Would a person need to be officially GnT to consider Oxford?

But there's a significant difference between 5 A's and 7 A*'s.

As well as a difference between both of those and a straight run of 10, 11 or 12 A*'s.

I certainly haven't heard any outreach officer claiming that a straight run of GCSE A*'s are required.

Agree about subject making a difference, even within Oxford and Cambridge. On MN, entrance requirements for the two universities are often conflated and that causes confusion.

Admissions procedures also vary between subjects. What holds good for Medicine may well not hold good for History (etc.).

The extent to which subjects are directed from the centre also varies. A number of these procedures appear to be in a state of flux.

The synthesis?: it may be wise to ignore a lot of advice and apply anyhow, if a student is so minded!

I think it's absolutely right that outreach people aren't putting students off by saying you need a perfect clutch of GCSEs

I agree.

I think it's absolutely right that outreach people aren't putting students off by saying you need a perfect clutch of GCSEs. In the real world, all kinds of things can muck up your life and affect your schoolwork, especially if your school is too big and busy to really notice and help you out. If you get your act together in time for AS levels, then you should be allowed to make a full recovery.

And, as someone else has said, it depends on the subject as well.

Boffinmum - an oxford outreach (?) person told my friend that the minimum A* was really 7 maybe 6. She has still applied with less so it did not faze her

I might be able to clarify the stuff about applying to do maths at Cambridge, and not meeting your grade offer but getting a place anyway.

The thing that really matters is STEP - the special maths papers. So if you got the grade you needed in STEP - say, an S or a 1 - but fecked up an A level completely and got a B, then you really should still be given a place, because skills at STEP level are far, far more relevant than being able to jump through hoops at A level. And if you got a B, it's most likely because your Gran died or something.

All of this is based on my reading of the matter, but I think it offers a clue. Apologies in advance to anyone who knows better than me, though.

AFAIK to get an S in STEP is really quite brilliant, so to not let you in because you got an A level B would be bonkers.

V few geniuses at Oxford. I'd say out of those on my course at my college, there was 1 girl (German) in the year below who I would say was exceptional. The others all fall into the hard-working quite bright camp. (Myself included.)

By the way, G&T is hardly 'genius' - just top 10%.

Wrong Ella I make a point of doing exactly the opposite. It annoys me a lot when people claim that 10 A*'s the norm. I said precisely that on another thread a day or two ago. It deters talented applicants so isn't good.

That having been said, I do think representing Cambridge's standard offer as 5A at GCSE, 2 A's at AS and 3 A's at A2 isn't helpful. There's no suggestion that OP's DD is likely to be a Special Access applicant (though I'm happy to be corrected if I've missed something above).

I'd rather not name names BoffinMum, I'm not convinced it would serve any purpose. I've had reason to listen to a number of different outreach officers speak and all have been completely consistent. In each case the audience was high achieving however, so Kalidasa's point holds good. The message was: over 90% in AS modules (94% and above) and no question of any offer less than A*AA, preferably with a fourth subject at A2.

I'm very keen on the idea of differentiated offers becoming the norm. The new A must be extremely difficult for students in some schools to achieve. But I still believe that the overwhelming majority of offers made at Cambridge are currently at AAA. Again, I'm happy for you to tell me that across the university and all disciplines I'm wrong.'

i know a few people who went to oxford/cambridge. only one was your typical genius. the others had 3 As at A level but were more rounded with extra curricular activities, things like volunteering schemes not things that can be gotten by simply paying for it. i think oxbridge admissions comes down to more who you are rather than down to grades, i think they would took someone with 3 As but who volunteering with a charity for a long time rather than someone with 4As.

I think people have misunderstood how it works. Everyone who interviews is supposed to have attended the Staff Development training course, and on that course we are told to screen applicants for the whole of Cambridge, not just the college we are interviewing for that day. We give marks for the interview (and the other stuff on the UCAS form, plus any tests done on the day) and if the candidates reach above a certain threshold, they are pooled regardless of whether we offer them a place. That means other colleges consider them as well as our college. So that means if there is a good haul at one popular college, it does not mean that other good candidates lose out, because in theory they will be accepted elsewhere. So you are not necessarily competing for a place at one college, but rather across the whole university, and the number of places in each college has a little flexibility (it also depends on how many people are accepted for deferred places and so on). We start from the premise of trying to accept people, not reject them.

'Ella what I'm saying is that if students are turned away with A*AA having missed one grade in STEP then it's going to be very unlikely that many students will be allowed in with AAB. '

Why, though? There's no reason why one student's offer should have any impact on another student's offer, is there? Let alone why any student's missed offer should have an impact on the offers other students in the same year will have received several months before the failure you claim is so crucial.

I am not especially knowlegeable, just puzzled by that chain of reasoning. And I do think in all areas of academia, a lot of people seem positively to want to say it is harder than you can imagine. I find it depressing.

The Outreach team certainly are not going around telling everyone that they need a full clutch of A stars in order to apply, and if you have heard this them please PM with the name of the person or school involved, and I will raise it with the relevant people.

Thank you Kalidasa.

Oxford is asking for an A* in certain sciences this year but not Medicine and not in the Arts.

What BoffinMum says sounds right to me and as I said I have done admissions interviews very recently (though not this year). Some subjects have strict guidelines on offers across the university (e.g. maths at Cambridge I think?) but others will have more leeway and show some variety between colleges and subjects - e.g. Christ's Cambridge which until fairly recently (but I think no more) still gave some EE offers.

I do think too that parents'/schools' impression is bound to vary depending on their context - so for instance if your children and those of most of your friends are at top-rank schools with very good A level results and lots of Oxbridge entrants each year the offers are likely to be high and students are likely to be rejected if they miss them. A group of students who applied following a Sutton Trust summer school might have a slightly different experience.

I don't think Oxford have started demanding an A* yet, but perhaps they're going to this year?

Agreed that the grades you cite might just past muster for special access but that's all.

Would you out yourself by saying which discipline you were in? It's a big place!

Ella what I'm saying is that if students are turned away with AAA having missed one grade in STEP then it's going to be very unlikely that many students will be allowed in with AAB. The latter is what BoffinMum*'s first post suggested. Cambridge doesn't even particularly like re-marks after A Levels where a student has missed a grade.

I'm not clear where I've suggested that 'two big universities would bother to make up elaborate lies about their admissions procedures'! I don't think MN is yet an official sourse of information for either Oxford or Cambridge. But in the real world of admissions the grades BM cites are nowhere near what the generality of students applying to Cambridge have or have to have, they are not what the university itself puts out officially either and it's right that information is kept fairly consistent except for special access cases which by their very nature are different.

I can't because I would out myself. But honestly, your past and predicted exam results are weighted against typical results for your school and whether you are a Special Access student, and we also take other things into account including the interviews, for which applicants receive an average mark.

The guidelines I gave represent a guideline for potential applicants who are thinking of applying. A lot of people who are offered places have to fulfil much higher offers, but I have been part of admissions teams who have given places to applicants on the basis of these grades.

If we assessed on the basis of GCSE and A Level grades alone, we wouldn't need interviews, would we?

So, you're saying students sometimes get turned down when they miss an offer? Well ... yes. What else would happen?

Equally, some students receive offers of 2es as a compliment. This does not mean they are expected to get 2 es. I think you are reading too much into specific cases and maybe not trusting enough what Oxbridge says for itself?

I just find it quite unlikely that two big universities would bother to make up elaborate lies about their admissions procedure.

I'd really like BoffinMum to explain which department she's in because it worries me that what she's saying is so inconsistent with what's happening in most departments and with the guidance which is being handed to school students and their teachers by everyone else including very knowledgeable outreach officials who are supposed to convey clear messages about exactly what standard is required.

G&T is clearly not required ZAYC - in my year over 20% of the year got places in O or C - and that's not the definition of G&T is it. Then there were the oddballs like me that didn't actually want to go there and chose to go to a Redbrick instead due to the course. Its only an open-day - what harm can it do?

No I'm really not Ella. I know many candidates like those. I'm referring very specifically to students with provisional offers made in January who on results day in August have their places declined having achieved A*'s but not the required grade in STEP.

I also know some students are allowed their place despite having missed a grade, but AAB at the moment would be utterly exceptional, not at all run of the mill (which is what the use of the term 'blip' suggests).

Yellowstone - but BoffinMum is actually making these decisions at Cambridge!

I meant BoffinMum.... and Encouraging students to apply is one thing.

Looking back I can make sense of what you say on the basis that the * function on your keyboard wasn't working?