Cambridge Degrees

@EatYourVegetables @TeenDivided

I did say ‘for lack of a better word’ bur anyone in maths knows there are questions requiring deep insight and questions requiring computational tricks. As your knowledge develops you can replace the latter with the former. The word ‘gimmicky’ when things skew too far to the tricks is one I picked up from DH and his pals — RG maths professors and journal editors who use the word about research papers that are more about tricks than insight.

My l PhD is in a maths-intensive STEM field and some of my research is in mathematics journals. Why people should have jumped to compare a short passage about DH’s initial difficulty adjusting to Cambridge maths (culminating in great success) with GCSE maths, and whether he or I was meant to look ignorant, I have no idea.

Hi, just realised I phrased the last sentence of my post terribly 🙈 I mean, hard work doesn't equal a first like the previous 18 years of life, not the previous 18 years of Cambridge. You can do GCSEs and A levels and get amazing results then go to Oxbridge (my DH went to the other place, fair play to him) and then it's really hard!!! Hang in there 😜

Sure, but he was talking about the workload. In my subject there were 40 hours per week of scheduled lectures and supervisions, on top of which we were expected to study and write around two essays a week.

I could easily have spent all my time on academic work if I’d been of that mindset.

I kind of agree.

It is in some way similar to this years GCSE students complaining about the octagon question (which contained no maths skills above a grade 5) or the 'Hannah's Sweets' question in 2015 which just combined the two topics of probability and algebra into the same question.

Calling it “gimmicks” is very immature. “Challenging questions”? “Questions which test deeper understanding and not bookwork”?

In the real world, doing maths or STEM is not about repeating what was already in the textbook, but using the knowledge to solve new problems.

This is the same for every university in a humanities subject, as long as you make a decent argument and evidence it they can't mark you down. You can't be 'wromg'.
STEM is different,.if you don't know where to start you don't know.

I had this as a final essay question one year:

“Malthus was right after all. Discuss.”

I laughed out loud in the exam hall. Got a first on that paper, mind.

A friend of mine studying English had his department arguing over whether one of his first year final essays deserved a first or a third. One examiner though it was genius, one thought it was garbage.

That’s probably why it’s best not to lose your mind over it. I didn’t feel the slightest bit competitive while I was there. For me it was enough to have got there at all, I didn’t feel I needed to be the best among geniuses. That way lies madness.

Having written all that, it's probably not applicable to maths which sound like it might just require genius 😀

I have also read that Maths ability peaks very young, maybe they are looking to find that as fast as possible.

I got a high first in Engineering at Cambridge 25 years ago.

I think what I did 'right' as an undergrad was

• 'work' was my main 'thing' - I did plenty of extra-curricular, drinking, fun etc but I didn't have something (sport, hobby, boyfriend) that ranked above 'work'. This partly happenchance, partly because I genuinely really enjoyed my subject
• I played to my strengths in course choices for 3rd & 4th year (as many posters above describe)
• I worked roughly 9-6 most days (including lectures etc in this) and mostly did not work evenings. I think I did a bit less at weekends. So it was full time but did not feel horrific. (I had a year out working full time in engineering before I went, I guess I just treated it like a full time job) It was/is way more work than you hear described at other unis.
• I attempted to keep up with supervision work during term (hard work!) - and crucially made myself catch up in holidays. Second year maths was my 'hardest' subject, and for that I did additional holiday prep. Feeling that I knew how to try to get on top of things also gave me an element of feeling in control?
• I was friends with some people a year or two above me who were good at maths - a few times they showed me stuff on back of envelope over a pint that really helped! I was also friends with the other engineers in college who were good at the subject and we would sometimes work together. Thus I had informal channels to help when stuck.

I wasnt aiming for a first before I started (hadn't really thought about it, and I didn't have a life plan in academia). I think I took the second route that College Dad described above (which is good advice) and then was also lucky because one of the hobbies I chose was my work?

I did cry in a Thermodynamics supervision. And despite my degree, still think that magnets roughly work by magic, I have never properly understood them :-)

Got a 2.1 in a humanities, knew a lot of mathmos. You won't get a first through hard work. Especially not in maths. The super hard questions are (in my understanding... I think someone told me.... After a load of college port) designed to be stretch the undergrads really far because you have some kind of maths genius hormonal rush that's done by your mid 20s (think how young Newton was when he was doing a lot of incredible work) and they want to spot who's got it, then and there. Yeah there can only be one senior wrangler but they need to make it hard for them 😜

Do some extra curricular stuff and get a 2.1! It's the best way. A friend who did English said one of the options for the final essay was "Tragedy: when the feeling's gone and you can't go on. Discuss"

But yeah sorry hard work doesn't equal a first, unlike the previous 18 years 😜

Should have gone to Oxford - I knew no one who slogged away like that, genuinely no one.

What a wise college dad you had!

Cambridge experience is course and college specific. They vary to an extent they might as well not be the same institution. If you are looking for knowledge about Cambridge University only seek knowledge on specifics to what you intent to do there, everything else is irrelevant.

Cambridge and Oxford are meant to be hard. The majority of students are hard workers who are very bright, a tiny proportion are geniuses. But boy, their brains are something else.

I did a humanities subject there 20 years ago. The best piece of advice I got was in my first week, from my college "Dad". He said there are two ways to approach your time at Cambridge:

You can bust a gut day and night to try to get a first, and still risk not getting one, because it's not as simple as slog=results. There's an extra spark of something you need to get a first.

Or, you can do a reasonable amount of work, get involved in all the extra-curricular stuff, not lose your mind, and come away with a respectable 2:1.

He was dead right. Although in the end I did a fairly low amount of academic work, busted my gut day and night at the extracurriculars (which were my passion), lost my mind, and came away with a respectable 2:1 anyway.

So who the hell knows.

My DD did engineering at Cambridge - I think she found it similar to what @Ironoaks describes for her DS and physics.

I studied a humanities subject but this wasn't my experience of Cambridge. I did 2-3 hours of work a day, plus maybe one lecture, and spent the rest of the time getting quietly pissed or acting. I got a first in both parts of the Tripos. My best friend was a mathmo (one of the only women at my college) and also always got a first without doing a huge amount of work. Maybe the best person in the year was at a whole different level again, but a low-medium first didn't seem to me (or subsequently from experience of other universities) to represent an especially high standard of attainment. Of course, quite a lot of people get firsts...

This sounds very maths-specific. But also not unbelievable sadly.

I’m a Cambridge maths graduate. Agree with what other people were saying. School maths is ridiculous in many ways - loads of people get 100% in their final A level exams because it really isn’t that hard.

At Cambridge maths they want to find the next Stephen Hawking. So there needs to be clear water between the person who comes first in the tripos and the person who comes second. It isn’t really about the person who comes somewhere in the middle (me!) - they give us a 2.1 and send us off to make money working in finance.

It’s an amazing thing in many ways - I am proud to be an “also ran” in a system that was looking for perfection - but it is bloody hard on the ego.

They do explain all of this when you start - and that the person who comes top will still only be able to do a small amount of questions in the time available. I also remember being told on the first day that over the next 3 years every single one of us would cry at some point because it was too hard. I did!

I did a BA at Cam 10 years ago (PPS) and can relate to this post. As a PP has written, you go from working hard but things coming relatively easy to you, to really struggling and having to review whether you are any good at all. It is a real ego blast. The students who suffered the most in my college seemed to be Medics, Vets and Maths. Quite a few people dropped out as a result.

However, there are massive highs. The supervision, the extra curricular activities. I wouldn't go back to Cambridge for the degree as it has little bearing on my current job. But I would go back for the connections and the experience.

A memory for me that sums up my experience of the teaching:
I had handed in a hand written essay a few days before supervision. Got to supervision and the lecturer asks where my essay is. I share I handed it to her 3 days prior. She says, oh yes! And then does a comedy walk around the room looking for it. 'Found it' in the bin and my only feedback is she wouldn't read the drivel. I had worked hours on it. Came away with a 2.1 in the end, but crikey it was a ride

The thing about maths is that it’s never going to be a subject that rewards hard work. The brilliant students will be able to get away with very little. The lest brilliant ones can work all hours of the day and still not be able to achieve as much. And I’m afraid that A-level results are not a good indicator of who will be brilliant at the next level.