Hope you find the info useful! If you have any questions, give me a shout :)

@@HannahColemanV ah yeah I will thanks ^_^

I'm very pleased to hear that :)

Hi Ciaran, Nice to hear from you. The Engineering and Physical Sciences foundation year at Nottingham last year had about 110 students in total on the course. I'd say the vast majority of them were young international students. When I started, I thought I might be the only non-international, non-18 year old woman on the course. Of course, that wasn't the case at all, even though I was still probably in the minority by a long way. I was not alienated at all, and studied with, went to BBQs with and played football with a diverse mix of people from the course. By the end of the year I had friends my age, and friends not my age, friends from Birmingham and London, and friends from Spain, the USA, Oman and Turkmenistan (to name but a few!). We also had a good working relationship with our lecturers, who were there to help when we needed it. I can only speak for Nottingham, but you should be absolutely fine. Again, I can only speak for Nottingham, but the style of the foundation year is set up to mirror the university experience. Some of the teaching felt like college/sixth form and others felt much more like university with lectures and workshops. So I guess it's a mix. But the teaching takes place on the main campus, in the engineering and physics buildings and you are an undergraduate student (and treated as such). Hope that helps! Where are you hoping to study?

Hannah Coleman, Thanks for the fast reply! That's a great help. We're still going through the whole UCAS process, so I'm not completely decided on where to go yet, although Keele is looking to be a strong favourite, largely due to the fact they have their own observatory which I have heard is used heavily as part of astophysics. What (if anything) are you looking to specialise in (ie. Astro, theoretical, etc.)?

Hi Ciaran, Let me know if you come for an Open Day at Nottingham at all :) At the moment I have no idea what I'd like to specialise in. I'm quite excited to find out!

@@HannahColemanV can you progress to year 1 after one term, or you have to do the full foundation year?

Hi :) I was 28 when I started.

kenny Hi Kenny! Thanks for your suggestion. Unfortunately a lot of universities don't accept the Access courses as they don't have a high enough level of maths. One of my classmates did the access course and still had to do the foundation year. This is what I was told would happen to me if I did an access course too.

Hannah Coleman I see. I'm sorry. I would've thought that unis would recognise what Access courses was about. I hope u do pass and reach your goals

kenny im in the same position. Loughborough have told me I will need to do a foundation year.