Well D22 is just a junior now, so fingers crossed that by Sept 2022 the pandemic will be under control. Right now I feel like the UK (and esp Scotland) is safer in all ways than the US.
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Think through how often youâll be able to afford to have her come home. Right now sheâll want to come home âneverâ because sheâll want to spend breaks traveling with friends. Reality is that she WILL want to come home at some point-- fares are very cheap right now because demand is so low, but if Covid is under control, that means the fares will be back to normal as well.
Think through work experience- if she needs to work summers to help cover expenses, sheâs got to anticipate when/how to look for a job back home.
Think through post-grad opportunities- internships and the like, how to figure that out. Back in our day, you could interview for jobs second semester of senior year with nothing on your resume besides working in the cafeteria and being a cashier during the summer at a grocery store. Nowadays, the internships can be make or break.
Think through how youâd all handle a medical emergency- support on the ground? Who might be within driving distance? In my own immediate family, the kids ended up with a broken arm, appendicitis, pneumonia severe enough that campus health services said âyou go home, or you get admitted to the hospital, we canât take care of you hereâ, emergency abdominal surgery for a fluke condition.
âSafe in all waysâ is a relative term when itâs your own kid!!!
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Yes it is MY kid!
Medical issues, etc, are all things that could be a problem if she was in school in California, too, as weâre in NC. Itâs a plane ride away either way. As I mentioned up thread we have a neighbor who just graduated from Trinity and absolutely loved her experience including spending a year abroad in Moscow. Life is too short to be scared of what ifs.
Not worried about internships (sheâs studying Creative Writing, not finance or anything). I think studying in the UK would be a fabulous opportunity and I am definitely on board with her going there if she wants to, qualifies, and we can afford it.
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Interesting that Aberystwyth came up on your radar, I know it for IR but not much else. A friend of mine did undergrad there. From what I understand, itâs a lovely town, but it is quite isolated. Maybe not the best choice for an overseas student from that perspective.
I donât think I saw you mention Newcastle? I understand they have a BA in creative writing (SIL did postgrad in it there). Iâm not sure how competitive it is.
On medical. Yes itâs scary if something happens far away. Imo itâs a little less scary when your student can be on NHS and you donât have to worry about costs and finding in network providers etc and the sorts of things youâd worry about here.
Look into Maynooth - smaller university but relatively residential and undergraduate-focused for a European university, Dublin within easy reach.
In Scotland look into Stirling (very nice campus), and Aberdeen. For a safety look into Queen Margaret University, brand new campus in an Edinburgh suburb.
I agree that the town is the campus at many/most UK unis.
Think U of Edinburgh was mentioned. Thatâs a great city. Iâd have loved being a student there.
Stirling is a wonderful school. My niece attended and had a great experience. Scotland in general is awesome, but the weather really can be a shock. Itâs cool and wet, even in the summer.
I also agree about the âwhat ifâs.â If a student is mature enough to live abroad, they are mature enough to handle any health crises. And really, a plane ride away isnât such a big deal.
Never said âdonât do itâ. Suggested figuring out various scenarios ahead of time.
And writers most definitely do internships. Creative writing- magazines, feature writers for online news, learning the ins and outs of comedy and script writing. The entire entertainment industry is fueled by interns with an interest in the written word.
Business writing- everything from employee communications to investor relations to media relations, legislative communications, etc.
Museums hire writers (often after their internships), large school systems hire writers, cultural organizations (opera companies and symphonies) hire writers.
You get your foot in the door with clips and an awesome portfolio which you developed during your internships.
Just something to talk through with your D. And if sheâs not interested- then fine, something to consider.
Do not confuse Bath Spa with Bath University. The latter is much more highly rated overall. I wouldnât be paying that kind of money for Bath Spa, which is basically like a directional state school.
Perhaps of use:
https://education.independent.ie/2020
Look university/college by college, and then course by course. Anything 500+ would likely be too competitive but worth a try, anything 400+ is fair game.
I agree wrt to Bath v. Bath Spa.
Thanks CollegeMamb0 â that is exactly the kind of info I am looking for. I just donât have a handle on which universities are well respected beyond the major players and even then they may not have the Creative Writing course that she is looking for. Bath Spa looks like an art school/creative school, which might be a good atmosphere for her. On their website they look to have a lot of success after university and help with jobs placement, etc. Really did remind me a bit of SCAD, which is very well regarded as an art school (and expensive) https://www.scad.edu/ . But if Bath Spa is bad (say like the for profit âArt Instituteâ ) then itâs not what weâre looking for.
We are in North Carolina. Most of you have heard of Duke and UNC-Chapel Hill which have an international reputation and can be pretty hard to get into, but there are also schools like Appalachian State University, UNC School of the Arts, UNC-Greensboro, Guilford College, that you may not have heard of, but are pretty good and have some excellent programs. And then there are the small schools like Catawba College, Barton College, Mt Olive College, Methodist College, which are not very selective at all.
I think we will be aiming for the middle tier there in the UK. Not Cambridge, Oxford, St Andrews, but not âhey weâll take anybodyâ either.
Thank you all for all your comments.
(BTW, there are quite a few unis I am finding that are campus-based rather than city-based. It is fun going through all the different websites. )
Have you looked at Bangor and Essex? Both have more than one creative options and are solid âmiddle rankingâ in the Guardian lists. They are very different places but with good links to other places. Both Aberystwyth and Bangor have direct rail links to England though Aber is more distant.
I agree that Bath and Bath Spa are very different. Fwiw As far as I remember Bath Spa was created from a merger of Bath art college, a teacher training college on itâs present site,plus others and has grown from there. This type of merger was fairly common when the uni system expanded decades ago. Bath Uni grew from a former polytechnic.
One of the best places for English/ creative writing is East Anglia (UEA), https://www.uea.ac.uk/ which is a campus uni in Norwich. You could also look at Sussex (in Brighton) https://www.sussex.ac.uk/ , another campus uni.
Note that after 1st year, your D is likely to be living off campus in rented accommodation, in the nearby city anyway.
Bournemouth is an excellent arts uni with emphasis on job placement. Not sure about creative writing but animation, advertising, digital stuff etc all well regarded. https://www.bournemouth.ac.uk/
Some unis will have an industrial or work placement year making the degree 4 years - but you pay much reduced tuition in the work year. The uni helps organize the placement and you get paid. Not sure how many have Creative Writing with Industrial Placement but definitely something to investigate. I know Exeter has English with work placement year.
Some history on British universities. Up to about mid 90s, there were universities granting academic degrees: Bristol, Oxbridge, Manchester etc. Then there were polytechnics and further education colleges, which were more vocationally focused, and more designed to get people directly into jobs. The Blair gvt wanted to expand university access so allowed many of these latter institutions to become full universities: this would be Bath Spa, Oxford Brookes, etc. It is not that these places are bad, but many have kept more of their vocational focus rather than a traditional academic one. Some like Bournemouth have really created a niche for themselves. Others like Oxford Brookes punch above their weight and are popular with rich kids from private schools who canât get into popular places like Bristol and Leeds.
Also - UK league tables/ rankings put a big emphasis on student satisfaction, not so much on teaching quality, research, selectivity etc.
@MYOS1634 . Data point of one, but a friend of mine from my home country went to Queen Margaret for postgrad a few years back, and said there was effectively zero support from the college for international students once youâd paid your fees and arrived. She had some major hassles (that I know for example my alma mater would have helped significantly with) that she had to deal with alone and almost ruined her ability to get her degree. I donât know if itâs different for undergrad or if hers was an outlier, but Iâd certainly look more into that angle.
Agree in general there is a lot on offer from the Scottish universities (and Scotland in general, I love the country). There are a lot of very decent âmid tierâ colleges on offer throughout England. Some places are delightful to live in general and easy to travel around from, obviously the more centrally located the easier this is. (Aberystwyth to London by train is around 5 hours. That is really long by UK standards. Many towns will have easier connections and only be an hour or two from many other places). One thing that I personally found really hard was how early sun sets in winter, the further north you go the earlier this is. I still think thereâs an awful lot that makes up for that!
There used to be a lot of looking down on the ex polys, but some of them (definitely not all though) have become well respected.
(PS I have heard of Catawba, but only because a good family friend went there on a volleyball scholarship. She loved it and has had no problem finding good and satisfying jobs since! I think she graduated around 5 years ago.)
The entire discussion so far focuses on UK and Ireland, for obvious reasons. However, these days a lot of excellent European universities have programs mostly or entirely in English, even in English-averse countries like France. Also, they tend to be less expensive (or almost free if you happened to have an EU passport).
D had a great experience with Across the Pond a few years ago when she nearly went to uni in London. As someone said, the application process and essays are very different from the US.
D saved $$$ by dealing directly with the university in London for a semester abroad, with the classes/credits accepted ahead of time by her school.
Absolutely, @ArtsyKidDad! I would start with the Netherlands, which is the most evolved and next-easiest transition.
Thank you. You all have helped so much. I will have a look at your suggestions and pass them on to my D.
4mummy, I have not looked at Bangor or Essex, but I have seen them on the League Tables. I will check them out further on your recommendation. Thanks for that. Will also check out East Anglia, Sussex and Bournemouth, Mamb0. UEA was on my radar. I think I saw Matt Smith went there? My eyes are crossing from looking at the League Tables on âThe Complete University Guideâ (.co.uk) and The Guardian and cross-indexing.
I guess what we really need to figure out is what universities are well regarded in the Creative Writing field and fairly well regarded overall. As an American the former polytechs donât sound bad at all.
SJ2727, funny you have heard of Catawba. It is an okay school, but definitely not aspirational for NC-ers. Good for C students. Iâm glad your volleyball player friend had a good time.
rhododendron, glad to hear a good endorsement of Across The Pond. D22 has signed up with them and is waiting to be paired with an advisor. Where did your daughter end up in the US? I didnât quite follow regarding saving $$$ with the semester abroad. How did that work? Thereâs no way to predict the future, of course, but I am feeling 50/50 on whether D22 will go to the UK for all of undergrad or end up staying in the US and just doing a year or semester abroad.
Iâm sure there are many fine universities in France and The Netherlands and elsewhere in Europe, but D22 is really only interested in the UK and Ireland right now and my head is swimming so much from researching that I donât dare introduce another idea.
Re UEA, I know a couple of people whoâve gone there (long ago though), and Iâve also spent some time in that area. Norwich is really lovely and the Norfolk coast is nice too.
My gut feel is that for a degree in creative writing, UK/Ireland is going to trump the continent.
D22 is exploring all the suggestions. Do you all think that the monthly budget calculator is accurate at https://www.which.co.uk/money/university-and-student-finance/student-budget-calculator ? Just trying to get a handle on the total cost of Uni in the UK.