To push DD to apply to Cambridge?

[AllieinWonderland]

So I'm relatively new to posting on mumsnet, but have been a long time lurker, so if I mix up the lingo a bit then apologies!
DSS1 got 9As 3As at GCSE, 4 high As at AS level, and is on track to exceed his AAA offer for Oxford.
Oldest DD achieved 13A*s 2As and a B at GCSE (the B in music - she had a panic attack in the exam and it was on a tape so she was unable to get the time back) and is looking on track for 5 high As at AS level in French, English lit, history, physics, and art. She is seemingly good at almost everything (triathlons at county level and has previously played and trained younger children in cricket and basketball, plays the cello, the xylophone, and the clarinet, won a local photography competition, always gets lead roles in an amateur dramatics group and solos in choir) yet has always struggled severely with self esteem, and focuses on the things she is bad at: sees her B in music as the end of her chance of going to good universities, can't bake or cook to save her life despite much encouragement and teaching, is awful at tidying (she is happy to do it but ends up gradually making more of a mess and gets flustered. Again, I've tried forms of 'teaching' and noting has worked). These latter two issues have led her to thinking she needs to stay at home for university and she is driving me mad by saying she'll go to the local university, which is really not a very good one at all, and the only others she'll consider are those with offers of "BBC" or below.
She has finally settled on studying English literature, and I took charge and booked her on open days at Warwick, Edinburgh, Cambridge, and Durham, and her school took the 'Oxbridge' candidates to Oxford for a trip. She hated Durham, didn't like Edinburgh, thought Oxford and Warwick were okay, but loved Cambridge.
In spite of this she is refusing to consider applying, says it's a waste of an application.
I don't want to push her, but I do want her to apply because she clearly loved it and is more than capable. All of her teachers have been saying it since before I can remember, and she reads almost constantly.
Aibu to try and change her mind?
Sorry for the lack of coherence here, my mind a bit of a mess!

LRD, oh yes, I definitely think academics should be providing some pastoral support. But they're neither selected nor trained for this, and in practice some will be better at it and more interested in doing it than others. Everyone will get a director of studies whose role is supposedly partly pastoral and who is supposed to know about any serious problems the student is going through, but mine was utterly useless and uninterested and that isn't uncommon. Also, I do think there's a gender issue in that women academics are often seen by the students as more approachable and therefore end up dealing with more of this stuff. When I was briefly an academic (not at Oxbridge) I ended up dealing with everything from getting a student assessed for dyslexia and extra support, to being a shoulder to cry on over myriad boyfriend problems, coming out as gay, and other issues involved in being young and leaving home for the first time, and negotiating extensions with other staff members. It was exhausting and definitely took away from my own research.

This is a bit off topic for the OP though, sorry.

Sorry, theworse, I feel as if I'm nit-picking, but - that's really not fair. At some universities, academic work and pastoral care may be closely linked. But it's far from commonplace. In fact, many universities have rules in place, for the reasons olives gives, to keep pastoral care and academic support far more separate than they are at Cambridge.

I also agree with theworst that academic and pastoral issues are generally kept very clearly demarcated at Cambridge and mostly the academics are just interested in your work. It is possible to defer a year but it's very difficult and not encouraged, and the university will look hard to ensure you don't gain any extra advantage by doing so (you're not allowed to repeat exams, for instance, no matter what the reason for you messing them up).

LRD, not to speak for theworst, but I think she might mean in part that no allowance is given for pastoral issues (extensions, resits, kinder marking) at Cambridge, unlike elsewhere.

but I disagree with the emphasis on students 'needing' to learn these things, especially in a gendered context

Yes, your nuance on this is of course correct! we're on the same page about the gendered nature of it (I wrote upthread on this thread about the heavy expectations on young women to "deserve" their very existence sometimes).

I guess where I teach, which doesn't offer the 1 to 1 or 1 to 2 Oxbridge tutorial system, which also operates as a kind of pastoral care system as well, we sometimes don't have so many opportunities to do this for young women. Which is why I teach a lot of women's writing/feminist theory modules - I get it in there, so at least 20 students each year get something that helps.

Cross posted.

olives, absolutely agree with all of that, down to the letter. And especially the issue of well-meaning academics (definitely including me!) having to learn that we need to defer to the professionals, even if students wish we were trained in these areas. But this is an issue at all universities, of course.

All I meant to get across was that I think there's a lot of effort and care - not indifference - in the Cambridge system. If you hear people talking about how lovely it was back in 1973 when Prof So-and-so spent an hour listening to your woes, and you contrast this harshly to today, when Dr Lady Academic tells you how to apply to counselling services, you're not understanding that there's a wider context that you are I are thinking about, and it's not about us not caring, it's about us knowing we need the professionals.

There is a serious point here about administration/structure, though, and I think this is what theworse is trying to say. A place that allows greater flexibility over deadlines, and perhaps relies less on final exams may work better for someone who is susceptible to anxiety/ depression/ self-esteem issues/ panic. This has nothing to do with academic attitudes or pastoral responsibilities, because it's not so much a matter of individual preference as institutional arrangements - it is a very practical, administrative element of the course that does vary from place to place and it has a very real impact on student experience.

olives - but allowances would be considered, and could be granted, just as elsewhere. This is in the Equality Act.

I've got various reasons for finding the thread interesting

I'm an ex-Cambridge English student. My daughter currently studies there.My stepdaughter is currently a primary school teacher - one of the stated future ambitions of the young woman whose future prompted this thread.I come from an abusive family backgroun. I volunteered on a phoneline which supported survivors of abuse including those who suffered from flashbacks and my partner spent over thirty years working professionally with children who had not been cared for well.

So - for what it's worth..

Adapting to student life is tough, even for those who haven't got a background that includes discovering a parent's suicide, witnessing abuse and having regular flashbacks.

Despite improvements in pastoral care over the last forty years, Cambridge remains a highly stressful environment. The short terms and high expectations mean that it's very hard to keep on track, so that even short periods of being unable to cope can end up creating more pressure around catching up.

In terms of future career paths, teaching primary school children is a hugely draining and challenging job, where the ability to switch off and take care of one self is absolutely vital if one is not to be burned out.

Having come from an abusive family affects your whole life. No, it doesn't doom you to being a victim forever, but if does shape the way you respond to pretty much everything. In my case, it's created problems around trusting others and emotional resilience. A lowered immune system, probably as a result of damaging family relationships meant that I had a long and serious physical illness as a young adult - after managing to get through university.

When I worked as a helpline volunteer I had the utmost respect for the women and men who rang up for support. They were all people who were doing their absolute best to cope and who had great strengths.. But their intimate relationships continued to be shaped by what what they had experienced in the past.

So I suppose what I'm saying is that too much reassurance may not be realistic or helpful. When things have gone seriously wrong, putting them more 'right' is a long and complex and unpredictable process.

It is to be hoped that everyone will get further forward ultimately, but my hunch it's likely to be a long job with a lot of false starts/ going backwards/going round in circles along the way.

And brilliant and helpful post from shovetheholly - what you say is so important (although what would I know - middle-class to the bone & for 500 years!). But still, I recognise much of what you say.

A place that allows greater flexibility over deadlines, and perhaps relies less on final exams may work better for someone who is susceptible to anxiety/ depression/ self-esteem issues/ panic.

Absolutely! Sorry if I was being dim in not following that point.

All I was trying to get at was that there is some flexibility in the system, and in some ways, it is more flexible than elsewhere. It depends on how your difficulties manifest. I taught a student at a RG university mentioned on this thread, whose anxiety was made much worse by having to attend classes whose fixed time could not be changed. I ended up offering her some skype supervisions for essay feedback, because she was just not able to cope with the rigidity of her timetable. Had she been at Cambridge, it would have been much, much easier simply to ask her to set times that were working for her.

I disagree supervisions can easily be changed. Everyone's very busy and there's generally a rule of no changes without 24hours' notice, to stop students cancelling at a moment's notice when they haven't done the essay! You also have to get in 8 supervisions per subject in 8 weeks so there's little or no flex.

Of course there are special arrangements for exams, such as extra time and a less threatening environment, but there's no such thing as extensions, resits and it's hard to the point of impossible to get pastoral circumstances taken into account in the marking.

I once cancelled a supervision because I had flu, and this was noted disapprovingly in my end of term report from that supervisor! In general even though the teaching is mostly 1:1, the academics aren't interested in pastoral issues but in teaching you the subject. In my experience.

Sorry, that's 8 supervisions per paper, or roughly up to 16 in 8 weeks, in my subject. With an essay prepared beforehand for each. Plus technical classes on top. Not a lot of room for catching up if you're ill.

No, dissertations (which are what I was referring to, in the context of extensions for coursework) are supervised over four hours, and potentially over slightly more than a term.

Supervision norms for most papers are 8 hours, or with language support, 12, but I don't think this means there can be no flexibility at all. It is immensely easier to reschedule a class on, say, Monday, to a Wednesday, if you have only two students to deal with, rather than 20. It's also possible to start at 12.15 not 12, if the only issue is waiting for your single student who is struggling. You cannot do that if you have a class of 15 people, and you're waiting for one straggler, however much you might wish to.

dancing - I don't think you have to walk in someone's shoes to be able to empathize (where on earth would we be if that were the case?). Thanks for your kind words and understanding.

LRD - you make a really good point that what is good for one student is bad for another. It is individual and there will be no place that is ideal for every set of circumstances! I think there is something very useful in finding out the practical nuts-and-bolts of how a course works and trying to assess how much help/flexibility there is for a particular set of circumstances belonging to a particular student.

I would urge the OP and her DD, and anyone else in the same boat, to do the legwork and make up your own mind, rather than trusting reputations. (If you suffer severe exam stress - and you can have this and still perform tremendously well in them - a course with all-finals is possibly not a great idea).

In terms of not trusting reputations, an anecdote: I did an OU degree a few years after finishing my PhD (it's a long story) and I thought there would be loads of flex in terms of deadlines etc. The reality was, there was far less than at the RG university I was teaching at, largely because of the way that courses are administered and 'taught'! (I don't have many good words to say about the OU's institutional reality, though I am profoundly supportive of the idea of the place).

Oh god! Get off the poor girl's back! At this point, it's 100% her decision and 0% yours.

READ THE THREAD Zingally

It seems to me that it would be a good thing if there could be the academia version of work experience for students wanting to join such and such a Uni bit like the workplace, courting a mate even.

Course with my knowledge of how a Uni is /isn't run that may be a totally daft idea;!.

It doesn't matter if aUniversity has the best pastoral care in the country if the person needing help is not going to access it.

One of my DC had some mental health issues at Uni but, fortunately, he dealt with it well and sought out help for himself. I didn't need to do anything as he clearly had a handle on what was happening and what he needed to do about it. He was fortunate that he loved his University and his course and that he had supportive friends and flat mates. I wonder how he would have got on elsewhere. His pragmatic acceptance of his problem was his saving grace. If he hadn't acknowledged what was going on and hadn't sought help I hate to think what would have happened. At the very least h would have not been able to complete his studies and I am sure he wouldn't have been able to make the complete (I think?) recovery that he has.

Who knows how the OPs DD will be in a years time but at present she doesn't sound like she has the self awareness to look after herself.

Lots more useful stuff here since I last checked - even though some of it isn't directed at me!

I have read the whole thread again, and reported a number of my own identifiable posts. The thread may subsequently make a little less sense, but a lot of the useful, generalised content is still there and can easily be taken and applied to other situations.

I think my early blasé language and expression towards everything was a lack of comfortability posting online - which was also why the story was drip fed. I didn't really want to post so much of my life, and didn't feel ready to talk about my daughter's mental health in a serious way on a forum. I was just getting to grips with sharing, and didn't want to let out too much.

I now seem to have become a weeping, open book of feelings. Amazing that a thread has done that

I started today - had an argument (!!) with DD after giving her my honest opinion - that I think a gap year is what she really needs, and what I would recommend. She wasn't happy, and is now at a friend's sulking and refusing to reply to texts. Oh well. Regular teenage behaviour isn't something I want to complain about! Think it will be a long road, maybe not to recovery - maybe just to coping-with-a-nervous-disposition. Get the feeling we'll have a lot of bumps.

I also will be far more vigilant and less denial-y (cannot think of the word I want) with my other DCs. I'm sure they're all affected in some bigger way than I previously acknowledged, so will be on the look out for that.

I've tried far too hard to "get on with things" and honestly feel relieved at the idea of taking some steps back. I'm even considering cutting down my work hours! (Currently do 12 hours a week so any less might be basically nothing but...) this family needs a good recovery period. A stressed out, tearful, angry, sad, confused, mistake-ridden recovery period. Then we can move on a little. But still be teary, confused and damaged. Just damaged in the okay ways, because everything will never make sense. I shouldn't have stayed with the arsehole, I should never have gotten involved and I will regret that forever. But at least it's given me five of the most wonderful DCs.

This thread was just what I needed so thanks MNers. to all, even those who think I'm a terrible mother!

OP well done. Try replacing denially in your head with copingy. You were all coping because that's how you felt you had to be. Now that's not working for everyone do it is time to regroup and find a new way, which will be all the better for being able to say "You know what, it was awful, and hard, and difficult and that is sad for everyone." And yet you have come far and will go further.

AllieinWonderland Did err, anyone ever tell you Allie that being a parent is the hardest job in the word;!

But i reckons your doing well and trying, that's what's important:-)

My DD would say I'm very trying, that's for sure.

I've witnessed on Thursday reaction of students who didn't get high enough marks in A* needed for Cambridge. This was at my DD's high achieving school so 95% of the rest got exactly what they wanted in grades and offers.
For the high achievers as they are they really don't need that kind of knock back, they are applying for a remark but who knows if they get any extra points in STEM subjects. maybe easier to get it in Humanities.
Please keep that in mind when applying.