Transferring PGCE course

Hi

I am sorry to hear this, shocking and if you were my son/daughter i would want you the hell out of there but maybe I am over reacting as a parent myself, its disgusting that you have to put up with this and its a factor during your qualification where you will ultimately be doing good to help educate future generations. You don't deserve that, they are just utter low life scumbags.

I just looked up the crime stats for the Lewisham area and its 90 per thousand the vast bulk anti social, violent and sexual offences:-
https://crimerate.co.uk/london/lewisham#:~:text=Crime%20and%20Safety%20in%20Lewisham&text=Lewisham%20is%20among%20the%20top,of%2095%20per%201%2C000%20residents.

So the region near where you are is classed by the police as a medium crime area or 6/10. This is not disastrous in the grand scale of things there are worst places but equally there are better safer places. The national average is 78 per thousand.

If you were doing your PGCE outside of London in say somewhere like University of Bath the area is 27 per thousand, its 34 per thousand University of Bristol so 3 times safer. if you went further out probably even less per thousand.

Some here could argue that you could get mugged anywhere, wrong place wrong time etc, just bloody unlucky but as far as i'm concerned safety first. Having been mugged already you are going to feel more conscious of it than most now. But the main thing here is you can secure your PGCE at loads of Uni's:-
https://www.thecompleteuniversityguide.co.uk/courses/search/postgraduate/pgce

If you look at the crime stats using the Times guide from complete university guide data it paints a slightly better picture:-
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/carousels/uk-universities-ranked-crime-rate

The London university locations obviously have higher crime rates than outside of London locations. It ranks Goldsmiths itself as 34 per 1,000 so where you study itself is considered fairly safe the issue you have is you are 20 mins away and probably going through a really rough area like Lewisham or similar to get to your study.

Is it worth calling accommodation services and explaining you were mugged and feel unsafe where you live and travelling in and if they have any university halls or similar closer to the University you can move to? Got to be worth a try?

Otherwise, probably worth seriously considering a total change.

As a side my own daughter is at University of Bristol which is a city Uni not a campus Uni and she lives with other students in the city and loves it, feels completely safe, the location is a student city something ridiculous like 20 thousand UOB students and similar numbers from UWE near it so that possibly helps, safety in numbers and all that but i guess where ever you are you still need to be on your guard.

You could be at University of Birmingham, second city and that Uni is rated as 29 per 1000 so on paper lower than Bristol BUT whilst the campus is fairly safe some of the surrounding areas are well dodgy, if you were traveling through areas like Handsworth to get to University of Birmingham and NOT on the actual campus itself you might be taking your life in your own hands its so rough.

So those two examples above are a total contrast to each other so clearly whilst the crime rates at the university itself are a factor its the surrounding area you are living in and where you travel through that is more important to consider.

I wish you well going forwards, its just awful what you have been through but if you cant move closer to Goldsmiths i would seriously look at changing. Go and visit Universities you can complete your PGCE at that are further out with nice safe accommodation services on campus or a city Uni like Bristol with other students. I guess these days where ever you go you need to be on your guard but if you can avoid travelling through rougher areas it at least reduces your odds of this sort of incident happening again.

Good luck and take care now