The Student Book 1981

An applicant's guide to UK colleges, polytechnics and universities. A complete list of all institutions offering higher level courses, advice and information on finding your way through the jungle of jargon and abbreviations to make an application, a most useful introduction to what you are letting yourself in for in each study area (nearly eighty pieces - Accountancy to Zoology - written in the main by well-known academics in the area) and a short 'What It's Like' piece on each place written by a student or from a student viewpoint. This last is (from my own observations) the most unsatisfactory part. Not all writers seem to have been using the same criteria or even commenting on the same things. Some are better communicators than others and some seem unnecessarily jaundiced. Okay, so it's supposed to be subjective; but I dare say these pen portraits are likely to sway would-be applicants more than the more sober sections of this book so they are potentially very influential and should have been more carefully vetted.

Nevertheless it is good to have all this information between two covers and at so reasonable a price. Used with discretion and counselling from teachers and parents, sixth-formers should find it invaluable. Also in hardback, £8.95.