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kinola67

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  1. Yes De Montford is in Leicester but by train it is two or sometimes one connection from Edinburgh so although geographically closer the train journey is a bit of nightmare. I think you can fly to East Midlands but the journey from there is another bus and as Edinburgh airport has expanded so rapidly recently the check in time is really long...basically meaning trains to London are the quickest and easiest. We did like De Montford though!
  2. Thanks very much for getting back to me, my DD has an offer from the four Uni's now, so that's the stage we are at for starting in Sept. I think she is happy with the choice of Uni over vocational, but wants to be able to dance as much as possible whilst doing her course! so it's just trying to fathom out which of the four would be the best for 1. dance classes per day included within the course 2. easiest to top up with either private classes (cost?) or dance clubs/societies and 3. one that provides a resonable expectation of a choice of work destinations including hopefully performing as well as admin/teaching/management. Surrey do major/minor degrees but it was difficult to fathom out how popular they were when we visited this week, but yes I agree they seem to be a good combination for those wanting the degree security but also to continue dancing. Surrey do a placement year which gets the students working (not earning though) and they pride themselves in the fact that many of the students get jobs at the end of their course with their placement firms. The placements however as admin roles, so no dancing involved which means a year of less dancing unless one can afford to pay for top up. My DD just didn't like that idea. I don't know if I am now over analysing it all! but I guess as researching it all is much easier these days with the websites etc I feel we must take adavantage of it! I'm sure my mother had no idea what my Uni was like and only saw me in the holidays and as long as I phoned once a week, we were all happy!
  3. Great advice, thank you I will spend some more time looking at the teachers backgrounds, so far it seems to be about 1.5/2hrs dancing per day and the rest is your own time to do your academic work and top up with other dance, fitness, clubs etc
  4. Thanks for getting back to me, we are not looking at conservatoires as she realises that she would not be able to handle all day every day dancing, she'd like to do at least the same as she is now which I think she will be able to cover with what they do on the Uni courses and add to that with a dance society and/or private classes. We did go to visit the conservatoire in Glasgow just to see what it was like and realised that unless you go straight after 4th year (so age 15/16 in Scotland) you are already getting a bit too old. It was obviously very intensive and as they are quite young, it's really abit more like being at school in terms of social life etc I think we both realise that she wants to experience student life in all it's forms so will be making full use of the student lifestyel - if she could only decide on which one to pick! so I'm really just looking for anyone that has experiences at those Unis if possible. Where do you teach?
  5. Yes she want to carry on with dancing but is under no illusion and realises that if she wants to be in reasonably good paid employment when she's older (like my age!) she needs to be able to work on the admin/teaching/management side. So we're looking to see which one we might reasonably expect to offer a range of 'positive destinations' as our school likes to call it! She'd like to do some performing and hopefully she will get quite a bit of that if the right Uni has the right mix of classes, dance societies and the like. Fingers crossed!
  6. I think she liked Roehampton, I didn't see that one but looking at their website they do seem to have a good mix of styles and a good mix of work destinations on graduation, it's fairly small too compared to say Surrey - which seems huge, so that might be a good thing moving such a long way from home. I think they have just built a new library. De Montford was great - just too complicated a journey to get there from Edinburgh!
  7. Thanks all for getting back to me, it's been so mind boggling - yes we maybe just have to say things will work out fine if she goes with the right attitude. I think it would be possible to top up at all the courses, just depends on how much that costs (on top of EVERYTHING! else), Surrey seem to have good dance society group and as they are part of the GSA I think you can pay per term to do other classes such as tap/jazz etc Surrey also do a placement year which has confused us a bit, almost all the students will do this in 3rd year and it does sound good but as far as we can tell the placements are mainly admin so no dancing involved, which would mean not only another year of fees/accomodation but a year not dancing as much (unless she has time and money to top up). I am assuming a placement year is not the be all and end all but they way they described it (of course) was that as so many graduates do not get paid jobs when they finish uni, the ones that have done the placement year are much more likely to get into paid work as they have effectively already done their unpaid work in 3rd year. But I'm sure the other uni's wouldn't necessarily agree with that!! I will check out the university tagging - thank you and no we can't fly but will be on the train. About 7 hours door to door for Surrey, bit less obviously for London. Just hope I don't have to go through it all again with the next DD!
  8. Hello everyone, I previously posted about finding out about Uni dance degrees, we have finally got to the stage where we have seen four Uni's, Middlesex, Roehampton, De Montford and Surrey. My daughter has offers from the first three and we only saw Surrey yesterday so we'll see what they say. It's hard to choose which one! I think De Montford is out due to it's location and travel time from Edinburgh where we live. Has anyone else been to these audition days? and if so what did you think? I think my DD is having a crisis of confidence and wondering whether there will be enough actual dance to safisfy her but on reading other threads about this I think there are ways to top up if she wants to, it's just being practical about finding extra classes etc Has anyone got advice for a tired old mum who has has enough of train journeys for the time being!
  9. Hi there, new to this thread, my oldest daughter is leaving school next year and DMU is on her list to apply for - how are you finding it? it looks amazing from the details on line!
  10. Thanks everyone for your replies, we have narrowed down our choices I think Uni wise to Surrey, De Montford, Roehampton and Middlesex London. Annoyingly De Montford although nearer geographically takes longer to get to and costs more on the train. We are only considering 'down south' for dance degrees as the choice is better than in Scotland, so if DD wasn't doing dance at Uni we'd definitley be going to a Scottish Uni as the fees are free! Also looking at Trinity Laban, NSCD and Glasgow Conservatoire... will let you all know how it goes! Good luck to all those making choices for next year!
  11. Yes the above is right, it seems (from my trawling) that many students will do an HND to give them a good basis for either going on to get work or completing a degree at the same place of study or elsewhere, assuming it has to be in a related field. In Scotland, we don't do A levels (not at state schools anyway) but we do Highers in 5th year and Advanced Highers in 6th year. Many of our honours degrees are 4 years and tuition is free for those living in Scotland (that's why it's such a big decision for us to consider going down south!) HND is a more advanced qualification than both Highers and A Levels so if your DD got that, she could then decide what to do next, but yes if 2 years of funding were used up at HND level at one college/uni, then there might only be funding for one more year if the subject of study is only a 3 year course - which most of the dance related ones seem to be. I think!! Here's me thinking once we got the exam results everything would be easy and fall into place - hehe. You're right, they are thinking in the here and now, we are thinking forward to the mortgage/children/life. Good luck with your research!
  12. Hi thanks for getting back to me, yes Glasgow looks great, we are going to the open day to find out more, I don't think it's as ballet based as we thought it was which would suit my DD but we'll see what they say. A joint degree was something I thought of ages ago but as they are relatively new in the UK (for dance anyway) it's hard to know what graduates are doing later on, where do they end up I wonder? HND is done after school so like the first and second year of Uni, then folk if they want to go onto to the 3rd/4th year to do the BA or BSc, which could be done at a different Uni I'm assuming. Ballet West is mentioned above - you could ask about the entry requirements. My DD did a summer school there and loved it!
  13. Thanks for getting back to me, yes I noticed last night whilst trawling the internet, some youtube videos of stuents talking about their auditions for Uni, so guessing it's not as easy to get into some as others, not like applying for a regular course based on points only.
  14. Hi thanks so much for getting back to me, she has done a summer school at Ballet West and did love it but it's too remote for her. I would love it I have to say but she is a city girl at heart! That's good that your DD has discovered her inner dancing passions - if she has a talent for choreography that will be an important asset, my DD loves that side of things and I think it's something that could keep her going in future employment!
  15. Thanks very much indeed for this - yes it does help. DD is not a singer (I blame the husband for that!) and shies away from acting parts so really we are looking at dance as the main passion. I can understand how odd it seems for the youngsters not to know what contemporary really means in terms of expressing their dance, I would say the dance school she has been at, although known for ballet mainly, does try to incorporate contemporary style into shows etc DD has also done a really good course with another company (can't remember the name!) over two years - which was more along the contemporary route, the first time I saw her perform this I was quite amazed...it really did look so different. When we went to 'move it' in London we spoke to the contemporary schools which was interesting and came away thinking yes that's what she wanted to do. But her dance school changed her mind by saying you need to cover all bases to start with and try for performing arts schools. But we have come right round to thinking that a degree either in contemporary or in a dance related subject would best suit her talents and good grades (you can imagine it is me who is thinking about the grades!), it also means she can diversify more easily if it all goes belly up after first year. So at the moment (of course it could change any time!) we are narrowing it down to those choices which means applying through UCAS to Unis and to Laban/Glasgow/Leeds. We also have to take in practical matters such as travel and accomodation. I found Surrey by accident when trawling the internet, it looks great as there are a few joint honours courses which might be of interest, I will look at Roehampton too. I love the south west but Plymouth will be too far!
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