Want to Study CHOCOLATE? (Bournville College of Further Education)

Member Name: kittykat18

Product:	Bournville College of Further Education
Date:	06/07/02 (773 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Choice of courses, easy to get to, good teaching

Disadvantages: So many students, poor facilities for some subjects

Bournville College is located along the Bristol Road in the South of Birmingham, between Selly Oak and Northfield. And yes, it is named after Bournville chocolate but unfortunately you don't get to study chocolate. You can do wine testing and beers of the world though! It is about 3 miles south of the city centre and is easily reached on many bus routes. It is a very large further education college, which offers courses ranging from A Levels to cooking and ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages). I did my A Levels here from 1998-2000 and have also done a number of other short courses there since. My Mum now goes to computer classes there as well.

The building is not a highly attractive one, being a 1960's concrete quad with a garden in the centre. The layout, although confusing at first, is quite easy to get to grips with. The gardens in the centre are a nice area to sit at lunch times and gossip. There is a huge car park and bike storage area next to the college, as well as a football pitch and a pond area. The canteen serves cheap meals and has a Nescafe coffee bar with nice sofas and chairs. There is a small shop inside the college selling magazines, papers, sweets and stationary.

Access for people with disabilities is excellent. Cars can drive right up to the entrance (there is a North and South entrance) and there are gently sloped ramps as an alternative to steps. The college is five stories high, and there are two lifts. One for everyone, and the second solely for people with disabilities, who are each issued with a swipe card to operate the lift. There is a special needs office, which is very helpful. During my time there I had a friend with spina bifida who made full use of the advice and facilities available. The college is to be commended for widening the access of education in the area.

Student services include a careers service and counsellor, as well as a religious worship room.

I was not overly opt
imistic about going to this college to do my A Levels in all honesty. It does not have the best reputation, and I only chose to go there because a girl who I did not get on with was going to the other Sixth Form College I had considered. Some of the bad points regarding Bournville College are:

-It is in the Quaker area of Bournville so there are no pubs nearby. Not that the underage students should be going anyway!

-There are few social events or societies. When I was there, the only organised "groups" were a weekly aerobics session and football club. At lunch times the sports hall was open and students were allowed to play pool and table tennis there. Me and my friends never did though, because the "bad boys" (don't ask) always took over. When compared to other colleges, which have a newspaper and various clubs, this was disappointing. There is also no common room, so the only place you can sit and socialise is the canteen, which gets very busy and full at lunchtimes. Before I started there was a smoking room, but this was closed down due to people smoking "funny" cigarettes. Since I have left, the social situation has been improved slightly by employing a member of staff full time to be in charge of the students union and various events are organised, often in conjunction with Westhill College (part of Birmingham University, just up the road).

-Organisation. I often turned up to lessons to find a sign on the door saying the lesson had been cancelled. It would not be too difficult to arrange a supply teacher or telephone the students, as it was frustrating to catch 2 buses for nothing.

-When I started, I was studying English, Theatre Studies and Social Biology. After three weeks I changed Biology for Law. This was simple to do but left me with a personal tutor who did not teach any of my subjects. It was irritating that for the next two years I had a report written on me by a teacher who knew not
hing about me!

-Students dropping out. When I started, there were about 30 students in Law, 15 in Theatre Studies, and 25 in English. By the end of the course, the numbers were approximately halved. I do not think this is the fault of the college though (and in a way it was good, because class sizes were smaller for the remaining students). There were a large number of mature students and students were not pushed as would happen in a school sixth form.

-Inconsistency of facilities. In some areas, the facilities are excellent. The science centre opened in 1998 and cost millions. A large number of students consequently study science subjects, and there is a large teaching staff for these subjects. For my subjects though, books were in short supply in the library, and the drama facilities were poor. For our practical exam, we had to use a meeting room and stick black paper over all of the windows. The college no longer offers Theatre Studies at A Level, which is a shame, as the teaching was very good. The library is small and frankly not very good, considering there are thousands of students.

Computing facilities are also very good in the computer rooms, but in the sixth form centre they were quite slow. So slow in fact that I preferred to use my home computer (which is very slow!) There was also an annoying filter on the Internet, so when I attempted to look up information on Les Liasons Dangeroueses for Theatre Studies, it was considered pornographic. Tsk.

***A Level students now get free text books supplied for the duration of their course and a free overseas trip if they work at a satisfactory level. This annoys me, because it was brought in the year after I left. The only benefits we had was £16 worth of dinner vouchers each term. Wow. ***

It?s not all bad though. There are many good points about Bournville College and I miss my time there.

-The staff.

All of the staff are helpful, from the advice ce
ntre and careers guidance to the teaching staff. After 5 years of strict schooling it was a relief to address teachers by their first name (although strange at first) and to be treated like an adult. I quickly grasped that I was not going to be told off for not doing my homework as I would have been at school. As my English teacher said "it just means less work for me". So I had to make myself work, which is a useful skill to have in life, where you will not be pushed. Considering the fluctuating levels of students and relative chaos of the administration, the staff did very well. The teaching on the whole was excellent and the teachers were willing to give up their time to help the students who wanted to do well. One of my teachers even gave us her home phone number in case we had any questions. Another would come to the pub with us and talk about how she became a teacher at a later age. There was not one teacher who I did not get on with, and I was taught a lot there, not just in the way of academic work.

-Mixture of people

At a school sixth form, you would most likely be with the people who you had already been through secondary school with. All the same age, and similar backgrounds. I really think my time at Bournville helped me to grow up. In my classes there were people aged from 18-50, from all backgrounds. Learning with all of these different people is good for an individual. There are a significant number of refugees who attend the college to learn English, as well as special needs classes and groups of children who have been expelled from school. This leads to a mix of all of society in one place.

-Choice

If I had stayed at school, I would only have been able to do one of my chosen A Levels, the traditional subject. At Bournville there is a wide choice of subjects available, and opportunities to take up more subjects. While I was there I took Spanish classes for some time, alongside several over 50's. I als
o did A Level Art for all of, ooh, a few weeks. But it was an easygoing place where you could try things out without feeling obligated to stay.

It may look like the bad points outnumber the good. But although it was occasionally disorganised and facilities were limited, the people were great and I did well from my time at Bournville.

Bournville College of FE
Bristol Road South
Northfield
Birmingham

www.bournville.ac.uk

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