Top Unis - am I missing something?

She's sounding like a student in a pressurised environment (is she at a selective school, by any chance?) who is burnt out.

Would a gap year be a sensible option for her to re-evaluate her choices?
Alternatively, a university with a slower pace of work might actually be better for her.

OK my post crossed with yours. So it is indeed you wanting her to go somewhere you perceive to be prestigious.

It’s an odd post indeed
she applies for Oxbridge if she fancies it, if she doesn’t get in she hopefully gets in at one of the other unis she loved, in which case she will have (a bit) less pressure to get the top grades which is a good thing.

and if she gets the top grades anyway then that will look good on her cv but she’ll still have a great time at university and probably be more likely to do really well there eg get a first, than if she went to Oxbridge. If she’s as high achieving as you say she is then she will do very well out of life regardless.

Honestly both you and she are overthinking it. After a year at Uni she will be a young adult not a school girl, and they change, grow. What seems ultra important right now, will feel less so (campus v city etc) The first term anywhere is pretty stressful and they often want to be close to home but after that it usually settles and you see a lot less of them.
My girls were both straight A Alevel students.. one chose Exeter, the other Nottingham because they were perfect for the courses they wanted. We are in the middle. Neither drove at the time either. They managed, we managed. Neither wanted to stay local (Oxford) and medicine at Camebridge didn't appeal.
They had a great time, went into their medical careers and don't regret working hard at school!

On the basis that your DD is in Year 13, she is at liberty to decide not to study so hard and (potentially) get lower grades if that's what she prefers.

She should also be aware that students entering university with higher grades (and there are more students with A* grades than there are places at Oxbridge) tend to have better outcomes than students with lower grades. At the very least, it will make her university transition much smoother.

Getting top grades (which I will point out that your DC doesn't actually have yet so your whole post is premature) gives you more options. That's the point of them.

I am sorry but it really does come across as if you want bragging rights of what you perceive to be prestigious unis. Cambridge apart some of those you are turning your nose up at are as good or better than Durham.

Is it your daughter who believes she shouldn't have worked as hard as she have "just" to go to what you perceive to be lesser unis or you? She will find good school grades are often what separates out candidates for internships and graduate jobs in some professions going forward.

I can't help thinking you don't want her 5 hours away op. I think your experience of being at home for uni is colouring your views here. I know you will say I'm wrong but you need to be honest with yourself.
Plenty of shy kids go away to uni and make friends eventually. And its often the making of them.

Honestly this is ridiculous

A million years ago I had straight As at GCSE and at A level - it was really hard to get those grades then, we are talking early 90s.

I didn't get into Oxford, and went off Bristol sure that I would be the cleverest there. Nope. I was in the top cohort for sure, but there were many many people there who were as clever or cleverer than me.

Your DD will be among clever kids wherever she goes because there are loads of them! And I can assure you that in my long working life that the cleverest people I have worked with have definitely not all been Oxbridge graduates.

If she has applied to Cambridge and has an offer from Warwick. It hardly matters what she writes in the rest of the form does it??
With her specific criteria she isn't going to do better than Warwick unless she rules London and Durham back in.

Ok, this is where she starts to grow up. Find a good university that has the politics course she is most interested in at a university with a good reputation for the course itself.
From there, chose the campus / additional things of interest, then start visiting

The travelling home thing is ludicrous, just get the train, fly from Glasgow / Edinburgh/ Aberdeen if needed.
As for the grades, who cares, pick the uni and the course, if she has higher grades then great she'll get the offers no
Doubt.
Good luck!

3 A stars and an A?

I think you'll find it's quite hard to get higher grades than that.

DS wants to attend Warwick 3As needed for his course exactly the same as Oxford/Cambridge. He is looking like getting 2A* and As and it’s like a top 10 uni. You get what you put in. Its about being happy not prestige sometimes so if she’s telling you “better” unis are to far listen to her.

Is she in private or state school OP?
Those results won’t be good enough for Oxbridge if she’s at private. Unless she interviews exceptionally well but it sounds like she’s got a poor attitude to hard work.

Durham! Really? It's so unbelievably rah. I always thought Warwick would be better academically than Durham.

What do you mean by pushing herself? I hope she didn't give up on living a healthy and happy life in order to study like a machine. If she needs to study like that to excel, she won't have a good time at Oxbridge, nor will she make the best of it.

I hope she will start to enjoy learning freely and finding unexpected ways that her education enriches her life over her entire lifetime!

I can't bear children being disciplined into use-value learning.

OP would it blow your mind to know that EE offers were the Oxbridge norm when I was applying? We all (generally) carried on working hard and got As but it took the pressure off!

For most of the unis you've listed, the typical offer is only one grade lower than Cambridge (AAA as opposed to A*AA) There will be plenty students there who got higher grades than that. I think it's a bit of a reach to say going to Bristol or Bath as opposed to Cambridge will adversely affect career prospects. I'm yet to come across a company wholly staffed by graduates from only 2 universities (unless they're a group of mates who founded a start up or something)

Don’t be daft

There are plenty of high achieving young people out there and the majority of them don’t go to Oxbridge

the fetishisation of these institutions on here is insane

This is ridiculous advice. 18 year old can't dial their results up and down.

Imagine saying to a young person oh you only need ABB make sure you go the pub and don't bother working that hard.

I think this is where you step in as a parent and guide her. If she wants a stellar career and is bright then she has to pick London or Oxbridge with Durham as a back up. You can ask her whether she prefers distance or London uni. She can decide. There isn't a uni on the par with those. That's realities of life. Explain it to her, if she is bright then she'll get it.

My DD is at Sheffield, where her dad and I also went. I've just looked and the entry requirements for politics are AAB, is that too lowly?

Well here’s a great life lesson in efficiency and enjoying yourself. She could’ve checked last year the entry requirements for universities she was interested in and aspired to those grades. She could’ve then had more down time, a part time job, picked up a new hobby or spent more time with friends.

I could’ve been an Oxbridge candidate but decided that wasn’t for me, so didn’t pick up the extra curriculars I would’ve needed and instead walked the 4 As I got at A levels (before A* existed), and went to a Uni needing ABB.

Life isn’t about slogging as hard as you can all the time. It’s about understanding the next goal and working sensibly towards that. Of course, over performing is never going to hurt her and her learning will likely help her excel in her degree course too.