Any Ideas - daughter had 4 rejections

G-G_4

Good luck to your daughter.. if she has the motivation and the want to do well then she will do it, no matter where she studies..

All the best x

digsby202

This is my first post , so I am a bit nervous!
This thread caught my eye having been through the whole Uni application process 2 years ago.

My daughter is studying English, at Cambridge she applied with 4 predicated A's in English (language), History, Economics and Maths. She was luckily accepted for all her other choices (Warwick, Durham, York, Bristol, St. Andrews), and some useful advice she was given is the Personal Statement is all important. What seems to matter is the whole thing tying together with links between subject applied, the passion for that subject and extra cur. activities.
They seem to want 4 straight A's now and the diversification between English and Maths is important. A lot of her fellow English students had a couple of Arts subjects but one non-arts subject ( Science, Maths ) , physics seemed to be a popular choice. She was told by one of her tutors that this shows a logic mind set which can be applied to English.
I do hope this helps. My advice would be for her to take a gap year and re-apply, using the gap year doing something connected with her subject of choice.

Good Luck x

bestpud

I haven't used ucas extra or clearing so this may not be relevent!

But assuming you still need to submit a personal statement, and you can change the original one, is it worth you getting your dd's checked somewhere other than her school?

I agree she has been given appalling guidance. It is general practice to make an insurance application for a start. But worse than that, it was little short of madness to apply for places with higher entrance criteria than she is predicted to meet!

Given all that, I'm wondering how far you should rely on their word that her personal statement is great?

Out of interest, how is your dd coping with this situation? I hope she's ok.

poet123

I think that would be a very good idea.

Colleges are hard pressed at UCAS application time and witht the best will in the world some personal statements which are good, but not exceptional,will get passed through.

As a tutor I regularly see personal statements about to go forward which contain spelling and grammatical errors. Sometimes pupils do not have their statements checked as they are on the last minute with their applications. So it is worthwhile either starting again or at the very least tweaking the statement.

Good luck.

Also the calibre of a personal statement is subjective,and what one tutor deems good, would be mediocre to another.

Janeyjaz

Thank you once again for the advice, my daughter is finding it difficult at the moment, I have to say that as far as I know she had no advice from school about what Universities she should apply to, for financial reasons I would prefer that she did not take a gap year, as she gets EMA this year and will get a small amount of help if she goes to University this year, but at the moment she is convinced that she will not be going anywhere, though does also talk about working for a charity in America - which I am not keen on her undertaking, it's a charity in Florida and helps people who self harm.

freebie_junkie

Oldernotwiser wrote: »

I'm very pleased that this worked for you but as another qualified Careers Adviser I think that this is probably some of the worst advice I've ever read! I'm afraid that Bolton has the most appalling reputation and would not enhance someone's career plans in journalism one iota. I cannot understand how someone who "loves English with a passion" wouldn't love studying it at a higher level. The fact that you hated the unit you did at Bolton is hardly a recommendation for English courses at new universities; quite the opposite, I would have thought.

Well, I got onto the PGDE course, I achieved a 2:1 and I am now making money from my writing and performance poetry- what did I do wrong?!

freebie_junkie

poet123 wrote: »

Bolton has a terrible reputation,:eek: and one of the highest drop out rates in the country. I hope that when you leave academia and venture into the real world you do not regret this choice. Where you study does have an impact on how prospective employers view you.

Some of the older "red brick" unis also do the course you mention. Salford, has a much better reputation for this particular course for example but only do Sept intake as far as I know.

Well it's not affected my career at all ta very much, at the moment I'm turning down work as I'm so busy and I have scores more work lined up for when I finish my post-grad. I've worked for myself for the past 2 years and will continue to do so, so my employer doesn't mind either way!- by the way in case you think that I'm unemployable, my placement college has also offered me a full-time job for after I finish but I turned it down as it's not what I want to do. I didn't go straight from college to uni, I've had a variety of jobs, I very much understand the 'real world' and currently do live in it, thanks.

As far as slagging off Bolton goes, I had a wonderful time on my degree being taught by actual professionals who are currently working in my field, and I also made a lot of contacts whilst on my degree that I use now. Have you studied there?

Almo

My brother studied Politics and Economics, changing from History and Economics. I studied Linguistics, having started out on Speech Therapy - she may well change her mind once she gets to uni!

On this note, I know of several unis that allow a range of subjects to be taken in the first year, provided a certain number of credits are achieved in the 'major' subject. Provided you have completed sufficient credits in an alternative subject, you have the option to change degrees after your first year. I found that very useful and it certainly prevented many students from dropping out and starting again. If your daughter is interested in English, but also journalism, and various other things, perhaps she should investigate doing a joint honours. A degree in English doesn't give her an awful lot to write about once she's graduated. My brother is a journalist with a very prestigious magazine, and didn't do a journalism course. He did however do lots of work experience and then get the job via an internship.

I think, were I in her shoes, I would get my head down and do my best for my results then sit back and weigh up my options. There are scores of English graduates out there; she'll be facing a lot of competition if she goes down this route single honours. If she takes a gap year there are plenty of opportunities for her to earn money and support herself. In addition to this, if she really wants to do journalism I would suggest she looks at the BBC's work experience vacancies, and also applies to each and every local publication you have for work experience. While at uni she should try and write for the uni newspaper. She could also look at a stint in France on a gap year, perhaps publishing a blog about her time there or even seeing if any of the higher education supplements would be interested in publishing articles (The Telegraph published a backpacker's articles some years ago).

I seem to have rambled somewhat, sorry. I hate the way that UCAS is so stressful. Please encourage her to focus on her grades and deal with the fallout later.

PS, I would echo what has been said previously that you should research the department not just the uni. I went to a fairly good red brick uni who were exceptional in the area I studied. However, I do believe that overall a good uni is slightly better than a good department in an ok uni - particularly in English!

Oldernotwiser

freebie_junkie wrote: »

Well, I got onto the PGDE course, I achieved a 2:1 and I am now making money from my writing and performance poetry- what did I do wrong?!

I didn't mean to be critical of your choices - I said that I was pleased that it worked for you. However, you're not really a typical case, I think. Firstly, you're obviously very dyslexic and the new universities are often excellent for students with learning difficulties as they have more experience of their needs. Secondly, being a professional poet is quite an unusual career choice and is by no means typical of most students' career aspirations. Thirdly, in your other career of teaching adult literacy your having overcome your own difficulties in this area will have been a bonus in applying for work as you will have skills and experience that someone without learning difficulties won't have. (I used to teach adult literacy and although I wasn't bad at it I sometimes had difficulties in understanding students' problems as I was someone who'd never had problems in this area and, in fact, could read before starting school!) In this sort of work, having gone to a highly academic institution could even be seen as a negative point.

I was critical of your advice to other students who might be aiming for more traditional paths. Journalism is incredibly competitive and I think it's completely blinkered to think that someone from Bolton would be likely to have the same success as someone from Oxbridge or the more prestigious redbrick universities. I also think that you have no idea of the differences between journalism training and a creative writing course.

Bright students with traditional career aims in competitive areas need to go to either the most prestigious university they can get into or else a new university which specialises in a particular vocational area and has an excellent reputation in that field. Unfortunately, in the real world, not all universities are equal and those of us who advise students need to be aware of this and not peddle the politically correct line that all institutions are equally good.

(Sorry about the rant; I feel very strongly about this!)

freebie_junkie

Oldernotwiser- I am currently sat in the Bolton Uni canteen with both a Creative Writing BA vet and a fellow PGDE student who did he degree elsewhere. We are all of the unanimous opinion that Bolton is an excellent place to study, we are all mature students with copius life experience and we all have previous teaching experience (including in other Unis) so we can also see this agument from the other side. We are of the opinion that if you are actually 'bright' it really doesn't matter what Uni you attend. If your comments were supposed to suggest that dyslexic students are not bright, I can assure you that we have above average IQs in the majority of cases.