more important to you than whether your next lecture is on the Law Lords or Bosnian warlords.
The challenge — because that’s what it is, more than a problem — is to work out which university offers a complete package that suits you.
You might want to do an initial round of eliminations based on which universities do your course and their entry requirements (then again, you might not), but, after that, consider what you’ll be doing for the 70% of the time — at least — that you’re not actively studying.
Increasingly, students are referred to as ‘the customers’ of higher education. Sure enough, with the recent funding changes, the process is likely to cost you enough to dump you in £40-50k of debt. So applicants have every right to act like customers.
Would you spend forty grand on anything else without knowing as much as possible about it? Would you buy a car, say, without looking under the hood and taking it for a test drive? Of course not.
Acting like a customer involves asking questions to check that you’re getting the product you want, to check that you’re getting value for money and to check that you couldn’t do better elsewhere. With over 400 places in the UK where you can do a degree, most of which would be willing to accept any decent applicants, you can afford to be a bit picky, to demand your consumer rights.
No two universities are the same and it’s not a case of which will take you, but rather of which is offering you the most.
Make them sell themselves to you. Find out all you want to know to stretch your £40,000 investment as far as it will go and to make sure you’re getting what you — as an individual — want.
If you want punting and Pimms, don’t accept anything less. If you want a dingy squat, don’t bother about promises of plush student halls. And if you want long hours of study, don’t choose somewhere where propping up the bar is considered hard work.
The next few sections look at that side of life — everything about being a student that’s non-academic, extracurricular, necessary and unnecessary, a pain in the butt and just plain fun. They’ll give the low-down on why you should care how many students per counsellor a university has, what facilities the students’ union lays on or what difference it makes to you if a university’s big or small, old or new, in a town or out on a limb.
Education and careers specialist (and Push founder) Johnny Rich has some wise words on how you choose the best university for you.
A few questions to consider:
- What do you imagine student life will be like?
- What attracts you most about student life and what therefore, apart from courses, are your priorities?
MOre information
ENTRANCE REQUIREMENTS
WHERE CAN YOU GET IN VS WHERE DO YOU WANT TO GO
The question shouldn’t be ‘Where can you get in?’ but, as a Zen Buddhist taxi-driver might put it, ‘Where do you want to go?’
Obviously, there’s no point wasting anyone’s time applying to universities who expect students to have a string of As when you’re just holding out for a string of A levels.
But, entry requirements aren’t set in stone. There’s nothing to stop you hedging your bets — aiming high, while at the same covering your ass. You’ve got five spaces on the UCAS form — you might as well use them.
It’s good strategy to spread the stakes: choose one university that’s a long-shot, at least one that’s a sure-fire bet and ensure that the others are universities who want grades around about what you (and your teachers) reckon you’ll actually get.
Nonetheless, every university that goes on your list should be a ‘keeper’. There’s no point applying somewhere you wouldn’t want to go, because there’s no point going if you don’t want to. Unhappy students aren’t successful students. And remember that statistic again — more than one in seven flunks.
With well over 400 universities and colleges, all competing with each other to get you to apply, there should be at least five that are more than a make-do. If not, maybe you’d better ask yourself whether going to university is such a great idea after all.
So rather than trying to build up a list of five from scratch, start by cutting down the entire list by chucking out anywhere that’s not right for any reason. That reason may be that it’s not realistic to think they’ll take you — fine. But it may also be that they’re not offering the right course or that they’re too far away or even that they don’t have a belly-dancing society. Whatever, your call.
So, as we said, it’s not who wants you, but who you want.
Wherever it is, you have to like this place. It’s going to be home for a while. So you decide, not them.
The question shouldn’t be ‘Where can you get in?’ but, as a Zen Buddhist taxi-driver might put it, ‘Where do you want to go?’
Obviously, there’s no point wasting anyone’s time applying to universities who expect students to have a string of As when you’re just holding out for a string of A levels.
But, entry requirements aren’t set in stone. There’s nothing to stop you hedging your bets — aiming high, while at the same covering your ass. You’ve got five spaces on the UCAS form — you might as well use them.
It’s good strategy to spread the stakes: choose one university that’s a long-shot, at least one that’s a sure-fire bet and ensure that the others are universities who want grades around about what you (and your teachers) reckon you’ll actually get.
Nonetheless, every university that goes on your list should be a ‘keeper’. There’s no point applying somewhere you wouldn’t want to go, because there’s no point going if you don’t want to. Unhappy students aren’t successful students. And remember that statistic again — more than one in seven flunks.
With well over 400 universities and colleges, all competing with each other to get you to apply, there should be at least five that are more than a make-do. If not, maybe you’d better ask yourself whether going to university is such a great idea after all.
So rather than trying to build up a list of five from scratch, start by cutting down the entire list by chucking out anywhere that’s not right for any reason. That reason may be that it’s not realistic to think they’ll take you — fine. But it may also be that they’re not offering the right course or that they’re too far away or even that they don’t have a belly-dancing society. Whatever, your call.
So, as we said, it’s not who wants you, but who you want.
Wherever it is, you have to like this place. It’s going to be home for a while. So you decide, not them.
UCAS POINTS
How do you know which universities are realistic choices?
Ideally you’ll do so darn well in your exams and be such a good-at-everything freak that nowhere would refuse you. But that’s not possible for all of us.
Fortunately, most students aren’t at the other end of the spectrum either, where their choice is limited to universities who charge $10 a degree (postage and packaging not included).
Most students have their choice of most courses, within reasonable limits. With three Ds, you won’t be doing medicine, but the crop is still plenty pickable.
POINTS DONT WIN PRIZES
Every course at every university sets its own entry requirements. The university quotes either certain grades, or a certain number of points that they’ll expect all (or, at any rate, most) of their students to get. You can find a list of entry requirements in the universities’ prospectuses, on their website, by contacting the university directly or from one of the websites and other resources listed below that collect them for (nearly) all courses in one place.
The Course Search facility on UCAS’s website also details the entry requirements including what attitude the university will take if you’ve got non-standard qualifications search as the International Baccalaureate or a bronze swimming badge.
Usually, the points are scored by achieving a minimum score at A levels or Highers, based on UCAS’s points system. You can also get points for other qualifications, such as vocational A levels (VCE Double Awards) which are worth twice a regular A level, and AS levels which are worth 40% — or for having achieved Key Skills in number, communications or IT at level 2 or higher. It's important to know that these figures have just changed in line with the new A Level structure.
https://www.ucas.com/file/63536/download?token=lKi4qZse
* AS Levels, if you're still taking them, only give you extra points if you don’t go on to take the A2 and get the whole A Level. So, let’s say you’ve got B grades in history and physics at AS Level — you’ve got 32 points. If you then take A2 physics and end up with a C for the whole A Level, you now have 48 points (not 64) — 16 for the history and 32 for the physics. Got that? It’s no double counting.
* AS Levels, if you're still taking them, only give you extra points if you don’t go on to take the A2 and get the whole A Level. So, let’s say you’ve got B grades in history and physics at AS Level — you’ve got 32 points. If you then take A2 physics and end up with a C for the whole A Level, you now have 48 points (not 64) — 16 for the history and 32 for the physics. Got that? It’s no double counting.
TWO POINTS BAD, FOUR POINTS BETTER...?
This may all look complicated, but don’t be fooled — it’s not half as easy as it appears. Even though the whole point of the system is that every point is of equal value, some are more equal than others.
Universities not only expect you to get the points, they’ll expect them to be the right points — points that are relevant to whatever you want to study. If you want to study Spanish, for example, it doesn’t really matter how many points you have if your Español only extends to knowing the chorus to ‘Livin’ La Vida Loca’. The same is true for most courses — especially sciences, languages and, to a lesser extent, social sciences and arts.
You don’t have to have A Level statistics to study it at university, but they’ll be looking for maths. Similarly, for genetics, biotechnology and botany, it’d be good to have some biology on show (by which we don’t mean wearing a short skirt to the interview).
Of course, if you want to do something out of the blue — philosophy, for instance — then A Level philosophy is a first step, but pretty much anything will help you get your boots on. The same goes for many modular courses and other mixed bag degrees, where your qualifications can be as wide as the selection of subjects you want to bundle together.
So far so good, that takes care of A Levels and Highers, but how about points racked up on other qualifications?
Push is not dismissing vocational A Levels — however, unless you want to study a directly relevant vocational degree, or at least something in the ball park, then there’s no way they’re actually worth twice the points of regular A Levels to most universities.
Similarly with AS levels — when it comes down to the wire, they may make all the difference, but probably not until then. Points from AS levels only really count when they back up your choice of what you want to study or when they’re straight out of left field — doing English, say, when your A Levels are all sciences shows you can string a sentence together as well as crunch numbers.
As for Key Skills, only a handful of universities (so far) are taking them particularly seriously. Since, in practice, you have to demonstrate you have them in your personal statement on your UCAS form anyway, most universities will give you just as much credit if you write a good statement and can show you’re rounded.
As well as the above, there’s a bucketful of other qualifications, certificates and brownie badges that may or may not translate into the UCAS points tariff — the International Baccalaureate, for a start. But when all’s said and done, it’s not about points. Universities can’t pick and choose applicants based on that alone. (Well, they can, but they’re doing nobody any favours.)
So, whatever points are listed for a course, take it as a guide only and ask yourself whether you’re likely to get something like the right score in something like the right subjects.
If a previous record in the subject is likely to be important or you’re not getting all your points from regular A Levels and Highers, then aim to get a bit past whatever score the university suggests.
Either way, think about what else you have to offer. You can make yourself a whole deal more attractive — and even make up for points — with a good personal statement, with relevant or interesting experiences or with a good interview.
And remember, you’ve got five spaces. One for somewhere that wants the best score you’re likely to achieve, at least one at well below par and so on.
HOW POINTS FIT INTO THE BIGGER PICTURE
Matching your predicted points to universities’ entry requirements is only a first stage in the choosing process — well, it is if you’re doing it right.
So far the process goes something like this:
1. Start with a list of all the universities.
2. Pick a course or courses.
3. Eliminate universities that don’t offer the right course(s).
4. Eliminate universities that expect higher scores than you’re likely to get.
5. Don’t eliminate those that expect lower scores.
For most applicants to most courses, stages 1 to 5 won’t have struck off anything like enough universities to get the list down to five. So...
6. Decide where you want to go.
Your decision about where you want (rather than where wants you) is going to be based on a whole gaggle of factors, most of which should have nothing to do with your course.
Some factors, however, are everything to do with the course — the standard, the reputation, what it covers, how it’s taught, blah, blah, blah.
We’ve already been over what the course covers, and how it’s taught. As for the standard, the reputation and the blah, blah, blah... check out the rest of this section for more thinks.
UCAS POINTS: A FEW QUESTIONS
- What are the best grades you’re likely to get and where does that rule out?
- Realistically, what grades are you likely to get and which universities does that rule out?
- Have you made a list of all the universities that offer your chosen course and which demand grades you can realistically expect?
NO SUCH THING AS 'BEST'
Of course, you could just make it easy on yourself and apply to the best university in the UK which is…
Unfortunately not. There's no such thing. One person's paradise is another's hell. The best university for whom?
Despite this, you will sometimes find utterly pointless league tables of universities produced by newspapers, who claim to consider loads of variables and judge where's the best.
Cambridge has won this particular beauty pageant from time to time and, indeed, it may be ideal for certain students — but if you happen to be a single working mum in her 30s, living in the East End and wanting to do a part-time course in business studies, you'd be better off at Birkbeck, East London, Greenwich, City, London Met, South Bank or Middlesex universities, none of which has ever topped any of the 'best of' lists.
That's an extreme example, but it illustrates the point. Cambridge also isn't the best university for you if they want higher grades than you're going to get.
There's no such thing as the best university, only the right university — the right university for you as an individual.
Having said that, there's no harm in league tables for certain comparable statistics, especially when you know what to make of them.
For example, a list of the universities with most students is based on fact, not a statistician's idea of their perfect university. The thing is, such a list can't tell you whether a large or small university is better. That's your call.
Another example: a league table of the teaching standards assessments is not based entirely on indisputable facts. They're put together by experts in the field doing years of research and using the same benchmarks everywhere they go. So, it's an opinion, but it's a damned well-informed one and, even though it might say a department's teaching is good, it doesn't try to say whether that's more or less important to students than decent housing or low costs.
Given enough appropriate information about all aspects of student life, only you can put the picture together and decide which offers the best for you.
WHERE CAN YOU AFFORD TO GO?
Not all universities cost the same either. For starters, tuition fees vary depending on where you go and if you're Scottish, English or Welsh. Although most universities have settled on £9,250 a year, prices are as stable as a see-saw with hiccups.
In Northern Ireland, for example, the cost of living is a fraction of what it is in the South East of England, but that’s not much help if you have to pay the difference to get there and back. However, the North East is also cheaper as are parts of Scotland, the North West and the Midlands.
London is by the far the most expensive place to study. It’s not just accommodation costs which go through the roof (and then the rain gets in), but everything from the weekly shopping to a can of drink in a shop.
Just about the only thing that’s relatively cheap in London is petrol, but it’s still very expensive and most students can’t afford to run a car in London anyway. And then there’s the congestion charge and nowhere to park.
One of the other money problems with London (in common with a number of other places) is not just how much anything costs, but how much of everything there is. It’s hard to resist the temptations, whether you can afford them or not and, besides, what’s the point of living somewhere so expensive if you’re not going to make the most of its compensations?
In fact, you are entitled to a bigger loan if you’re a student in London, but it doesn’t reflect the difference in how much extra cash London students can end up forking out.
Money is a big bubble of worry in the gut for most students, most of the time. By choosing a university carefully, they can at least deflate that bubble to the size of a tennis ball.
Different universities cost different amounts, even if the fees are the same.
Living in usually works out cheaper than renting your own place, but not every university gives you the chance (and only a very few let you live in for your whole degree).
Local costs like travel, entertainments and shopping vary, as do different lifestyles that affect what you spend your money on and therefore how much of it you have.
On average a student outside London needs around £10,000 a year to live on, not including tuition fees. That leaves a shortfall compared to the maximum student loan and grant.
It’s no surprise, then, that the average student has an extra debt of about £1,000 from commercial sources such as overdrafts and credit cards.
London students tend to have the highest debts on average, but the strange thing is that it’s not just costs that affect the level of student debt. A whole bunch of factors drag it around like a rat on a string. Apart from simple costs, here are some of them (but bear in mind they often cancel each other out):
Keeping it lower:
When choosing a university, you could do a lot worse than eliminate anywhere that you decide you simply can’t afford.
What you can’t afford to do is make the wrong decision., If you drop out, you quite probably won’t be able to afford to go back. Unless you drop out quickly, you will almost certainly lose a year’s funding – that’s a year’s student loan, a year’s grant and possibly even the Government’s contribution to your tuition costs for a year. You’ll also have to pay back any money you’ve borrowed. In other words, there’s funding for you to do a degree, but if you screw up somehow along the way, you may well be paying privately for any extra years it takes.
Yet another good reason to choose the right university in the first place.
In Northern Ireland, for example, the cost of living is a fraction of what it is in the South East of England, but that’s not much help if you have to pay the difference to get there and back. However, the North East is also cheaper as are parts of Scotland, the North West and the Midlands.
London is by the far the most expensive place to study. It’s not just accommodation costs which go through the roof (and then the rain gets in), but everything from the weekly shopping to a can of drink in a shop.
Just about the only thing that’s relatively cheap in London is petrol, but it’s still very expensive and most students can’t afford to run a car in London anyway. And then there’s the congestion charge and nowhere to park.
One of the other money problems with London (in common with a number of other places) is not just how much anything costs, but how much of everything there is. It’s hard to resist the temptations, whether you can afford them or not and, besides, what’s the point of living somewhere so expensive if you’re not going to make the most of its compensations?
In fact, you are entitled to a bigger loan if you’re a student in London, but it doesn’t reflect the difference in how much extra cash London students can end up forking out.
Money is a big bubble of worry in the gut for most students, most of the time. By choosing a university carefully, they can at least deflate that bubble to the size of a tennis ball.
Different universities cost different amounts, even if the fees are the same.
Living in usually works out cheaper than renting your own place, but not every university gives you the chance (and only a very few let you live in for your whole degree).
Local costs like travel, entertainments and shopping vary, as do different lifestyles that affect what you spend your money on and therefore how much of it you have.
On average a student outside London needs around £10,000 a year to live on, not including tuition fees. That leaves a shortfall compared to the maximum student loan and grant.
It’s no surprise, then, that the average student has an extra debt of about £1,000 from commercial sources such as overdrafts and credit cards.
London students tend to have the highest debts on average, but the strange thing is that it’s not just costs that affect the level of student debt. A whole bunch of factors drag it around like a rat on a string. Apart from simple costs, here are some of them (but bear in mind they often cancel each other out):
Keeping it lower:
- A high proportion of students living in;
- Good general level of facilities;
- Campus universities;
- Being in a town or city;
- Being in a cheap part of the country;
- Collegiate universities;
- Smaller universities and colleges;
- Availability of paid work locally.
- A high proportion of students renting privately;
- A banging nightlife;
- Middle-class universities (where students don’t panic about debt so much) — except collegiate universities;
- Poor choice of shops;
- Being in an expensive town — especially London
When choosing a university, you could do a lot worse than eliminate anywhere that you decide you simply can’t afford.
What you can’t afford to do is make the wrong decision., If you drop out, you quite probably won’t be able to afford to go back. Unless you drop out quickly, you will almost certainly lose a year’s funding – that’s a year’s student loan, a year’s grant and possibly even the Government’s contribution to your tuition costs for a year. You’ll also have to pay back any money you’ve borrowed. In other words, there’s funding for you to do a degree, but if you screw up somehow along the way, you may well be paying privately for any extra years it takes.
Yet another good reason to choose the right university in the first place.
HOW DO YOU KNOW IF THE UNI IS ANY GOOD?
Once upon a time, there was the pretence that all universities' degrees were equal — a 2:1 in Law at Oxford was no better or worse than it would be at Thames Valley University.
No one even pretends any more. Just like their students, every department at every university is assessed and given a series of grades. A whole bunch of numbers are produced, some of which are helpful in judging how much you're likely to gain from one of that department's courses.
The list of statistics available is growing every year, which on the whole is a good thing, but not all of them are that helpful. No one should ever pick a university just because of a single statistic. But some of them can be very handy when making that choice. Some example stats to consider are:
No one even pretends any more. Just like their students, every department at every university is assessed and given a series of grades. A whole bunch of numbers are produced, some of which are helpful in judging how much you're likely to gain from one of that department's courses.
The list of statistics available is growing every year, which on the whole is a good thing, but not all of them are that helpful. No one should ever pick a university just because of a single statistic. But some of them can be very handy when making that choice. Some example stats to consider are:
|
•Teaching standards
•Employment rates •Flunk rate/non-completion rate •Staff:student ratio •Percentage arriving through Clearing |
•Average UCAS points
•Research standards •Number of postgrads •Study addicts •Other measures |
ACADEMIC STANDARDS: A FEW QUESTIONS
- What universities have the highest teaching ratings for the course(s) you want to do?
- Which has the best employment rate?
- Which has the lowest flunk rate?
- Which has the lowest staff to student ratio?
- How likely are you to need to find a place through Clearing?
WHERE DO YOU FIND THESE FIGURES?
It's all very well knowing what statistics to look for, but where do you look?
Universities and departments with nothing to hide will often give you the statistics themselves if you simply ask. If they can't or won't — well, that tells you something too, don't you think? Some even publish some of the figures themselves in their prospectuses and on their websites. Most of them do it to boast, but watch out for statistics that don't look independent and kosher — as you should know, 92.3% of statistics are invented on the spot. Also, beware of figures without comparisons — a duck's a pretty big animal compared to a hamster.
STAFF:STUDENT RATIO
If a teacher has a class of 200, the students don't get the hands-on help they would in a one-to-one tutorial. So, the number of academic staff relative to the number of students is a helpful guide to how many are going to have how much time to teach you.
However, staff-to-student ratios come with a health warning. If the staff are all newbies with no teaching experience, except a few old fogies who'd rather spend time publishing their own research, then a good ratio can be less useful than a haddock in a hurricane. That's why they should be considered with the teaching standards in mind.
TEACHING STANDARDS
The most obviously handy figure is the assessment of the department's teaching standards. Sometimes it's expressed as a score out of 24, where 24 is most excellent and one is… well, the other end of the scale.
Official inspectors visit each university department every few years to come up with these figures, which are produced by the QAA (Quality Assessment Agency) and published on their website (www.qaa.ac.uk) as well as in various other publications. If the rub-down from the inspectors was good, universities are increasingly willing to mention it in their own prospectuses and websites. If you can't find the report from an independent source, any department with nothing to hide should be willing to tell you how they were rated.
Most universities have strengths in some areas and weaknesses in others. If you happen to hear that somewhere's scored top marks for its teaching in chemistry, don't imagine that it makes a tiddler's todger of difference to its history degrees.
The assessment process is partly subjective. So, while some departments get the tasty end of the lolly, others get the stick. In general, they're a reliable test of exactly what it says on the tin: teaching standards.
There's more to a course, however, than how well you're taught — it's just one of the bigger bangs at the fireworks party.
AVERAGE UCAS POINTS
A university is only as good as its students — after all, students often learn as much from each other as from the so-called tutors. So, another measure of standards is to test the students' average brainpower. It's not 100% reliable, but to get a flavour of their grey matter, you can see how they scored in the qualifications that got them into the university in the first place. In other words, look at the average number of UCAS points scored by the students.
This is, of course, also a measure of how tough it is to get in, because UCAS points are like the height guides at fairgrounds: universities say you've got to have enough to take ride on their courses. So, if the average number of UCAS points is high, its probably because the university only lets intellectual giants go on their bumper cars.
Unfortunately, many universities don't keep records of what grades students actually get, only what they want them to get, so the figures for this can be sketchy.
NUMBER OF POSTGRADS
Some people stay on doing ever higher degrees until eventually someone starts calling them 'professor' and pays them to hang around — that's where academics come from (don't believe stories about mummy and daddy academics who love each other very much or storks wearing mortar boards).
These hangers-on start as postgrads: smartarses (or gluttons for punishment) who've already got one degree and are studying for another — usually a bachelors degree (BA, BSc, BEd, BEng etc.) to start with, followed by a masters (MA, MSc, MBA etc.) or a doctorate (PhD, DPhil, MD, DLitt etc.).
Once you get to this stage of study, the chances are you may be covering uncharted territory, thinking thoughts that no-one has thunk before.
Postgrads aren't really 'taught' in the same way as undergrads, they are 'educated', as in the Latin, ex duco, I lead out. (We're showing off now. It's all this talk of smartarses.) They have supervisors who guide their studies as much as tell them stuff. Then they go off and learn for themselves, or do research.
Academics also do their own research. In fact, most of them do research, and teach undergrads and supervise postgrads. (It's not such an easy life after all.)
You'll already have worked out, I'm sure, that the number of postgrads is related to the research standards.
These three tiers of boffin-ness — academics, postgrads and undergrads — provide the traditional backbone to the UK university system, with each vertebra passing knowledge down to the next and inspiring them.
This is how it works in theory at least. And, as it turns out, the undergrad students tend to do better at universities where good research is going on too. However, not every university does the same amount of research. Far from it. The ones with the best rep tend to corner most of the research finance, while the others end up doing projects like working out why toast always lands buttered side down.
Former polytechnics in particular complain that traditional universities hog all the research money and, as a result, they are unable to attract the best academics. They can't get the best academics because they haven't got the most interesting work to offer them. They haven't got that work because they haven't got the research money, which they can't get because they haven't got the best academics. You see the problem?
Some universities that find themselves in this position end up carving niches for themselves in certain areas, making sure they get all the best work in oceanography, for example, or ceramics, or pink balloon tectonics.
Nevertheless, at some universities that backbone of higher education — which depends on research feeding teaching, and the taught becoming researchers — just isn't as strong.
If a university doesn't have a large number of postgrads, the chances are that the self-supporting spine of academic fervour has been broken.
The place feels different — there's a less learned smell in the air — and the quality of the education may be suffering, even for undergrads, as a result.
RESEARCH STANDARDS
Most university departments have two purposes, of which teaching anyone anything is sometimes not the most important. They also exist to conduct and (more importantly) to publish research — new thinking or discoveries in their field.
Research rankings work in much the same way as the teaching standards grades: scores of one to five, where five is excellent research with an international reputation. Top departments will be home to world-famous academics whose books will turn up on every course reading list. They'll also attract the best of the best postgrads, and the department corridors will ring with cries of 'Eureka!'
For undergraduates, however, while all this might mean the department has a good reputation with employers, it might also mean that they're taught only by the most junior academics because the star professor is always off round the world doing new research or addressing conferences. It's possible, but high research standards generally work in the students' favour.
Most undergraduates don't do any research as part of their courses — or none that's considered in the official assessment of departments' research standards. As much as they can be a useful guide to academic standards, undergrad applicants shouldn't take too much notice when departments use research rankings as a boast. (Although postgrads should always take note.)
STUDY ADDICTS
On similar lines, there's not only the number of postgrads who are already studying, but also the proportion of undergraduates who decide to stay on to study more: an indicator of how swotty the students are or, to put it another way, how deeply the university manages to fill them with a passionate fervour for knowledge.
Now that around 40% of school-leavers go on to university, those who want to mark themselves out as cream material often decide a postgrad qualification is the way to do it. Therefore the percentage of students that stays on for further study is a good indicator of how creamy a university's students are.
OTHER MEASURES
There's an overload of other data which has some bearing on academic standards, a few of which deserve a mention — particularly because, as universities are forced to collect and reveal more and more of this kind of information, these less well-publicised figures may hold some juicy revelations.
The new kid on the block is conversion rates. These are a sort of reverse flunk rate — they measure how much students improve on the conveyor belt. For example, a department that sucks in straight A students and churns them out with firsts has a lower conversion rate than a department that does the same for students with straight Cs.
As yet, there's no agreed way of calculating the figures and they're not generally available for most departments, let alone whole universities. Look out for them, though, just in case.
A similar, but less informative figure is the percentage of firsts a department awards to its students. However, apart from the fact they don't all start with the same students, this figure is a throwback to the days of acting as if a first was equal from any university. Nevertheless, it might give a clue to your chances of a first in that department.
The reverse side of that coin is the percentage of thirds, which also is affected at least as much by the kind of students as by the teaching, but, if it's too high, it doesn't say much for the place and should be a bit of a red flag if you have any doubts about your own ability to avoid the low grades.
To complete the set of measures based on grades, you can check out whether they tend to give more higher than lower grades. If you don't think you're in the market for becoming teacher's pet, but you're equally confident the dunce's cap doesn't come in your size, then it might help you feel better about which side of the fence you might fall off.
One figure to be a bit careful with is applications per place, which doesn't tell you anything more than how popular the course is. A lot of the most useless courses are vastly oversubscribed (I won't be unfair and mention media studies here) and universities too can get lots of applications for all manner of reasons. Higher academic standards is rarely one of them.
For instance, in the year that Prince William was starting at St Andrews, the University's applications per place rocketed more than any other in UK. Makes you wonder…
For once Push agrees (partly, at least) with universities when they say that the number of applications don't tell you much. Having said that, if a course seems especially popular, it might be worth trying to work out why. The herd might just be on to something.
PERCENTAGE ARRIVING THROUGH CLEARING
You might ask why all courses don't advertise 360 points as a minimum entry requirement in an attempt to make sure they've got the best students (and therefore better grades and therefore better funding in the future). The reason is there aren't enough grade-A students to go around and most courses would be left with a lot of blank spaces on the register.
To some extent it does happen and, after the A Level results each year, there are thousands of vacancies nationally on courses in almost every university. It's important to remember that empty chairs mean less dosh for fund-frenzied departments. Universities abhor a vacuum.
So, to get bums on seats, departments let in students through Clearing. They might have the required UCAS points. On the other hand, they might not. They might have thought about it and then picked that university after careful investigation and consideration. On the other hand, they might have got desperate and picked it in the same way latecomers pair up at an orgy.
All this panic buying and selling doesn't make for very wise decision-making. Some students make the wrong choices. So do some departments. Suffice it to say there's a clear correlation between the number of students a university takes in on average through Clearing and their flunk rate.
The two aren't necessarily connected, but there's no way round the fact that a high proportion of students arriving through the Clearing system is hardly a guarantee that a course is the best available.
LOCATION
LOCATION: A FEW QUESTIONS
WHERE DO YOU WANT TO LIVE?
The UK may be small as your pinkie on a map of the world, but it’s got plenty of variety. You don’t need Push to tell you that there are some pretty big differences between England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland (where, for a start, degree courses are usually four years instead of three).
Even between different parts of the Midlands you can move from the pastoral charms of sheep and fields to the ruins of the industrial heartlands (ie. loft-style yuppie maisonette conversions).
That’s another thing. Student life in Birmingham and Manchester is a lot more similar than student life in Strathclyde and St Andrews, which are geographically much closer to each other. Being in a big city is a whole lot different from being in Lampeter — or the middle of nowhere, as it’s sometimes known. If the peace of the countryside is your bag, go for it. If, however, peaceful equals dull, think different.
But not all big cities are the same. Sure, they’ve all got plenty of shops and things to do — none of which students can afford — but London and Glasgow could hardly be more different, even if the people spoke different languages (which, to some extent, they do).
Similarly, the wilds of Wales and the English south coast may both be away from the clamour and claptrap of big city life, but they’ve little else in common.
Then there’s the weather. The south-west gets the first, the last and the hottest part of the summer and the shortest and mildest winters.
Meanwhile, the north-west gets more than it’s share of rainfall. This may seem trivial, but apart from the financial implications, it may have an impact on your health (if you’re a flu junkie or an asthma martyr), your course (such as sports studies or agriculture) or your interests (from skiing to cricket, from watercolour painting to nude volleyball).
No two places are the same.
There’s only one Ibiza, for example. If that’s the holiday you want, you’re not going to settle for the Norwegian fjords. And vice versa and the other way round. There’s only one anywhere (except Newcastle — there’s Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Newcastle-under-Lyme, just for starters, but they’re still different as chalk and chimpanzees. By the way, they’ve got three universities between the two Newcastles).
But this is no holiday. This is somewhere you have to live. It’s hard to understand why some applicants — people who wouldn’t pick a pair of shoes without spending a month shopping around — are willing to choose a home for three years based on no more than a prospectus.
Deciding to live somewhere — which is part of what you choose when you pick a university — means choosing to take on certain things about a place. All its good points — its local facilities, environment, housing, people and heritage — and its bad points — pretty much the same list.
To go to one place also means losing out on what other places offer, but to lose out on climbing mountains in order to live in London may be no big loss to you. And vice versa and the other way round.
There are universities all over the shop — North, South, East, West, in towns, in fields, in cyberspace even. But no two are alike — even in the same city.
Local Layout
So much for the national map, location matters just as much when you get down to the local level too. For a start, it matters what the place looks like.
For instance, Stirling and Durham universities both have castles and are pretty easy on the eye. It requires a more unusual aesthetic sensibility, however, to appreciate the delights of the Enfield site of Middlesex University.
And local location raises all sorts of other questions as well:
The answers to these and a press-gang of other questions depend on many factors. Lets take a scalpel to the lot of them, dissecting the corpse of confusion and extracting the marrow.
In particular, on a day-to-day level, a lot of your hassles or happiness as a student may depend on the way the university is laid out on a local level. So take a look at some of the typical set-ups of universities — campuses, civic universities, multi-sites, colleges — and paint a picture of what choosing between them is likely to mean when it comes to the crunch.
WHERE IS IT?
There's more to 'where?' than just 'how far?' There's cities, the countryside, campuses – it all makes a big difference. There’s a delicate balance to be struck here.
Many students want to live as far from home as possible. That way they get the degree from the University of Life as well as the University of Wherever.
So you want to go far enough that the folks aren’t going to come visiting too often. (Who knows? They may not want to. Perhaps they’re glad to have the house to themselves.)
But then, you don’t want to go so far that it costs an arm and a leg and takes an age and a day to get home. Especially if you may be popping back for weekends as well as trekking back and forth at the beginning and end of every term. (Not everyone goes home from universities over the vacations, but they sure become pretty quiet places. At many universities, especially in halls of residence, you’re turfed out of your room so money-bags like conference guests can move in. It’s another thing to think about.)
There’s no set mileage that works for everyone. You could settle your choice that way though: decide the closest you want to be, decide the furthest and draw two circles on a map eliminating everywhere outside the doughnut zone in between.
But it’s better to think of distance in terms of time and cost. If you live in Penzance and you pick Aberdeen University, you’re pretty much saying to your folks you won’t be popping home with the laundry all that often. Also, if you live in the Hebrides and choose Ulster University, it may not be that far as the seagull flies, but you’re looking at ferries and planes and all sorts. Big trip, big money trap.
LOCATION: A FINAL WORD
All this stuff about location, especially questions such as ‘What’s it like?’ aren’t just a matter of where. These things are closely linked to the whole question of atmosphere.
- How far from home do you want to go?
- Would you like to (or would you consider) staying at home while you’re a student?
- Are there any parts of the UK you’d especially like to go?
- Are there any parts of the UK you’d especially like to avoid?
- What parts of the country might you rule in or out because of the cost of living?
- For universities left on your shortlist, what’s the local vicinity like?
- What are the local facilities and attractions?
- Would you rather live in a city or in the countryside?
- Would you like to live in a small town or a big city?
WHERE DO YOU WANT TO LIVE?
The UK may be small as your pinkie on a map of the world, but it’s got plenty of variety. You don’t need Push to tell you that there are some pretty big differences between England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland (where, for a start, degree courses are usually four years instead of three).
Even between different parts of the Midlands you can move from the pastoral charms of sheep and fields to the ruins of the industrial heartlands (ie. loft-style yuppie maisonette conversions).
That’s another thing. Student life in Birmingham and Manchester is a lot more similar than student life in Strathclyde and St Andrews, which are geographically much closer to each other. Being in a big city is a whole lot different from being in Lampeter — or the middle of nowhere, as it’s sometimes known. If the peace of the countryside is your bag, go for it. If, however, peaceful equals dull, think different.
But not all big cities are the same. Sure, they’ve all got plenty of shops and things to do — none of which students can afford — but London and Glasgow could hardly be more different, even if the people spoke different languages (which, to some extent, they do).
Similarly, the wilds of Wales and the English south coast may both be away from the clamour and claptrap of big city life, but they’ve little else in common.
Then there’s the weather. The south-west gets the first, the last and the hottest part of the summer and the shortest and mildest winters.
Meanwhile, the north-west gets more than it’s share of rainfall. This may seem trivial, but apart from the financial implications, it may have an impact on your health (if you’re a flu junkie or an asthma martyr), your course (such as sports studies or agriculture) or your interests (from skiing to cricket, from watercolour painting to nude volleyball).
No two places are the same.
There’s only one Ibiza, for example. If that’s the holiday you want, you’re not going to settle for the Norwegian fjords. And vice versa and the other way round. There’s only one anywhere (except Newcastle — there’s Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Newcastle-under-Lyme, just for starters, but they’re still different as chalk and chimpanzees. By the way, they’ve got three universities between the two Newcastles).
But this is no holiday. This is somewhere you have to live. It’s hard to understand why some applicants — people who wouldn’t pick a pair of shoes without spending a month shopping around — are willing to choose a home for three years based on no more than a prospectus.
Deciding to live somewhere — which is part of what you choose when you pick a university — means choosing to take on certain things about a place. All its good points — its local facilities, environment, housing, people and heritage — and its bad points — pretty much the same list.
To go to one place also means losing out on what other places offer, but to lose out on climbing mountains in order to live in London may be no big loss to you. And vice versa and the other way round.
There are universities all over the shop — North, South, East, West, in towns, in fields, in cyberspace even. But no two are alike — even in the same city.
Local Layout
So much for the national map, location matters just as much when you get down to the local level too. For a start, it matters what the place looks like.
For instance, Stirling and Durham universities both have castles and are pretty easy on the eye. It requires a more unusual aesthetic sensibility, however, to appreciate the delights of the Enfield site of Middlesex University.
And local location raises all sorts of other questions as well:
- Where will you actually be living?
- How does that relate to where you’ll need to go for lectures, for shops or for a bit of fun?
- How do you get around between these places you need to go.
- Is it a rough part of town or one that you can’t get to after 8pm without a taxi?
- How does the local population feel about students? Would they rather hug ’em or hang ’em? In other words, how are ‘town/gown’ relations?
- How far is it from home? Is it far enough? Is it too far to travel back for Christmas, Birthdays, Mother's day... and when you run out of food?
The answers to these and a press-gang of other questions depend on many factors. Lets take a scalpel to the lot of them, dissecting the corpse of confusion and extracting the marrow.
In particular, on a day-to-day level, a lot of your hassles or happiness as a student may depend on the way the university is laid out on a local level. So take a look at some of the typical set-ups of universities — campuses, civic universities, multi-sites, colleges — and paint a picture of what choosing between them is likely to mean when it comes to the crunch.
WHERE IS IT?
There's more to 'where?' than just 'how far?' There's cities, the countryside, campuses – it all makes a big difference. There’s a delicate balance to be struck here.
Many students want to live as far from home as possible. That way they get the degree from the University of Life as well as the University of Wherever.
So you want to go far enough that the folks aren’t going to come visiting too often. (Who knows? They may not want to. Perhaps they’re glad to have the house to themselves.)
But then, you don’t want to go so far that it costs an arm and a leg and takes an age and a day to get home. Especially if you may be popping back for weekends as well as trekking back and forth at the beginning and end of every term. (Not everyone goes home from universities over the vacations, but they sure become pretty quiet places. At many universities, especially in halls of residence, you’re turfed out of your room so money-bags like conference guests can move in. It’s another thing to think about.)
There’s no set mileage that works for everyone. You could settle your choice that way though: decide the closest you want to be, decide the furthest and draw two circles on a map eliminating everywhere outside the doughnut zone in between.
But it’s better to think of distance in terms of time and cost. If you live in Penzance and you pick Aberdeen University, you’re pretty much saying to your folks you won’t be popping home with the laundry all that often. Also, if you live in the Hebrides and choose Ulster University, it may not be that far as the seagull flies, but you’re looking at ferries and planes and all sorts. Big trip, big money trap.
LOCATION: A FINAL WORD
All this stuff about location, especially questions such as ‘What’s it like?’ aren’t just a matter of where. These things are closely linked to the whole question of atmosphere.
FACILITIES - WHAT YOU NEED TO HELP YOU LEARN
Official statistics are all very well, but ultimately what's behind them?
There's the academics who do — or fail to do — the teaching. And whether you get on with your tutor can count as much as anything towards doing well in your degree, which is another good reason to attend interviews and open days wherever possible (although the person you meet may not end up being anything to do with you).
There's also the learning facilities.
Libraries
Libraries, for instance. Or as they're often called these days, 'Learning Resources Centres' — a name which is supposed to demonstrate the emphasis on computers, multimedia and other learning facilities than books, but all too often just means that don't have enough books.
Indeed, some universities' libraries are more barren than a fish farm in a drought. Meanwhile, Oxford and Cambridge both have copyright libraries, which means they get a copy of every single book published in the UK for free.
For universities who have to pay for them, however, books are expensive and there hasn't exactly been a funding fountain in higher education lately. That means that some universities, particularly newer ones, haven't had the aeons to gather shelf-loads of tomes nor the dough to splash out big time on making up for lost time.
Some have chosen to buy the books, but at the expense of anywhere good to put them or the staff to keep the place open more than ten minutes a day. As a result, the libary may have your book, but getting it out is like stealing candy from a baby (and anyone who thinks that means it's easy has clearly never tried stealing candy from a baby). And so end up with a hefty photocopying bill. For more info on academic costs, click here.
Libraries vary hugely and a bad one not only costs you money, but can stunt your study too. The number of books, the quality of the library (as a place to work as well as borrow stuff), the hours it's open and the amount of money spent per year on books in order to keep the stock up-to-date all these make a big difference to how well your study goes.
Bear in mind that you get left to do a lot of the studying under your own steam and books are the coal you need to shovel in to get that steam stoked. Oh, and you won't be able to afford to buy all the books you need even if you wanted to.
Computers
Computers are the chalk and board of our time. What are education and intelligence without IT? Merely educaon and nellgence. Which is nonsense.Like books, a lot depends on the availability and standard of computers, not least because most written work has to be typed. But even if you've got your own kit, you may want to ensure your chosen university is well tooled up.
Students are lucky enough to get free internet access from university computers. If they can get access to the computers, that is, because most universities don't have enough of them (I mean, how many would ever be enough?) and sometimes they're slower than a Virgin train. On the whole the level of computer availability — how many and when — is less predictable that an Eastenders plotline.
Of course, all students would like to have their own computer and if they do, some places, (usually for an extra fee) students can hook up to the web and the universities' own networks from their college room.
If you haven't got a computer of your though, you shouldn't count on being able to save up for one. However, if the university's provisions are good enough, it's not an issue.
The number of workstations, the opening hours and the amount spent every year on keeping it all up to speed are pretty good indicators whether the university's bytes have got any bite.
Others
Other learning facilities vary too, which can affect everyone, but for some courses, it more important than others. For example, a drama degree without a theatre to perform in is like a goose with a balloon — a bit silly. Or a language course without a language lab. Or a media studies course without a TV studio. Or a music course without rehearsal rooms. Or a law course without a practice courtroom. Or a golf course without bunkers. Naturally, if a course needs certain amenities, you can be fairly sure they'll be available, but it's not always wise to take it for granted, especially if it's a small course or needs unusual facilities. Also, there's no guarantee that the facilities are any good unless you look into it.
Unlike books, these other amenities are one area where older universities tend to have no advantages over newer ones. In fact, many new universities where able to plan what might be handy when they were building. Meanwhile, converting priest-holes into editing suites presents more of a challenge.
There's the academics who do — or fail to do — the teaching. And whether you get on with your tutor can count as much as anything towards doing well in your degree, which is another good reason to attend interviews and open days wherever possible (although the person you meet may not end up being anything to do with you).
There's also the learning facilities.
Libraries
Libraries, for instance. Or as they're often called these days, 'Learning Resources Centres' — a name which is supposed to demonstrate the emphasis on computers, multimedia and other learning facilities than books, but all too often just means that don't have enough books.
Indeed, some universities' libraries are more barren than a fish farm in a drought. Meanwhile, Oxford and Cambridge both have copyright libraries, which means they get a copy of every single book published in the UK for free.
For universities who have to pay for them, however, books are expensive and there hasn't exactly been a funding fountain in higher education lately. That means that some universities, particularly newer ones, haven't had the aeons to gather shelf-loads of tomes nor the dough to splash out big time on making up for lost time.
Some have chosen to buy the books, but at the expense of anywhere good to put them or the staff to keep the place open more than ten minutes a day. As a result, the libary may have your book, but getting it out is like stealing candy from a baby (and anyone who thinks that means it's easy has clearly never tried stealing candy from a baby). And so end up with a hefty photocopying bill. For more info on academic costs, click here.
Libraries vary hugely and a bad one not only costs you money, but can stunt your study too. The number of books, the quality of the library (as a place to work as well as borrow stuff), the hours it's open and the amount of money spent per year on books in order to keep the stock up-to-date all these make a big difference to how well your study goes.
Bear in mind that you get left to do a lot of the studying under your own steam and books are the coal you need to shovel in to get that steam stoked. Oh, and you won't be able to afford to buy all the books you need even if you wanted to.
Computers
Computers are the chalk and board of our time. What are education and intelligence without IT? Merely educaon and nellgence. Which is nonsense.Like books, a lot depends on the availability and standard of computers, not least because most written work has to be typed. But even if you've got your own kit, you may want to ensure your chosen university is well tooled up.
Students are lucky enough to get free internet access from university computers. If they can get access to the computers, that is, because most universities don't have enough of them (I mean, how many would ever be enough?) and sometimes they're slower than a Virgin train. On the whole the level of computer availability — how many and when — is less predictable that an Eastenders plotline.
Of course, all students would like to have their own computer and if they do, some places, (usually for an extra fee) students can hook up to the web and the universities' own networks from their college room.
If you haven't got a computer of your though, you shouldn't count on being able to save up for one. However, if the university's provisions are good enough, it's not an issue.
The number of workstations, the opening hours and the amount spent every year on keeping it all up to speed are pretty good indicators whether the university's bytes have got any bite.
Others
Other learning facilities vary too, which can affect everyone, but for some courses, it more important than others. For example, a drama degree without a theatre to perform in is like a goose with a balloon — a bit silly. Or a language course without a language lab. Or a media studies course without a TV studio. Or a music course without rehearsal rooms. Or a law course without a practice courtroom. Or a golf course without bunkers. Naturally, if a course needs certain amenities, you can be fairly sure they'll be available, but it's not always wise to take it for granted, especially if it's a small course or needs unusual facilities. Also, there's no guarantee that the facilities are any good unless you look into it.
Unlike books, these other amenities are one area where older universities tend to have no advantages over newer ones. In fact, many new universities where able to plan what might be handy when they were building. Meanwhile, converting priest-holes into editing suites presents more of a challenge.
WHICH IS THE GREENEST UNI?
Obviously, you want to find the best uni for you, but which is best for the planet? Now students can think about the impact on the environment when choosing where to study thanks to the League, compiled by People and Planet, a student campaign network. In the hope of pushing unis into being more environmentally friendly, the League shows which are as green as Kermit’s love-child and which are stamping a carbon footprint with oversized Doc Martens.
Nottingham Trent got the biggest pat on the back, with LSE not far behind. Meanwhile the poor environmental record of Royal College of Music and Lampeter means they fail miserably to qualify for a green mortarboard.
Universities are given a ranking from a First to a Fail based on eleven factors, including the number of staff devoted to managing environmental impact, how much waste they chuck out and what types of energy they use. The results show that many unis have bucked their ideas up when it comes to loving the planet. There are more environmental managers than ever before and the number of ethical investment policies has doubled.
Also, more universities were keen to get involved and show off their tree-hugging credentials. Of the 131 universities eligible for inclusion, 127 provided enough information to be ranked in the League.
Disappointingly, universities well-known for their research into sustainability and climate change turned out to be better at lecturing the rest of us than learning the lessons themselves. For example, the University of Oxford, home to the Environmental Change Institute and the School of Enterprise & The Environment, ranked just 84th in the league.
While many universities are taking steps to be more environmental aware, a lot more still needs to be done. Ian Leggett, Director of People and Planet, congratulated all the unis which were awarded “a first class degree”, but warned that “the 2009 Green League makes it crystal clear too many universities have failed to recognise the importance of becoming a model low carbon institution”.
ATMOSPHERE
What makes it like it is?
Without getting too philosophical here about how anything comes to be as it is, there are certain fool-proof signposts to how a university is likely to be.
- PHYSICAL SETUP
- THE ACADEMIC BALANCE
ARTY COURSES
Goldsmiths College (part of London University) specialises in arts courses — drama, dance, English, art history and so on. They also do maths and other things, but most students are doing creative courses. No surprise then that the place is buzzing with creative types. The atmosphere of the place is defined by it and, in turn, what the students think of as fun is also defined by who they are.
So, for example, if your idea of a good time is spending a night playing Dungeons & Dragons and watching reruns of Star Trek: TNG, Goldsmiths is probably not going to offer you too much in the way of entertainment. But, if you’ve ever seen an old movie where Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney stand in a barn and shout “Hey, why don’t we do the show right here?” and you’ve thought how cool that would be, then Goldsmiths might be more your thing.
OTHER COURSES
Whether it’s just a single site or a whole university, each subject affects the atmosphere in its own way. Although a well-informed guess will usually tell you how the influence will operate, it is just a guess, and don’t assume too much if you want to avoid disappointment.
For example, there are the places that get tugged in two directions at once. Take UEA (East Anglia) for example: a campus university on the outskirts of Norwich. It does the usual range of courses, many of which are quite traditional, but it is particularly widely respected for English and American studies, and for environment-related courses (including geography, geology, meteorology and messing with plants’ genes at the John Innes Centre). Although these schools don’t account for the bulk of students, they’re fairly influential in setting the university agenda.
Then there’s Bath, a modern campus on a hill outside the city that looks like (and often is) a set for a Merchant Ivory movie. The University’s courses lean towards sciences, with a tendency to the vocational. Not what you’d imagine to be the perfect breeding ground for lots of luvvie thesps and arty types. However, perhaps because it boasts good facilities for all manner of arty-fartiness, it’s a bit of buried treasure when it comes to theatricals and the like.
Meanwhile, there are the more techy places — Brunel and Imperial College, to name but two. These places aren’t necessarily more boring or less outrageous just because most of the students are scientists. They’re just exciting and outrageous in a different way, a way that suits the students there.
You can say the same about places dominated by any area — or areas — of study, whether it’s social sciences (like LSE), vocational courses (eg. Leeds Metropolitan or Middlesex), medicine (any med school), agriculture (Silsoe College — part of Cranfield University) or even religious education (Heythrop College and The School of Jewish Studies).
The same influence operates when a site within a university specialises in some subject — perhaps more strongly than the way it affects whole universities. Business studies, for instance, is often given a site to itself, a site that is often full of students in suits carrying briefcases — the highly professional Emm Lane site of the otherwise most laid-back Bradford University, for instance.
- MIX OF STUDENTS
No university is just the physical set-up and the courses. It’s not even the lecturers and the facilities. Mostly, it’s the students.
Perhaps more than anything else, they create the atmosphere — although there’s a whole chicken-egg debate here that Push just doesn’t want to get into.
- Sex ratio
The sex ratio doesn’t just alter your pulling odds (in itself a relevant factor in determining atmosphere), but all sorts of other things: not least whether the place is laddish or politically correct, although more women doesn’t necessarily mean more right-on — sometimes quite the reverse.
The sex ratio is not unrelated to the balance of courses — there are still more men doing sciences than women and vice versa for arts. There are exceptions, however: the School of Pharmacy, for example, is 60% female.
- Students’ backgrounds
Take Oxbridge, for instance. Oxford and Cambridge are almost synonymous with elitism, but, if you ask the universities, they’d say that’s because they skim off the academic cream. They’re the elite because they’re the cleverest (an arguable claim in itself).
However, there are those who would claim that Oxbridge is elitist because they prefer privately educated students.
On paper, they have a point. Nationally, about 6% of people go to private schools. But from that 6% are drawn 47% of Cambridge’s students. And Oxford, with 50%, has an even higher proportion.
The situation isn’t quite that simple — for starters, students at private schools are more likely to go to university anyway — but even so, it’s not a set of statistics Oxbridge is particularly proud of.
Indeed, they’re constantly trying to encourage applicants from state schools, but it’s a bit like the police trying to recruit blacks and Asians. Oxford and Cambridge are institutionally posh and, deep down, they don’t really want to believe they could have been doing things better all these years. While the universities give off that attitude, the applicants they want to attract don’t regard Oxbridge quite as highly as Oxbridge regards itself.
(To be fair, one of the advantages of Oxbridge’s collegiate systems is that colleges differ in their degree of elitism and, while some are posh as caviar sarnies, others have even become working class ghettos — well, not quite, but more diverse.)
Of course, Oxford and Cambridge aren’t the only ones. Several universities get tagged as dumping grounds for ‘Oxbridge rejects’ — Bristol, Durham, Edinburgh, Exeter, St Andrew’s, Southampton, Stirling and York, to name but a few. If it were just an academic thing, they would probably consider it more of an insult, implying that they’re inferior in quality. But, as much as anything, it’s a class thing.
These ‘Oxbridge reject universities’ are quite posh and have plenty of privately educated students to prove it.
One university in particular deserves a special mention here:
Buckingham. In the way that you’ve got state schools and private schools, you’ve got most universities and then there’s Buckingham where students pay not just the regular fees, but they cough up for essentially the full cost of their courses.
Because Buckingham pushes students through their degrees in just two years, for students who’d have to pay anyway (such as certain overseas and mature students), it can work out cheaper but, even so, the students are mostly the kind of people who can afford the sort of big bucks involved.
At the other end of the scale there are some universities — Salford, Strathclyde and South Bank spring to mind — where, for most students, going to university isn’t part of any family tradition, and ‘laugh’ isn’t pronounced as if it has an ‘R’ in it.
Most universities are in the middle of the spectrum — a smattering of all sorts (although it’s worth bearing in mind that the middle classes make up a hefty share of the 40% of school-leavers who go to university).
It may be that none of this class nonsense matters to you. Maybe you couldn’t care less whether someone was schooled at Eton by minor royals or taught in a garden shed by a miner. But even if it doesn’t matter to you, it matters to them.
On the other hand, you may want to take it into account, either so you can stick with your own kind, mix with the rough stuff if you’re a toff or so you can lord it with the gentry if you’re an oik.
The question is, where will you enjoy yourself? That may mean fitting in, but, if you’re daring, it might mean standing out. As ever, it’s your call.
- Ethnic minorities: a few wise words
While most universities have at least a few faces that aren’t white, some have more and a much wider range of other shades. The School of Oriental & African Studies, for instance, is a college of London University that specialises in studying exactly what it says on the tin. As a result it attracts a lot of students from ethnic minorities — around 60% in fact.
Then there’s London South Bank University that exists to provide South Londoners with a university with an open-arms access policy. As a result, its students pretty much reflect the local population — a local population that’s made up of Europeans, Afro-Caribbeans, Nigerians, Ghanaians, Asians, Turks, Cypriots and people from just about every immigrant population past and present.
Racism isn’t common in universities, though — or not conscious racism, at least. But the same problems of ignorance arise wherever, say, being black is regarded as unusual. If you happen to be black, you might want to avoid putting yourself in that position. Or you might not. Either way, it’s not just the university you ought to think about and the proportion of its students that are drawn from ethnic minorities, but also the local community where specific problems are more likely to arise.
- Local students
- International students
- Mature students
LOCAL STUDENTS
It’s worth pointing out that at some universities the local community and the students are pretty much the same thing. Because it’s cheaper not to decamp to become a student, the proportion of students studying at the local institution has rocketed in the last couple of decades.
Some universities — South Bank and Paisley, to name but two — have a special remit to provide degree courses to the local punters.
Naturally, this affects the atmosphere. It would be an exaggeration to say local students are as indifferent to the excesses of student life as part-timers, but they tend not to have the escaped convict’s lust for fun that some students experience when moving away from their parents for the first time.
And it would be an outrageous exaggeration even to mention inbred knuckle-draggers, but if you’re an outsider coming in to a principally local university, there may be just a hint of The League of Gentleman’s local shop for local people.
It’s worth pointing out that at some universities the local community and the students are pretty much the same thing. Because it’s cheaper not to decamp to become a student, the proportion of students studying at the local institution has rocketed in the last couple of decades.
Some universities — South Bank and Paisley, to name but two — have a special remit to provide degree courses to the local punters.
Naturally, this affects the atmosphere. It would be an exaggeration to say local students are as indifferent to the excesses of student life as part-timers, but they tend not to have the escaped convict’s lust for fun that some students experience when moving away from their parents for the first time.
And it would be an outrageous exaggeration even to mention inbred knuckle-draggers, but if you’re an outsider coming in to a principally local university, there may be just a hint of The League of Gentleman’s local shop for local people.
How do i choose the right uni?
'Researching Universities: How to Make the Right Choice' Telegraph article by Helena Wozniak
We thought we'd share with you a Telegraph article featuring the wise words of Push founder and Chief Executive, Johnny Rich.
In it, Johnny compares choosing a uni to choosing a marriage partner – “You wouldn’t rush into a nightclub and grab the first person you saw — likewise, you shouldn’t spend three years at a university without having spent at least three hours looking around beforehand."
Have a read for some stellar advice on choosing the right uni for you. Don't get yourself stuck with a bad Tinder date for three whole years.
We thought we'd share with you a Telegraph article featuring the wise words of Push founder and Chief Executive, Johnny Rich.
In it, Johnny compares choosing a uni to choosing a marriage partner – “You wouldn’t rush into a nightclub and grab the first person you saw — likewise, you shouldn’t spend three years at a university without having spent at least three hours looking around beforehand."
Have a read for some stellar advice on choosing the right uni for you. Don't get yourself stuck with a bad Tinder date for three whole years.
PUSH's 90 second guide:
WHat i wish i'd known when choosing a uni
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Talks and editorial manager, Lucy Harding, suggests you think of choosing a uni like picking a date on Tinder. It’s all about getting the right match.
Do i need to go to A "GOOD" UNI?
We thought we'd share this great article that education and careers specialist, Push founder and Chief Executive Johnny Rich was asked to write for Huffington Post: 'Do I Need to Go to a Good University?'
Johnny is is also a member of the Board of Directors at the Higher Education Academy and a member of Govermnent advisory committees on higher education (BIS, HEFCE). He is a consultant to Which? University, BestCourse4me, and various universities, as well as a key consultant for U-Multirank.
He is also a regular commentator on radio & TV on issues about student life, higher education and student finance, and a freelance journalist. For more info on the man himself, head over to his website.
Click here for some wise words on choosing the best university for you.
Johnny is is also a member of the Board of Directors at the Higher Education Academy and a member of Govermnent advisory committees on higher education (BIS, HEFCE). He is a consultant to Which? University, BestCourse4me, and various universities, as well as a key consultant for U-Multirank.
He is also a regular commentator on radio & TV on issues about student life, higher education and student finance, and a freelance journalist. For more info on the man himself, head over to his website.
Click here for some wise words on choosing the best university for you.
Comparing vs ranking universities
Here at Push we know that any traditional university ranking is based on what its inventors think is important, but their priorities may be a snail’s hike from yours.
Our CEO, Johnny Rich, is a consultant to the consortium behind alternative online tool U-Multirank. He champions the ability to allow students to create their own rankings based on criteria that they chose as important to them rather than those picked by the rankings compilers.
Discussing U-Multirank he said "I’m really not comfortable with it being described as a ‘ranking’. Rather it’s a beast of a big data set with a powerful tool to build comparisons. It’s not so much a ranking as the antidote to rankings."
Check out the full article here.
Our CEO, Johnny Rich, is a consultant to the consortium behind alternative online tool U-Multirank. He champions the ability to allow students to create their own rankings based on criteria that they chose as important to them rather than those picked by the rankings compilers.
Discussing U-Multirank he said "I’m really not comfortable with it being described as a ‘ranking’. Rather it’s a beast of a big data set with a powerful tool to build comparisons. It’s not so much a ranking as the antidote to rankings."
Check out the full article here.
WONKHE ARTICLE BY JOHNNY RICH, PUSH CEO
Our CEO Johnny Rich, a Director of the Higher Education Academy, has written the following blog for WONKHE regarding university league tables and how students should use rankings within their research: Antidote to university league tables.
After advice and wondering where to turn to?
I’m sure you’ve been exploring this site widely, gripped and paying close attention. Good.
In that case, by now you’ll be saying, it’s all very well to tell me I need to prioritise universities based on the price of a pint in the student bar and on whether they have a Harry Potter society, but where on earth do I get that kind of detail? Come to think of it, where do I even find out what courses are available and where, how good they are and what grades they expect me to get?
Worry no more. This section is a guide to who to ask, about what and whether to believe them.
There are six basic criteria for a good source of information and we have given each of them a star rating so you know who to trust.
No stars means that as far as the criterion in question is concerned, that source is as reliable as a Jaffa Cake bridge. Three stars means it’s good to go.
So, those criteria are:
So... who can you rely on?
In that case, by now you’ll be saying, it’s all very well to tell me I need to prioritise universities based on the price of a pint in the student bar and on whether they have a Harry Potter society, but where on earth do I get that kind of detail? Come to think of it, where do I even find out what courses are available and where, how good they are and what grades they expect me to get?
Worry no more. This section is a guide to who to ask, about what and whether to believe them.
There are six basic criteria for a good source of information and we have given each of them a star rating so you know who to trust.
No stars means that as far as the criterion in question is concerned, that source is as reliable as a Jaffa Cake bridge. Three stars means it’s good to go.
So, those criteria are:
- Accurate: Whatever they tell you, it must be right.
- Comparative: Do they compare one place to another, judging them equally or make it possible for you to do so?
- Comprehensive: Can they tell you about all your options and every university in the UK?
- Detailed: How much depth of information can you get?
- Independent: The advice should be warts and all, with no axe to grind, no vested interests, nothing to sell.
- Understanding: Do they know what you want? Do they talk your language?
So... who can you rely on?
push
Accurate: ***
Comparative: ***
Comprehensive: ***
Detailed: ***
Independent: ***
Understanding: ***
Obviously, Push is the best, the most reliable, the sexiest… no, but seriously, folks, we’re genuinely trying to provide helpful stuff here. Push was started by students who thought most sources don’t come anywhere close to the six criteria above and so we set out consciously to match them. If you think this resource has been handy, then we hope it’s because that aim has come out in our approach. If not, we’ve failed, so don’t trust us and skip the next few paragraphs — they’ll make you vom.
Push’s idea is that we provide everything you need to identify the right university for you and we do it…
Basically, we keep it real and tell it like it is.
Push also runs sessions in schools, colleges and universities across the UK, giving students the lowdown on everything from options to employability and study skills.
Enough of the shameless plug, already. What about the other sources?
Comparative: ***
Comprehensive: ***
Detailed: ***
Independent: ***
Understanding: ***
Obviously, Push is the best, the most reliable, the sexiest… no, but seriously, folks, we’re genuinely trying to provide helpful stuff here. Push was started by students who thought most sources don’t come anywhere close to the six criteria above and so we set out consciously to match them. If you think this resource has been handy, then we hope it’s because that aim has come out in our approach. If not, we’ve failed, so don’t trust us and skip the next few paragraphs — they’ll make you vom.
Push’s idea is that we provide everything you need to identify the right university for you and we do it…
- Independently — Push is answerable to no one but applicants
- Accurately — our research is the most detailed into student life anywhere in the UK, involving visits to every university every year
- and Accessibly — our staff are all students, recent graduates and experts in the field.
Basically, we keep it real and tell it like it is.
Push also runs sessions in schools, colleges and universities across the UK, giving students the lowdown on everything from options to employability and study skills.
Enough of the shameless plug, already. What about the other sources?
teachers
Accurate: *
Comparative:
Comprehensive:
Detailed: *
Independent: **
Understanding: **
Problems: Contrary to popular belief, teachers are human. This means they are fallible.
Therefore, although their advice will be well-intentioned and quite possibly well-informed on their own subject, they are unlikely to know more than two or three universities personally.
Quite unintentionally, they are bound to have their own preferences and prejudices which will be based on where and when they were at university. If that was more than ten years ago, you can forget the star for accuracy.
What they’re good for: Teachers, however, do know you — although maybe not all that well and they may have the wrong idea — and they also want to see you do alright. Therefore they’ll try to help. In particular, they’re good at pointing you in the right direction to make decisions. They know what resources your school or college has and they’ve been through the application process so many times with other students that they’ll have picked up some useful stuff about how and when to do things.
Verdict: Good on the process and where to find stuff out, pretty poor on most other things.
Comparative:
Comprehensive:
Detailed: *
Independent: **
Understanding: **
Problems: Contrary to popular belief, teachers are human. This means they are fallible.
Therefore, although their advice will be well-intentioned and quite possibly well-informed on their own subject, they are unlikely to know more than two or three universities personally.
Quite unintentionally, they are bound to have their own preferences and prejudices which will be based on where and when they were at university. If that was more than ten years ago, you can forget the star for accuracy.
What they’re good for: Teachers, however, do know you — although maybe not all that well and they may have the wrong idea — and they also want to see you do alright. Therefore they’ll try to help. In particular, they’re good at pointing you in the right direction to make decisions. They know what resources your school or college has and they’ve been through the application process so many times with other students that they’ll have picked up some useful stuff about how and when to do things.
Verdict: Good on the process and where to find stuff out, pretty poor on most other things.
careers advisers
Accurate: **
Comparative: **
Comprehensive: **
Detailed: *
Independent: ***
Understanding:
Problems: Careers advisers tend to be better informed than teachers, but are still limited to personal knowledge of maybe a dozen universities out of more than 130 to choose from (and we’re not counting HE colleges).
Furthermore they probably don’t know you from Adam — or Eve.
What they’re good for: Take their advice on individual universities only with a pinch of salt.
They are, however, excellent on the wider range of options and on the whole application process and general paperchase. Also worth listening to about what specific qualifications might do for you in the long run and what jobs might open up for you.
Verdict: Good on the process and the wider context.
Comparative: **
Comprehensive: **
Detailed: *
Independent: ***
Understanding:
Problems: Careers advisers tend to be better informed than teachers, but are still limited to personal knowledge of maybe a dozen universities out of more than 130 to choose from (and we’re not counting HE colleges).
Furthermore they probably don’t know you from Adam — or Eve.
What they’re good for: Take their advice on individual universities only with a pinch of salt.
They are, however, excellent on the wider range of options and on the whole application process and general paperchase. Also worth listening to about what specific qualifications might do for you in the long run and what jobs might open up for you.
Verdict: Good on the process and the wider context.
family & FRIENDs
Accurate:
Comparative:
Comprehensive:
Detailed: **
Independent: *
Understanding: ***
Problems: Your family and friends, unless they happen to have specialist knowledge, probably don’t know what they’re talking about on this one. Or at least, not when it comes to knowing the differences between individual universities.
Parents, in particular, probably haven’t been to a university in the last two decades — a period that’s seen some of the biggest changes ever to the whole system.
Even friends, brothers and sisters probably only know one university at most (the one they go to or went to, if they went at all) and their experience of even that one is a very personal one.
What they’re good for: The above is also, however, their strength.
They have a good insight into what it was or is really like to be a student. They can answer questions in more detail than most other sources because they’ll take their time — although don’t rely on the detail to be anything other than vague impressions rather than specifics.
They can also say what became important to them during their studies and what they would like to have known beforehand.
They also know you pretty well and, let’s hope, care about you and want to try to give good advice.
Verdict: Okay on student life in general and on their university experience in particular but take what they say with a wheelbarrow of salt.
Comparative:
Comprehensive:
Detailed: **
Independent: *
Understanding: ***
Problems: Your family and friends, unless they happen to have specialist knowledge, probably don’t know what they’re talking about on this one. Or at least, not when it comes to knowing the differences between individual universities.
Parents, in particular, probably haven’t been to a university in the last two decades — a period that’s seen some of the biggest changes ever to the whole system.
Even friends, brothers and sisters probably only know one university at most (the one they go to or went to, if they went at all) and their experience of even that one is a very personal one.
What they’re good for: The above is also, however, their strength.
They have a good insight into what it was or is really like to be a student. They can answer questions in more detail than most other sources because they’ll take their time — although don’t rely on the detail to be anything other than vague impressions rather than specifics.
They can also say what became important to them during their studies and what they would like to have known beforehand.
They also know you pretty well and, let’s hope, care about you and want to try to give good advice.
Verdict: Okay on student life in general and on their university experience in particular but take what they say with a wheelbarrow of salt.
prospectuses
Accurate: ***
Comparative:
Comprehensive:
Detailed: **
Independent:
Understanding:
Problems: Universities’ prospectuses are sales documents, produced by the universities themselves and they should be taken with the best part of a Siberian salt mine.
The photos tend to be taken early on sunny Sunday mornings when there are no students cluttering up the place and they’ll try to crop out the chemical works in the background.
They provide almost no comparisons with anywhere else and, apart from spouting the same PR puff as every other prospectus, they don’t go into much detail about student life beyond the courses.
What they’re good for: The parts that aren’t busy selling tend to be the most accurate source of information about the university in question.
This means that prospectuses are the best resource for finding out exactly what courses are available, what each course will actually cover, how it will be taught and assessed and what you’ll have to do to get in.
Verdict: For course info and cold hard facts, prospectuses are a must. For all else, extreme scepticism is advised.
Comparative:
Comprehensive:
Detailed: **
Independent:
Understanding:
Problems: Universities’ prospectuses are sales documents, produced by the universities themselves and they should be taken with the best part of a Siberian salt mine.
The photos tend to be taken early on sunny Sunday mornings when there are no students cluttering up the place and they’ll try to crop out the chemical works in the background.
They provide almost no comparisons with anywhere else and, apart from spouting the same PR puff as every other prospectus, they don’t go into much detail about student life beyond the courses.
What they’re good for: The parts that aren’t busy selling tend to be the most accurate source of information about the university in question.
This means that prospectuses are the best resource for finding out exactly what courses are available, what each course will actually cover, how it will be taught and assessed and what you’ll have to do to get in.
Verdict: For course info and cold hard facts, prospectuses are a must. For all else, extreme scepticism is advised.
alternative prospectuses
Accurate: **
Comparative:
Comprehensive:
Detailed: ***
Independent:
Understanding: **
Problems: These are sometimes produced by the students’ union and the students who put them together usually have very limited knowledge of anything other than their own university.
As a result they tend to describe it as either the best in the world or the worst and rarely anything in between the two.
What they’re good for: The students’ own views of a university, however biased, are worth hearing and you can read a lot between the lines about the atmosphere, which otherwise is hard to pin down.
Verdict: Worthwhile (even the ones you have to pay for), once you’ve narrowed down your search to serious contenders.
Comparative:
Comprehensive:
Detailed: ***
Independent:
Understanding: **
Problems: These are sometimes produced by the students’ union and the students who put them together usually have very limited knowledge of anything other than their own university.
As a result they tend to describe it as either the best in the world or the worst and rarely anything in between the two.
What they’re good for: The students’ own views of a university, however biased, are worth hearing and you can read a lot between the lines about the atmosphere, which otherwise is hard to pin down.
Verdict: Worthwhile (even the ones you have to pay for), once you’ve narrowed down your search to serious contenders.
visits, open days & interviews
Accurate: ***
Comparative: **
Comprehensive: ***
Detailed: ***
Independent: ***
Understanding: ***
Problems: It’s difficult to know exactly where to go once you’re visiting and universities will often try to show you only their best parts. But there’s no point seeing the new cybernetics department if you want to do French.
Also, there’s not half as much point visiting one university as there is in visiting two. Only then can you start to make comparisons. However, you won’t get a proper idea until you’ve been to at least three. Four’s even better and, while you’re at it, you might as well make a point of going to any that might make it into the five on your UCAS form.
What they’re good for: Make sure you see the kind of accommodation you would be in, the department you’d be applying to, the students’ union and any specific facilities that matter to you especially.
A trip to the bar might even be in order and take the chance to chat to some regular students about what they think of the place. Even if they like it, you may not like them.
Remember: interviews are as much about you interviewing them as them interviewing you.
Verdict: If at all possible, go see for yourself any university you’re seriously considering. See if it passes your taste tests. So long as you know what you’re looking at, there’s no more reliable way of seeing if it’s the right university for you. (That even includes Push.)
Univisits
www.univisits.com
Univisits lays on tours of universities in the UK and Ireland. There are special tour packages or they can tailor one to suit your needs - this includes travel, accommodation and food. It's just like being a rock star...sort of.
Open Days
www.opendays.com
Bloody fantastic. It's basically just a calendar of university open days with a bit of advice around it, but it's a unique and valuable service.
Comparative: **
Comprehensive: ***
Detailed: ***
Independent: ***
Understanding: ***
Problems: It’s difficult to know exactly where to go once you’re visiting and universities will often try to show you only their best parts. But there’s no point seeing the new cybernetics department if you want to do French.
Also, there’s not half as much point visiting one university as there is in visiting two. Only then can you start to make comparisons. However, you won’t get a proper idea until you’ve been to at least three. Four’s even better and, while you’re at it, you might as well make a point of going to any that might make it into the five on your UCAS form.
What they’re good for: Make sure you see the kind of accommodation you would be in, the department you’d be applying to, the students’ union and any specific facilities that matter to you especially.
A trip to the bar might even be in order and take the chance to chat to some regular students about what they think of the place. Even if they like it, you may not like them.
Remember: interviews are as much about you interviewing them as them interviewing you.
Verdict: If at all possible, go see for yourself any university you’re seriously considering. See if it passes your taste tests. So long as you know what you’re looking at, there’s no more reliable way of seeing if it’s the right university for you. (That even includes Push.)
Univisits
www.univisits.com
Univisits lays on tours of universities in the UK and Ireland. There are special tour packages or they can tailor one to suit your needs - this includes travel, accommodation and food. It's just like being a rock star...sort of.
Open Days
www.opendays.com
Bloody fantastic. It's basically just a calendar of university open days with a bit of advice around it, but it's a unique and valuable service.
ucas rating
Accurate: ***
Comparative: **
Comprehensive: ***
Detailed: *
Independent: **
Understanding:
Problems: UCAS’s various publications, its website and helpline cover only courses, colleges and codes.
Strangely, UCAS’s independence is a bit of a handicap, because it means that, although it often seems they deal only in hard facts, in fact they deal only in official information provided by the universities. A very different thing.
What they’re good for: UCAS is very good on what courses are available where and what you’ll need to get in (especially their website — it’s not the easiest to use, but persist, there’s plenty of stuff in there). UCAS is essential, of course, for the application process itself and all the paperwork that has to fly all over the country. On these matters, they are very helpful and surprisingly efficient. (They’d be even better if their systems were simpler and they wrote instructions in plain English.)
Verdict: Good on what’s available where. Essential for the basic data and the process, but it ends there.
Comparative: **
Comprehensive: ***
Detailed: *
Independent: **
Understanding:
Problems: UCAS’s various publications, its website and helpline cover only courses, colleges and codes.
Strangely, UCAS’s independence is a bit of a handicap, because it means that, although it often seems they deal only in hard facts, in fact they deal only in official information provided by the universities. A very different thing.
What they’re good for: UCAS is very good on what courses are available where and what you’ll need to get in (especially their website — it’s not the easiest to use, but persist, there’s plenty of stuff in there). UCAS is essential, of course, for the application process itself and all the paperwork that has to fly all over the country. On these matters, they are very helpful and surprisingly efficient. (They’d be even better if their systems were simpler and they wrote instructions in plain English.)
Verdict: Good on what’s available where. Essential for the basic data and the process, but it ends there.
websites
Accurate:
Comparative: *
Comprehensive: *
Detailed: *
Independent:
Understanding:
Problems: Unless it’s a website from a reputable organisation, such as Push, UCAS, or NUS, you have to assume it was put together either by people who had something to market — as in the case of universities’ own websites — or who may not have got their facts right.
Most websites that cover a range of universities have obtained their information from someone else anyway, either by lifting it (in which case you’ve got to doubt not only the original research, but how accurately it was lifted) or by buying it in.
What they’re good for: University’s own websites are like more up-to-date and interactive versions of their prospectuses and are very useful to the same extent. The same goes for students’ unions’ websites as a more easily accessed way of getting the same information as in alternative prospectuses.
Other websites — if reputable — can be an excellent way of researching specific issues or aspects of student life. Skill’s website, for example, is very good for students with disabilities (www.skill.org.uk).
Verdict: As ever with the web, there’s a lot of hay in that stack, but a fair few silver needles too.
Comparative: *
Comprehensive: *
Detailed: *
Independent:
Understanding:
Problems: Unless it’s a website from a reputable organisation, such as Push, UCAS, or NUS, you have to assume it was put together either by people who had something to market — as in the case of universities’ own websites — or who may not have got their facts right.
Most websites that cover a range of universities have obtained their information from someone else anyway, either by lifting it (in which case you’ve got to doubt not only the original research, but how accurately it was lifted) or by buying it in.
What they’re good for: University’s own websites are like more up-to-date and interactive versions of their prospectuses and are very useful to the same extent. The same goes for students’ unions’ websites as a more easily accessed way of getting the same information as in alternative prospectuses.
Other websites — if reputable — can be an excellent way of researching specific issues or aspects of student life. Skill’s website, for example, is very good for students with disabilities (www.skill.org.uk).
Verdict: As ever with the web, there’s a lot of hay in that stack, but a fair few silver needles too.
multimedia & video prospectuses
Accurate: **
Comparative:
Comprehensive:
Detailed: *
Independent:
Understanding: **
Problems: Some universities provide prospectuses on video (through embedded clips or YouTube), but the main problem with most of them is that they’re so damn dull. TV’s a great medium and they could do a lot to show you what the university’s really like — but, no, usually it’s just a walking, talking version of the printed prospectus.
What they’re good for: If you can ignore the guff that the commentary usually spouts and focus on what the place actually looks like, it’s better than nothing. However, they’ve probably chosen a sunny day to shoot and they haven’t bothered to film the worst parts. To get a real idea, you have to visit.
Comparative:
Comprehensive:
Detailed: *
Independent:
Understanding: **
Problems: Some universities provide prospectuses on video (through embedded clips or YouTube), but the main problem with most of them is that they’re so damn dull. TV’s a great medium and they could do a lot to show you what the university’s really like — but, no, usually it’s just a walking, talking version of the printed prospectus.
What they’re good for: If you can ignore the guff that the commentary usually spouts and focus on what the place actually looks like, it’s better than nothing. However, they’ve probably chosen a sunny day to shoot and they haven’t bothered to film the worst parts. To get a real idea, you have to visit.
other
Various newspapers and magazines publish mainly second-hand material about universities, but all too often it’s just an excuse to sell ads. As with websites, rely only on the information if you know the source and you know that the source matches the six criteria.
However, around Clearing, the listings in The Guardian and The Independent in particular, are invaluable if you are tempted to submit yourself to that haphazard process.
At the same time the BBC usually does a series of genuinely helpful (if slightly self-consciously wacky) programmes and features across TV and radio stations (mostly BBC2, BBC Radio 1 and the various BBC digital channels). They also usually have a telephone helpline.
However, around Clearing, the listings in The Guardian and The Independent in particular, are invaluable if you are tempted to submit yourself to that haphazard process.
At the same time the BBC usually does a series of genuinely helpful (if slightly self-consciously wacky) programmes and features across TV and radio stations (mostly BBC2, BBC Radio 1 and the various BBC digital channels). They also usually have a telephone helpline.
choosing an oxbridge college
Oxbridge = Oxford and/or Cambridge
As with choosing a whole university, it’s no small deal to choose the right Oxbridge college. They might be right next door to each other, but they can differ radically and ending up at the wrong one can be as bad as turning up to a funeral dressed as Tinky Winky.
It’s a good idea to attend open days, study the college’s own prospectus and chat about the place with friends and people who’ve been there. Also, of course, read Push’s profiles of the individual colleges.
There’s also little point in applying unless you did brilliantly well at your GCSEs, are predicted top grades for your A Levels/Highers and have a range of interests as broad as a builder’s buttocks.
As with choosing a whole university, it’s no small deal to choose the right Oxbridge college. They might be right next door to each other, but they can differ radically and ending up at the wrong one can be as bad as turning up to a funeral dressed as Tinky Winky.
It’s a good idea to attend open days, study the college’s own prospectus and chat about the place with friends and people who’ve been there. Also, of course, read Push’s profiles of the individual colleges.
There’s also little point in applying unless you did brilliantly well at your GCSEs, are predicted top grades for your A Levels/Highers and have a range of interests as broad as a builder’s buttocks.
Oxbridge Differences
Apart from the course content and approach, other academic features vary too. Term lengths, for instance. Some universities have ten-week terms, but Oxford and Cambridge only have eight-weekers (although they expect quite a lot from students during their hols). Most universities, however, now have terms of fifteen weeks — but then they only have two a year and they call them ‘semesters’.
The idea of having two semesters (running September to February and February to July) is that their exams are split between the end of each, rather than bunched up in the summer. For students, it doesn’t feel all that different because there are the usual breaks (slap bang in the middle of a semester) for Christmas and Easter and, when the first semester ends, usually on a Friday, the new one starts the next Monday.
Oxford and Cambridge also differ from most of the rest because they’re collegiate, and much of the teaching is done within the college where students also live, eat, sleep and drink.
Durham, Kent, Lancaster and York are also collegiate universities, but the teaching is done in departments as it is in most universities. We say ‘most’ but, in fact, many don’t have departments at all — they have schools, faculties, institutes and probably other things besides. Sometimes it’s just the names for things that change, but often they do represent a slightly different way of going about things.
Among the things that the exact nature of the department might influence is your ability to chop and change courses, for example. It is not unknown for some students to apply deliberately for a course they don’t want, but at a university that they do, in the hope or expectation that, once they’ve got a whole leg in the door, they’ll be able to switch to their preferred course.
It’s a dangerous game and only to be recommended at universities that explicitly state that they’ll let people change courses (for the first few weeks at least). Stirling, for example, runs four-year courses where, put simply, you hardly have to commit yourself to studying any particular course for the first year.
Some universities outlaw such indecision — if you want to switch, you have to drop out and reapply with no promises, no guarantees.
The idea of having two semesters (running September to February and February to July) is that their exams are split between the end of each, rather than bunched up in the summer. For students, it doesn’t feel all that different because there are the usual breaks (slap bang in the middle of a semester) for Christmas and Easter and, when the first semester ends, usually on a Friday, the new one starts the next Monday.
Oxford and Cambridge also differ from most of the rest because they’re collegiate, and much of the teaching is done within the college where students also live, eat, sleep and drink.
Durham, Kent, Lancaster and York are also collegiate universities, but the teaching is done in departments as it is in most universities. We say ‘most’ but, in fact, many don’t have departments at all — they have schools, faculties, institutes and probably other things besides. Sometimes it’s just the names for things that change, but often they do represent a slightly different way of going about things.
Among the things that the exact nature of the department might influence is your ability to chop and change courses, for example. It is not unknown for some students to apply deliberately for a course they don’t want, but at a university that they do, in the hope or expectation that, once they’ve got a whole leg in the door, they’ll be able to switch to their preferred course.
It’s a dangerous game and only to be recommended at universities that explicitly state that they’ll let people change courses (for the first few weeks at least). Stirling, for example, runs four-year courses where, put simply, you hardly have to commit yourself to studying any particular course for the first year.
Some universities outlaw such indecision — if you want to switch, you have to drop out and reapply with no promises, no guarantees.
Applying to oxbridge
As if there weren't enough bits of paper and deadlines to remember, the application process for Oxbridge is slightly different from other UCAS institutions.
From 2009, if you're applying to Cambridge, you'll need to submit your UCAS form by the 15th October. After that, you'll need to fill out another form called an SAQ which will ask you about stuff that didn't make it onto the UCAS form.
For Oxford, not only do you have to fill out a UCAS form, but you’ve got another form to wrestle with for your chosen college – Oxford and Cambridge Universities are both made up of about 30 colleges each and candidates need to choose and apply to the individual colleges, which pick who they want for themselves.
Both the UCAS form and the Oxbridge form need to be in by October 15th.
From 2009, if you're applying to Cambridge, you'll need to submit your UCAS form by the 15th October. After that, you'll need to fill out another form called an SAQ which will ask you about stuff that didn't make it onto the UCAS form.
For Oxford, not only do you have to fill out a UCAS form, but you’ve got another form to wrestle with for your chosen college – Oxford and Cambridge Universities are both made up of about 30 colleges each and candidates need to choose and apply to the individual colleges, which pick who they want for themselves.
Both the UCAS form and the Oxbridge form need to be in by October 15th.
THE FORMS
Fill in the UCAS form in the same way, but remember it’s not possible to apply to both Cambridge and Oxford because it causes a quantum disruption in the space time continuum or something, which can only be repaired by a thing called an Organ scholarship (insert your own joke here). Learn about these organs from the college prospectuses.
OXFORD
If you're applying to Oxford, you'll need to get hold of the Oxbridge form from school, college or a careers office. It needs to be returned directly to your chosen college or, if you’re making an open application (the Oxbridge equivalent of waving flashing some thigh in front of the colleges saying, 'Come and get me, big boy'), it needs to go to the university’s central admissions office. By the way, make sure you’re not given last year’s form – that does happen.You can only pick one college, so choose carefully.
There’s a place to write another personal statement, but since they’ll see your UCAS form and they’re looking for something extra-sexy about you, don’t just copy out the personal statement from that.
CAMBRIDGE
If you're applying to Cambridge, you'll need to fill in two bits of (virtual) paper:
- The UCAS form
- An SAQ (Supplementary Application Questionnaire)
The UCAS form works in the same way as it does for every other university, except that you'll need to send it off by the 15th October. So far, so simple. Here's where it gets complicated - once UCAS have your form, you'll get an email telling you to fill out an SAQ (Supplementary Application Questionnaire) online. The point of the SAQ is that you get to say all the stuff there wasn't room to say on the UCAS form - things like the marks you've got for AS or A level modules and topics you've covered already. The email you'll get will have a link to the online SAQ and a deadline for when it needs to be done by.
If the Uni likes the cut of your gib, you'll get an invite to interview in November / December, and the decision happens after that.
HOW TO APPLY THROUGH THE ACCESS SCHEME
The Cambridge Special Access Scheme (CSAS) is designed for students whose education's hit a few bumps along the road - in otherwords, for anyone whose schooling has been disrupted or disadvantaged in any way. It's also meant to draw applicants who might be the first in their family to go to university.
If you're applying through this scheme you'll need two bits of (virtual) paper:
The UCAS form needs to be filled out and sent in by the 15th October. A teacher / tutor should fill in the CSAS form and send it to your chosen College, or to the Cambridge Admissions Office if you're making an open application. Get a CSAS form here.
If you're applying through this scheme you'll need two bits of (virtual) paper:
- The UCAS form
- A CSAS form
The UCAS form needs to be filled out and sent in by the 15th October. A teacher / tutor should fill in the CSAS form and send it to your chosen College, or to the Cambridge Admissions Office if you're making an open application. Get a CSAS form here.
APPLYING AS AN OVERSEAS STUDENT
If you're living in a country outside the EU, you'll need to complete a Cambridge Overseas Application Form (COAF) as well as a UCAS form. Get a COAF form here. The form needs to be sent to the Admissions Office, if you're making an open application, or to the college you're applying for, by the 15th October.
INTERVIEWS AND DECISIONS
Interviews for Oxford happen in November, while Cambridge hold them in December. If they’re interested, they will almost certainly ask you along. Very few people get offers from Oxbridge without interviews. In fact, expect to have to go to at least two: one with an admissions tutor, broadly responsible for checking you out personally, and one with a departmental tutor, who’ll probably focus more on your brains and commitment to your chosen course, or even pit you against other applicants in a fight to the death, (otherwise known as a mock-tutorial).
Be prepared to answer questions about your subject. At Oxford, there’s often a written test as part of the interview, and, depending on your chosen course and the Oxbridge college, you may have to supply a portfolio of your schoolwork. Some schools often have a selection of sample interview questions to help you.
Some colleges at Cambridge may set an exam paper after the A Levels (known as STEP papers). Just what you need - more exams. You’re most likely to get stung with these for maths and science courses, but each college has a different policy. Check the prospectus.
If they’re going to, Oxford will offer you a place by Christmas and Cambridge by January and they'll both write to you directly. You’ll also hear their decision through UCAS.
Be prepared to answer questions about your subject. At Oxford, there’s often a written test as part of the interview, and, depending on your chosen course and the Oxbridge college, you may have to supply a portfolio of your schoolwork. Some schools often have a selection of sample interview questions to help you.
Some colleges at Cambridge may set an exam paper after the A Levels (known as STEP papers). Just what you need - more exams. You’re most likely to get stung with these for maths and science courses, but each college has a different policy. Check the prospectus.
If they’re going to, Oxford will offer you a place by Christmas and Cambridge by January and they'll both write to you directly. You’ll also hear their decision through UCAS.
POOLING
If the college that interviews you decides that you don't quite cut their mustard, but are still a pretty enticing prospect, they'll have you Pooled. This is a sort of miniature Clearing system, whereby other colleges that don't have enough applicants can cherry-pick the best of the floaters and drag them along for yet more interviews. The chances of getting a place from Pooling are slim, but, hey, hope springs eternal.
Don’t apply to both Oxford and Cambridge. They don’t like that, which is a bit sniffy and pretentious, but that’s Oxbridge for you. There are exceptions to the rule though. It’s not such a faux pas if, for example, you’ve already got a degree or if you’re applying to Homerton College in Cambridge to do a BEd. Oh, and if you’re thinking of Oxbridge, there’s a whole other application to fill in as well.
university setups
The following are the classic university set-ups. They’re not all mutually exclusive and most universities aren’t entirely one type or another
Campus Universities
‘Campus’ is one of those bits of jargon everyone assumes you know because it’s so straightforward, but that’s no help till you know it.
Even schools have a ‘campus’ — it’s simply the site or precinct on which it’s based. In the case of schools, that’s usually not much more than teaching and common rooms, offices, a cafeteria, a hall and perhaps a gym, maybe a few playing fields.
In the case of a campus university, there’s likely to be all that — multiplied in size — as well as probably most of the following: student accommodation, bars, cafés, restaurants, mini-supermarkets, libraries, computer centres, launderettes, travel agents, night clubs, bookshops, banks, a post office, a sports hall and playing fields, a newspaper and radio station, concert venues, a theatre, a swimming pool and so on.
Not every campus has all of the above — far from it. If something’s particularly important to you, well that’s part of the decision-making process. Check what the campus has to offer before you end up living there.
At most campus universities, most of the buildings were thrown up all at once. and have been added to ever since. Most (but not all) were started in the 1960s when they were opening universities like crisp packets. As a result, they often rely heavily on the sixties’ optimistic enthusiasm for concrete with landscaped greenery — even a lake, if you’re lucky.
Sometimes, it works: a harmony of Bauhausian simplicity of form coupled with… whatever.
But sometimes, it don’t work.
Campuses have the advantages of being convenient with everything within easy reach — friends and facilities, work, rest and play. They often have a stronger community atmosphere than non-campus universities and can feel like a heady little world of their own — less dusty than more traditional universities, but just as separate from the daily realities of most people’s working lives.
Campus universities have even been the inspiration for a whole genre of novel-writing (called, unsurprisingly, ‘The Campus Novel’ — check out the works of Malcolm Bradbury and David Lodge if fiction’s your thing).
But the closed world of the campus can also be a disadvantage because, to some people, it can feel like sharing the Big Brother house with 10,000 housemates, everyone living on top of each other with nowhere else to go.
Of course, there always is somewhere else to go… off campus. If it’s in or near a town, that’s no problem and, indeed, most students at some point live ‘out’ (ie. live in housing not owned by the university, and maybe some distance from the campus). But, of course, living out may mean the benefits of having everything within easy reach become less important.
Campuses often have accommodation for thousands of students, but often there are relatively few places. When picking a campus university, you should not only check what’s on campus, but what’s not — and whether you’re likely to be on the list.
A few examples: Birmingham, East Anglia, Nottingham and Sussex.
Civic Universities
Often a bit older (founded before the 1930s), civic universities are based in a town. Often they’re on a campus in the city centre, such as Newcastle — no green expanses, but only a short step from the shops. Or there’s Manchester, and Manchester Metropolitan, all civic universities on what’s basically the same super-campus — the largest educational complex in Western Europe.
But many civic universities are made up of individual buildings dotted about town or in small groups. That’s no problem if it’s a small city and you can get around them easily enough — but if you’re in London, say and the different parts of the university are right across town, well, then you’re in multi-site university territory.
Being at a civic university means it’s more important to like your host city. It’s where you’ll spend your time and your money. If you get it right, it can offer the best of both worlds — the cosy community of student life with the wider horizons (and opportunities) of the real world.
It’s also more important at a civic university that your host city likes you. In some places, students are about as popular as an undertaker in a terminal ward. There are cities where it’s so bad that student-bashing has been declared a local sport.
Most places, fortunately, aren’t that bad and there are plenty of towns where students (and their money) are welcomed into the bosom (and pockets) of the local community, either as honoured guests or as part of the city’s heritage (and economy). It’s what they call ‘town/gown relations’.
A few examples: Bristol, Edinburgh and Newcastle.
Greenfield Universities
‘Greenfield’ universities are usually based on campus — the ‘greenfield’ bit only really means that they are, if not in the middle of nowhere, at best only on the edge of somewhere.
Keele, for example, is a greenfield university. It’s also a village with a population about the size of a cinema audience. Nearly two-thirds of students live on campus — a high proportion that makes for a cosy little family — the 37% who don’t live in have to find somewhere to live that’s not too far away and then get back to the campus for lectures and stuff.
There are advantages to a bit of remoteness, though. First off, there’s the effect on the atmosphere. Greenfield campus universities usually have a get-away-from-it-all attitude. Then there are the different opportunities (for sport, for example) that come with the countryside and all that available space.
A few examples: Keele, Lancaster and Warwick.
Keele, for example, is a greenfield university. It’s also a village with a population about the size of a cinema audience. Nearly two-thirds of students live on campus — a high proportion that makes for a cosy little family — the 37% who don’t live in have to find somewhere to live that’s not too far away and then get back to the campus for lectures and stuff.
There are advantages to a bit of remoteness, though. First off, there’s the effect on the atmosphere. Greenfield campus universities usually have a get-away-from-it-all attitude. Then there are the different opportunities (for sport, for example) that come with the countryside and all that available space.
A few examples: Keele, Lancaster and Warwick.
Multi-site Institutions
‘Multi-site’ means exactly what it says on the tin: there’s more than one site. Although within the definition, it can take many forms.
For example, there’s the University of Buckingham: just two sites, barely a mile apart.
There’s the University of Ulster: four distinct campuses separated by more than 60 miles.
The University of Durham: a collegiate university with a much smaller satellite campus in Stockton, a long way away not only geographically (it’s 21 miles south of Durham), but also socially, academically and in every other sense. Stockton’s only really part of Durham University in the way that Hawaii’s part of the United States (although there’s a lot less sunshine in Stockton).
Or there’s Westminster: a mix of three mini campuses and numerous other buildings dotted about central London, with another campus nine miles away in Harrow in north-west London.
Multi-site universities often start as several separate institutions (usually including at least one former polytechnic) which have merged or taken each other over. Sometimes multi-siters crop up because someone once had a half-baked plan to found a university and just bought a bunch of properties without giving any real thought to how the whole thing would work.
Some multi-site universities, however, have more respectable reasons for their fractured existence (although many have come up with these reasons after the event). For example, they may have a stated intention to provide a higher education to local people, living at home in an area not sufficiently served by other universities.
Northumbria University, for instance, has two sites in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and another in Carlisle. They’re 15 and 57 miles away respectively, nowhere near the main sites or any other universities — but that’s the point. The inhabitants of Carlisle can now do business studies in their own backyard. (Shortly, the Carlisle site will become part of the University of Central Lancashire instead, but the point’s the same.)
Fair enough, but all this has an effect on the atmosphere.
Splitting up a university changes the feel of the place. Sites often feel like separate institutions. You might have applied to a big university, but find yourself stuck somewhere smaller than your school.
The university may have fantastic bars, libraries and facilities, but they’re no good to you if it’s too much trouble to get to them. It’s desperately important when applying to multi-site institutions to work out not only which site your department is based at, but also where you might be living, where those bars are, and so on. Also check out how often you’re going to have to trek from site to site and how inconvenient (and expensive) that’s going to be.
Few multi-site institutions manage to offer great facilities at every site. If most of the students are local part-time mature students, say, that may be no big deal to them — they’d rather swap some of the flashier stuff for the benefit of having it on their doorstep. But if it does matter to you, gen up on the detail before applying.
A few other examples: Brighton, De Montfort, East London, Middlesex, London Metropolitan and Staffordshire.
For example, there’s the University of Buckingham: just two sites, barely a mile apart.
There’s the University of Ulster: four distinct campuses separated by more than 60 miles.
The University of Durham: a collegiate university with a much smaller satellite campus in Stockton, a long way away not only geographically (it’s 21 miles south of Durham), but also socially, academically and in every other sense. Stockton’s only really part of Durham University in the way that Hawaii’s part of the United States (although there’s a lot less sunshine in Stockton).
Or there’s Westminster: a mix of three mini campuses and numerous other buildings dotted about central London, with another campus nine miles away in Harrow in north-west London.
Multi-site universities often start as several separate institutions (usually including at least one former polytechnic) which have merged or taken each other over. Sometimes multi-siters crop up because someone once had a half-baked plan to found a university and just bought a bunch of properties without giving any real thought to how the whole thing would work.
Some multi-site universities, however, have more respectable reasons for their fractured existence (although many have come up with these reasons after the event). For example, they may have a stated intention to provide a higher education to local people, living at home in an area not sufficiently served by other universities.
Northumbria University, for instance, has two sites in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and another in Carlisle. They’re 15 and 57 miles away respectively, nowhere near the main sites or any other universities — but that’s the point. The inhabitants of Carlisle can now do business studies in their own backyard. (Shortly, the Carlisle site will become part of the University of Central Lancashire instead, but the point’s the same.)
Fair enough, but all this has an effect on the atmosphere.
Splitting up a university changes the feel of the place. Sites often feel like separate institutions. You might have applied to a big university, but find yourself stuck somewhere smaller than your school.
The university may have fantastic bars, libraries and facilities, but they’re no good to you if it’s too much trouble to get to them. It’s desperately important when applying to multi-site institutions to work out not only which site your department is based at, but also where you might be living, where those bars are, and so on. Also check out how often you’re going to have to trek from site to site and how inconvenient (and expensive) that’s going to be.
Few multi-site institutions manage to offer great facilities at every site. If most of the students are local part-time mature students, say, that may be no big deal to them — they’d rather swap some of the flashier stuff for the benefit of having it on their doorstep. But if it does matter to you, gen up on the detail before applying.
A few other examples: Brighton, De Montfort, East London, Middlesex, London Metropolitan and Staffordshire.
Collegiate Universities
Oxford and Cambridge — known collectively as ‘Oxbridge’ (maybe ‘Camford’ never caught on) — are the two most famous universities in the world and they’re both collegiate, along with Durham, Kent, Lancaster and York. Officially, London University is also collegiate (but in its own unique way) and the University of Wales too (but not so as you’d notice).
A collegiate system means that the university acts as an umbrella organisation for smaller educational establishments called colleges. Each university operates the system differently and at some (Kent and York in particular), it’s so weak the colleges are not much more than suped-up halls of residence.
The big difference, however, is that you only belong to a hall of residence while you’re living there, but with a college, you’re a member for life (or at least for as long as you’re a student). That gives you access to the college facilities which — as well as accommodation — usually include bars, entertainments, sports, welfare, libraries, computers and student representation. At non-collegiate universities, these things would all happen at a university-wide (or at least a site-wide level), but might be spread a little thinner as a result.
At Oxbridge and Lancaster, the academics tend to be attached to particular colleges and most teaching is done with your college chums by a college tutor rather than in your subject department or faculty.
Colleges tend to inspire some students to a kind of tribal loyalty, competing against other colleges in sports, debating, drama and all sorts. Being small communities they’re often close-knit and supportive — claustrophobic even — and certain colleges are often identified with certain types year after year: arty radicos, chinless Sloanes, rugger buggers, Christians, and so on.
Of course, the reality behind the stereotypes depends on the size of the colleges and the number of them.
Oxford and Cambridge have about 30 colleges each, mostly of between 100 and 600 students. At Durham, they’ve got 16 and on average they’re about twice that size. (By the way, they’re the only universities that still have any single sex colleges and Durham’s last is about to go mixed.) The other universities have fewer colleges and so naturally, most of them are a bit bigger.
For most students, college life is really supportive. It’s not just the better amenities they usually get, but that they feel they belong somewhere.
However, if life on a campus can get a bit claustrophobic, then life in a college can be like being trapped in a lift with a bunch of Sun reporters. You can’t fart without everyone knowing and commenting on what you had for dinner.
Some students complain colleges are too much like school. They cosset students so much, it can cramp their style.
However, one advantage of collegiate universities is that, if you don’t like it, you can always get out and pursue your interests on a university or department level. For instance, if the bar in college gets boring, not only are there bars in everyone else’s colleges, but there’s also usually a bar at the students’ union. Similarly, if you want to get into student journalism, but the college magazine is just a small-time gossip rag, you can get involved in the university-wide newspaper.
It’s the best of both worlds: you can choose your main sphere — college or university. Or department. Okay, the best of three worlds. Having said that though, facilities and organisations at university level or in departments may not be quite as good as they might be at some other universities because they’re more than compensated for in the colleges. For example, York University’s student’s union has no building of its own.
Colleges
At collegiate universities, if students live in, they live in their colleges.
Even within a college though, there may be a number of accommodation options ranging from blocks that look suspiciously like halls to rooms grouped in, well, shared flats.
Colleges, however, also have some unusual arrangements of their own. For instance, apart from the unique architecture of Oxbridge colleges, some have ‘sets’ — pairs of connected rooms so you’re kind of sharing a room, but not quite. Then of course, there are the rooms in the castle at Durham University.
Virtual Universities and distance learning
Virtual university may not be the first thing that springs to mind when you think of getting a degree, but it’s hugely popular for many reasons.
The Open University, with over 170,000 students currently enrolled, is the largest academic institution in the UK and definitely not to be sneered at. So many students are able to enrol at one time because of the flexibility it offers in terms of courses (hundreds), locations (limitless, even abroad), and schedules (well, open).
It’s a kind of virtual university in where, apart from annual week-long summer schools, occasional seminars in local study centres, all the teaching is done over the internet through video lectures, interactive seminars, online resources and books. Instead of face to face, tutor and lecturer support comes through email and Skype.
Whether it’s as good a way of learning depends on the person— it works for some— but there’s no way you can help yourself to a big slice of student life if everyone’s stuck in front of computers or videos.
Obviously, the effect on atmosphere is out of this world — in the sense that in space, there is no atmosphere. If that’s what you want (or even if it’s not), that’s what you’ll get. The plus side is it can work out a cheaper option and offers great flexibility, specifically for mature students who have commitments to work around.
The open college of equine studies is another example of a distance learning provider.
The Open University, with over 170,000 students currently enrolled, is the largest academic institution in the UK and definitely not to be sneered at. So many students are able to enrol at one time because of the flexibility it offers in terms of courses (hundreds), locations (limitless, even abroad), and schedules (well, open).
It’s a kind of virtual university in where, apart from annual week-long summer schools, occasional seminars in local study centres, all the teaching is done over the internet through video lectures, interactive seminars, online resources and books. Instead of face to face, tutor and lecturer support comes through email and Skype.
Whether it’s as good a way of learning depends on the person— it works for some— but there’s no way you can help yourself to a big slice of student life if everyone’s stuck in front of computers or videos.
Obviously, the effect on atmosphere is out of this world — in the sense that in space, there is no atmosphere. If that’s what you want (or even if it’s not), that’s what you’ll get. The plus side is it can work out a cheaper option and offers great flexibility, specifically for mature students who have commitments to work around.
The open college of equine studies is another example of a distance learning provider.
Higher education Colleges
So, university might not be for you or your life set-up. Perhaps the idea of studying for three or more years all at once doesn't get your juices flowing. Not to worry – there's a whole heap of other options to study a foundation degree or a degree at a college. The thing to look for is that 'higher education' part.
If you want to stay relatively local for whatever reason, then a degree via college can be a great option for you. Let's say you have a full-time job and/or a family to raise. Maybe you're living at home, and want to fit a degree course into your existing (and busy) schedule. If this is you, something close to home can be a really effective way of juggling everything and giving your degree the time it will need.
Colleges, just like universities, can be really flexible with accommodating how (and when) you learn. For example, some colleges offer online courses, part-time courses and short taster courses which you can undertake. These can then be converted into a HNC or HND or foundation course (the first or second year of a degree).
You can convert a HNC, HND or foundation into a full degree at a lot of places, if you ever felt ready for that. Or you can just go ahead and complete a full degree course from the very start.
Higher education colleges can be just as big as universities in terms of student numbers, with 1,000s there each day. Or they might be a lot smaller than most universities, which floats peoples' boats too.
For example, a lot of Art, Drama or Music Colleges are associated with a bigger university and can award degrees for their courses. They might be much smaller however, with class sizes of 10-30, instead of university courses that might have over 100 people turning up to certain lectures and seminars.
You may still have lectures and seminars at a higher education college, so it is worth thinking about exactly what you want from the college experience.
These are all questions you'll want to ask yourself if you're going into higher education, whether that's at a university or a college.
Colleges can offer a host of subjects that are sometimes more practical than academic, or at least a real mix of the two.
Traditional universities can be more focused on the academic side (knowledge, not necessarily vocational, practical skills) whereas colleges can offer more specifically job-related degree courses. These may have facilities related to your course that can be just as good – if not better – than some universities.
College class sizes can really differ, and it depends on the course you choose to go. No two colleges are the same just like no two universities are the same.
It's best to contact your local college and meet with someone from your desired course who can show you the site, facilities, the people you'd be learning from, and the structure of the course (as well as the ways you'll be assessed).
Drowning in a sea of shiny prospectuses and farfetched alumni claims? Wish you knew about more HE colleges in your local area, and not just what you’ve heard from your mates? Have a look at the Which? finder for unis and colleges - they’ll help you cut through the mayhem.
If you want to stay relatively local for whatever reason, then a degree via college can be a great option for you. Let's say you have a full-time job and/or a family to raise. Maybe you're living at home, and want to fit a degree course into your existing (and busy) schedule. If this is you, something close to home can be a really effective way of juggling everything and giving your degree the time it will need.
Colleges, just like universities, can be really flexible with accommodating how (and when) you learn. For example, some colleges offer online courses, part-time courses and short taster courses which you can undertake. These can then be converted into a HNC or HND or foundation course (the first or second year of a degree).
You can convert a HNC, HND or foundation into a full degree at a lot of places, if you ever felt ready for that. Or you can just go ahead and complete a full degree course from the very start.
Higher education colleges can be just as big as universities in terms of student numbers, with 1,000s there each day. Or they might be a lot smaller than most universities, which floats peoples' boats too.
For example, a lot of Art, Drama or Music Colleges are associated with a bigger university and can award degrees for their courses. They might be much smaller however, with class sizes of 10-30, instead of university courses that might have over 100 people turning up to certain lectures and seminars.
You may still have lectures and seminars at a higher education college, so it is worth thinking about exactly what you want from the college experience.
- What matters to you?
- How do you want to learn?
- How do you want to be assessed?
- How flexible is the course around your existing commitments? How much contact time with you have with the course leaders?
- Will leaders be there to guide you through your modules and assessments? Will they be available in tech-savvy ways such as Skype, FaceTime and online videos, as well as face-to-face?
- Is the college easy (and relatively cheap) to get to each week?
- Will they support you if you have specific needs such as a mental or physical disability?
- Is there a bursary or hardship fund available to help you study if, based on your circumstances, you'd find it difficult compared to others?
These are all questions you'll want to ask yourself if you're going into higher education, whether that's at a university or a college.
Colleges can offer a host of subjects that are sometimes more practical than academic, or at least a real mix of the two.
Traditional universities can be more focused on the academic side (knowledge, not necessarily vocational, practical skills) whereas colleges can offer more specifically job-related degree courses. These may have facilities related to your course that can be just as good – if not better – than some universities.
College class sizes can really differ, and it depends on the course you choose to go. No two colleges are the same just like no two universities are the same.
It's best to contact your local college and meet with someone from your desired course who can show you the site, facilities, the people you'd be learning from, and the structure of the course (as well as the ways you'll be assessed).
Drowning in a sea of shiny prospectuses and farfetched alumni claims? Wish you knew about more HE colleges in your local area, and not just what you’ve heard from your mates? Have a look at the Which? finder for unis and colleges - they’ll help you cut through the mayhem.
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