London

Halls are tight. My old poly sold theirs off, so maybe that's common.

So flatshare or bedsit. dunno how much that costs cos i am too bourgeois to rent these days.

The real issue is how much student loan do you get now? Is it london weighted?

Does debt give you big or little fear? Are you studying something which will lead to gainful employment or is it esoteric gadding about like wot I did?

grizzleb said:

Bit of a shit thread, but I've got the opportunity to study in London next year. I'd like to, and the course looks good - only thing is I'm worried about how expensive it is compared to other parts of Britain/whether I would be able to afford it. I also had a look at the university of london halls and apparently I'm not guarenteed a place? Bah. Just wondered if any Dissensian Londoners (I know there's a fair few) had any thoughts on the matter? Don't want to go down there and not be able to eat.

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Where are you coming from? Your biggest zaps are gonna be on rent and transport. LU prices are going up again, reportedly, thanks to a massive deficit nobody bothered to fill. I was around in student grant days but I wouldn't have got by without part-time jobs. It is bastard expensive, to be honest, but I hear Liverpool's really pricey too now? I'd say if you're determined to do it, do it. Don't flunk out half-way through or get distracted by a drug habit.

Will you still get help from SAAS even if you're studying down south? Doesn't matter, fucking go for it, you need to get out the family house and your best option in that respect is to take a big running jump to somewhere you don't know. Would probably suit you better for musical endeavours too

You'll have to be prepared to share with at least 3 people, I should think, to keep costs manageable. But if you're OK with that, go for it.

And get a bike. Transport is a big cost. If you can get to classes/ lectures for free, you'll save a lot.

But yeah, go for it. Studying in London would be awesome, I reckon

Doesn't the LSU have a special website with rooms advertised for students? That's how I found a place when I first moved to London, and it was lovely: a large clean room on the 3rd floor of a Georgian house in Tufnell Park. The only other person in it was the owner, who lived on the ground floor and I never saw. It was idyllic. In between Hampstead and Camden, it was everything I could have asked for, and was dirt cheap too.

Also, you get student discount on travel cards. I used to spend £50 a month on a travel card when I was a student, and it gave me unlimited transport throughout zones 1 and 2, never had to worry about buying tickets unless I was going to see my girlfriend in Eltham. I did have a part time job too, but so what? Part time jobs can be fun.

Good times.

Do it, you'll manage.

Max loan is about £6k (inc London weighting). Depending on household income you can get a grant of up to about £3k, but this comes off the max loan you are eligable for.

PLUS you have tuition fees of nearly £3.5k/year.

Scottish students get slightly different (better, iirc) support.

Basically, large debt awaits, but you don't start paying anything back until you are earning £15,000 per year.


By next year do you mean 2011?

If so you might want to wait until after the general election, because there will be a review of tuition fees and it is likely that universities will be given a lot more freedom to set their own fees. Fuck all the political parties for agreeing not to discuss this before the election.

Personally, I would certainly apply/go, as long as the institution you attend has a good reputation (basically not ex-polys) and you are not studying golf course and surfing management. University is about more than the learning, innit.

Regarding accomodation, if you have applied this year and have an offer from a London institution, accept it as first choice pronto and get the accomodation forms in- they are often first come first served.

It was idyllic. In between Hampstead and Camden, it was everything I could have asked for, and was dirt cheap too.

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alas, it was downhill ever after....
clapton, bow, clapham....

Bow was lovely.

Clapton was ok.

Clapham was horrific.

Vauxhall was quite shit.

Except, in Vauxhall, I could at least walk to work, and there was a 24 hr off licence. These perks did not exist in Clapham. Clapham is really horrible. Don't move there. The only people who prosper in Clapham are estate agents. And high income 30-something families (but not the pleasant kind, they all live in Hackney and Clapton).

on balance i think the nightlife in london is slightly better than the nightlife in exeter, although admittedly i dont go out in exeter much. isn't there a nice moor near there though?

I did philosophy at KCL. As it's humanities your contact hours will be low so if you do need to take part-time work it will be a lot easier to fit it in. It'd be worth looking to get a job with the SU e.g. in the bar as they are usually more flexible when it comes to accommodating your degree.

You'd be able to apply to both Birkbeck's halls and the University of London halls wouldn't you so you should have a good chance of getting something, although I'm not sure how much the UoL halls cost - I think they might be a bit more expensive, but then they would be very close to Birkbeck so you could probably save on travel. If you do need to rent then ULU have listings on their site. The landlords who advertise on there have to sign up to a code of conduct so they might be marginally better than your average landlord.

Craner is right though, you do get discounts on travel as a student (a third), but not on pay as you go or day travelcards.

My brother went to Exeter and the nightlife wasn't exactly Dissensian, so if that is an issue I'd say don't go there. I would expect London is better for philosophy anyway as there are so many talks etc. going on.

Philosophy used to be done federally at UoL - teaching was spread out amongst UCL, KCL, Birkbeck and a couple of others, but that isn't the case anymore. I think they were still looking to maintain the collaboration though, so it might be worth asking whether some of your lecturers would come from the other colleges.

i lived with some students in my 20s and being a student here seemed like hardwork compared with how I was a student in Leicester. Not havin much £££ in London is tricky and there are loads of distractions. You can always live here after your degree.

craner said:

Bow was lovely.

Clapton was ok.

Clapham was horrific.

Vauxhall was quite shit.

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Vauxhall's not that bad!

clapham is, of course, a hotbed of evil.

grizzleb said:

Basically I'd be studying Philosophy at Birkbeck (so yes, a useless degree). I've heard it's a good uni, but I don't really know. I'd be getting 5,710 a year from SAAS. I'd l would prefer doing halls for the first year rather than flatshare I think, it's expensive though, and also with no real guarantee I'd get in. My other option is Exeter. Would be easier financially (Exeter basically give you 1,500 on top of normal loan anyway), but I dunno what the uni is like, or the nightlife etc either. Which is kind of importantI suppose, but a lack of distractions would probably be a good thing in the long run like you say.
I'll be moving from Glasgow. And I should have said later this year. 2010-11 year.

Cheers for the comments.

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Am studying for an MSc at Birkbeck at the moment. The teaching and facilities are good, organisation less so. Mrfaucet's point about talks etc going on outside the course is a good one - that can be a huge benefit if you have the time to go to them (which you probably will).

I have been to Exeter several times. It is, apparently, the most chain-friendly town in the UK. Beautiful countryside, but just don't.

Yeah, Vauxhall's alright. Though you really are in the city maelstrom, you never escape the low level hum of electricity, cars, cops, trains, aeroplanes...it can be quite hard to sleep. I slept by drinking myself into a coma every night. I was just unhappy there...but it's a brilliant place to live in terms of access to the West End, Chelsea and Pimlico, the NFT, Speaker's Corner, South Ken and Brompton Oratory. I didn't spend a penny on travel costs while living there, unless I was so hungover and late for work I had to jump on the Victoria line.

craner said:

Bow was lovely.

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Either Bow has changed a lot since you lived here, Ollie, or you have very different standards of what constitutes "lovely". Or maybe you just lived in a different bit from me. I'm getting seriously hacked off with the constant noise, omnipresent litter and general air of antisocial cuntiness. Plus there's less than nothing in terms of amenities or culture.

Then again, I guess you'd probably have quite a different experience of the place if you lived in Tredegar Square or somewhere around there. God, I miss Harringay.

Mr. Tea said:

Either Bow has changed a lot since you lived here, Ollie, or you have very different standards of what constitutes "lovely". Or maybe you just lived in a different bit from me. I'm getting seriously hacked off with the constant noise, omnipresent litter and general air of antisocial cuntiness. Plus there's less than nothing in terms of amenities or culture.

Then again, I guess you'd probably have quite a different experience of the place if you lived in Tredegar Square or somewhere around there. God, I miss Harringay.

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I used to live in a flat just around the corner from Tredegar Sq...Tredegar Rd in fact. The Sq is an oasis of loveliness, offset slightly by the fucking trains that went rattling by my bedroom windown every 3 minutes