Advice on choosing a uni

This is really useful and thank you, underlines the fact we(she) needs to be open and discuss her needs and see how it is accepted by the uni and how open and supportive they are to it.

Also so helpful on the DSA aspects - she is a UK national and she has lived in the UK for over 5 years. Before the pandemic she spent more time in the UK than Switzerland because of the length of terms.

@MoritzV, I hope the course is going well for you and you are getting all you need.

We need to understand the finance thing - just starting to look at it now. 

She is looking at Maths or Physics or a combination maybe, not sure on uni at the moment but Durham, St Andrews, maybe Oxbridge - not sure really. The OU is an interesting idea but I think she is keen to go to a physical place to study if she can. Although with the pandemic who knows!

Some universities will have huge first year classes like 600, othersmore in the realm of 60. Some courses are structured, like many sciences with weekly small coursework, other with termly large coursework. Def think about the town; campus or not campus. I went to Lancaster and it was like a big school in a quiet town, suited me perfectly! It also attracted a lot of quieter types.

I'm also a UK resident but live away from my parents who live in another country. She is eligible for financial assistance (DSA and PIP) if she has lived in the UK for 5 or more years or has UK nationality. 

If she has diagnoes ADD and she is eligible, she will be able to get further help from the DSA. They also gave me a study skills tutor which helps me (on top of an autism specific tutor) 

It's all manageable for me, and she sounds like she will be ok. She sounds like she knows what she wants, so that's great. A catered hall is definitely an option, but I am also not that easy when it comes to food depending on the textures. I would check with them and ask them what they offer usually and when they release their menu. In that case, she can plan ahead and buy something for the days that she does not like what they are offering. However, this is not the cheapest option, but it is the most convenient. 

I am sure the uni will be able to assist in some way if they are connected with the student hall. 

I would make sure that the student services are nice and that they offer enough help. They will be the first point of contact for her if she needs help, that part is vital, so that she gets the support she needs, even when she has not received much support before. 

Also, if she applies for any support, do it as soon as possible as it can take a while for the support to be in place. For me, that took nearly 2 1/2 months for the DSA. 

Hope this helps :) 

So is she a UK resident and does she live away from you?    If not, she might not qualify for any financial assistance from the UK - I've no idea how that would work.     If you don't mind me asking, what course is she talking about and what uni is she thinking of?

What about the OU?

Same criteria everybody uses. Pick the best university she can get into (employers do care), that offers a course she wants to do, that's in an area she'd like to live, and that is based on a campus or in a city (as she prefers).

It's university not school. The larger the lecture the easier it is to sit quietly and be ignored, not feel forced to contribute and participate, engage with the material at your own pace and in your own way. So don't be worried about large universities or popular courses.

If she's handling school well enough then University will offer all the best bits and remove many of the bad ones.

@Plastic @MoritzV @FSCR - Thank you so much for all this really useful advice. It is so helpful to get different perspectives and view points. 

The introductory days and being able to arrive early will I think be really useful and we will definitely look into that. 

She is at boarding school (her choice to start this and we had to move to Switzerland for my husband's job so it was lucky she had already had the transition) and so is used to living with others and away from home but her day is very structured so that is going to be a big issue. She won't be able to live at home unless we have moved back to the UK by then (but Brexit means probably not) and she seems keen to want to live away. She has said she wants a catered hall if possible however she is very fussy and limited in food choices so I am not sure if that is best (based on my own uni hall food memories lol). The idea of being able to order food for her is a really good one - thank you.

The idea of things to help organise and record lectures also sound useful as she also has ADD and so I am not sure how she will manage an hour of lectures (on a subject she is less interested in)...

Thank you so so much again. It is such a big learning curve for us when we have had so little support through all her schooling we have never know what might be out there.

MoritzV said:

Make sure she applies for DSA as that helped me massively and they can otherwise also arrange transportation if she struggles with that (she can then book a cab for the price of public transport and claim the rest back if she does not live close to uni).

My daughter knew a girl doing this - a taxi both ways financed by DSA - she was lucky, the 'public transport cost' part was too small and complicated for the company to claim back so it was completely free for her - and as a regular contract, sometimes she got picked up in a huge Limousine if that was the nearest car available 

The DSA also assess the needs of the child so things like laptops and all sorts of stuff is available - a partially-sighted friend of my daughter had digital voice recorders with long-range directional microphones and a large-screen laptop with all the best voice-to-text software loaded to assist her in lectures - all provided by them..   The university provided large-font versions of everything she needed.

It's also worth looking at some odd extras that are available - at one time, my daughter was classed as coming from a deprived background - so as a commuting student, she qualified for an overnight stay in the posh hotel next to the uni with a free breakfast to help her prepare for exams (deprived = home has only one income, one tv and no i-pad or i-phone?). 

Your daughter will also qualify for extra time during exams.

Hey, 

I'm a student with ASC. I would also say it depends on how self-dependent she is and what she wants. There are lots of ways how you can support her. (do online shopping (you can do this for her) /do cooking classes for skills etc.)

My main thing that helped was that I went to the introductory days, to get to know the place as well as student services. 

When I was accepted I asked student services if I could come to campus again a week before getting to know the facilities better. They also organised that I have accesses to a quiet room and the possibility to wear noise-cancelling headphones (I advise to use in-ear noise-cancelling headphones because they are less noticeable to classmates unless she prefers complete isolation)

I prefer living really close to uni so I can avoid public transport and living in a privately rented room, as the student halls can be overwhelming (too many people for me) 

Make sure she applies for DSA as that helped me massively and they can otherwise also arrange transportation if she struggles with that (she can then book a cab for the price of public transport and claim the rest back if she does not live close to uni). They can also give you programmes for time management and many other things that help to make things easier. I also have something to record the lecture so I can listen back to it / rewatch it.

If you want to know anything else I'm happy to help!

Hello Tia

I have already been thinking about this for my 17 year-old daughter. I would look for a University that offers good pastoral care. Universities receive rankings for this. Some are excellent, some very poor indeed. When you look at their websites I would look specifically for support for students with ASD. If they don't mention it then I would say that they don't consider it seriously enough. Some Universities offer induction weeks/courses prior to the start of term to help with the transition. I would also consider a University that wasn't too far away from home. My niece was at Exeter and her family lived in Essex. When she was having problems the drive back and forth added to the stress for everyone. My sister-in-law seriously regretted her being so far from family support which she desperately needed. Like Plastic says look at what different types of accommodation they offer. Maybe catered halls is the way to start. They may even have 'quiet' floors in some of the halls. 

Also please encourage your daughter to tell all her teaching staff that she has ASD. I teach at post-graduate level and want to know about any educational, health or support needs that my students have. That way I can deliver a better educational experience that works for everyone. 

Good luck

Hi - a lot depends on her level of needs and what uni she's thinking of and what course she's looking at studying - some require more hours than others which can be draining.     

It can be a lot to be suddenly forced to be self-sufficient - the food, hygiene and clothes washing etc.- how self-reliant is she?   There's usually some kind of cafe open on campus but it can be very expensive if she's doing 3 meals a day, 7 days a week.   The on-campus washing machines can be a total rip-off - it all adds up quickly!.

The lectures and classes can be at odd times and, again, depending on the course, there may be only a couple of days of work so if she's not very social, there's a lot of hanging around - going to the nearest uni may make commuting possible so she's at home most days and parental support is only down the road.

My daughter graduated last year - by coincidence, the course she wanted was at a uni only 12 miles away but the social calendar turned out to be disappointing / awful / non-existent (the place basically shut over the weekends) and she only had to be there for a few hours on three days so it was convenient for her to commute - it saved a fortune in accommodation in years 2 and 3!     (Her other choice was about 25 miles away - again, manageable if it had to be)..

All will have support teams for the students - some are better than others - so it's worth talking to them now to help her sort out what her plans might be.   (you get a 'feel' for how useful they are - or not  ).

Does she have PIP?    Also, she may qualify for local authority transport back and forth or the uni may pay for it for her..