Oxbridge degrees - worth it?

[Pombearsandnaiceham]

What do you think? Would be interested to hear your thoughts :)

There is a general problem with funding for Disabled students - it has been cut and "farmed out to Universities" as far as I understand from a friend who is a Dean at a University the opposite end of the spectrum from Oxbridge, which is causing real issues and at times a lack of support.

I don't know anyone who got pooled @TamaleHot, except those at St Hilda's - I had friends across most colleges

It's a bit of an exaggeration to say most people get pooled. Most places are vastly over subscribed. You're much more likely to get rejected OR get a place at your first choice college than to get pooled.

Tamale it was St Anne's and it was over 30 years ago, but I have been back quite a few times since.

I don't want to invalidate your experience Tamale but it bears no resemblance to mine or to that of family/friends who have been much more recently.

I had many friends outside my college and got introduced to their college friends rather than being rejected.

I can't comment on disability issues, but re funding/pooling and friends I believe you are just plain wrong. Sorry.

I don't think most people get pooled, unless it has changed a great deal in the last years. My experience is that only a small number do.

Also most of my most longstanding friends are those from other colleges who I met through extra curricular activities

(waves to @YippieKayakOtherBuckets)

I found people to be incredibly friendly and I made lifelong friends both in and out of college

I'm really sorry you had such a miserable time @TamaleHot, and of course for some people it is anything but sunshine and roses. But thankfully that's not the case for most, and just because it happened to you doesn't mean others can't make friends outside college

mateysmum Are you white? If things were so great, why was a recent black graduate of the university made out to be a security threat for going to see his friends at another college?

TamaleHot is absolutely 100% right about rape culture and academics living in a bubble. I was at Magdalen in the 90s and this was my experience exactly - though I would add that the considerable racial abuse suffered by ethnic minority students all came from townies, as far as I'm aware.

If you're doing law or a STEM subject and have a thick skin, go ahead. For arts degrees, the same observation about thick skin applies, but you'd better have the right school tie and plenty of money to support yourself through internships (if those are still a thing) or no job for you. I spent the latter half of 1999 on the dole before giving up on finding a graduate level job and going back to waitressing. I suspect that mine is not an uncommon story, and I feel that on balance my degree wasn't worth anything like the hard work, stress and opportunity cost. This in spite of the fact that, as you can probably tell from my dates, I paid not one penny in fees!

Brexit permitting (my circumstances are complicated and I don't want to derail the thread) my children will go to university in France.

Agustarella Thank you for acknowledging the real experiences of myself and quite a few others!

The privilege implicit in some people's replies: it's like they can't accept that Oxbridge can be really horrible for people, just because they had a good time.

TamaleHot posted: "If you end up in a college where no one is friendly towards you and you're deliberately excluded, then it can be extremely alienating. Yes, you can participate in extracurricular stuff, but if the students you meet through sports or drama already have a group of friends from their own college, they very rarely will reciprocate your efforts to socialise outside of the stuff you're doing."

This, exactly! I'd be the first to admit that I'm crap at networking, but I ended up excluded for the stupid reason that there wasn't enough room in the first floor halls (Waynflete Building if anyone remembers that) for me and a handful of others, who had to live in a college-owned house on Longwall Street instead. I didn't socialise much with the housemates because, with the exception of an Indian guy who just stayed in his room and worked, they were all hard-drinking laddish types and I wasn't, and our living situation meant necessarily being unable to go to the impromptu parties in the Waynflete (which I admit I would probably have hated anyway). My subject group were all from major public schools (including the former Head Boy of Eton, don't get me started!!) and formed a pre-existing clique which did not admit people from minor public schools, or worse.

There were about 500 undergrads in the college at the time if I remember rightly, of whom I probably knew less than a hundred by sight - the loudmouth inebriated bullyboy kinds who would prop up the college bar every evening. The other 400ish were probably people who lived to work like the Indian medic I mentioned, or people like me who lost their confidence and became hermits after their social life crashed and burned in their first term!

Actually, in spite of being very down on Oxford from a careers/value for money perspective, I reckon I would have survived much better socially if I'd listened to my classics teacher and gone to St Hilda's instead. Perhaps not a very useful observation these days, as the admission of men will have changed the atmosphere considerably.

No-one has denied that some people have a negative experience, they have taken issue with your sweeping generalisations and insistence that everyone who isn't a white ex-public schoolboy will feel miserable and unsupported. In my first year the finalist in the next room tried to kill himself - he was as white and public school as they come.

@TamaleHot sorry, cross posted there! I remember a comment Bill Oddie made in an interview after an Oxbridge student had committed suicide. He said something to the effect that it was surprising suicides were so few, given the academic pressure students were under and the social isolation experienced by many. I wasn't suicidal as a student myself, just a bit demoralized, but his comments chimed with me and I thought it was a brave and honest remark given that many highly successful Oxbridge grads seem to want to sweep under a carpet the experiences of their less successful peers.

SchnitzelVonKrumm
And anecdotally the pressure placed on those white public school kids is often immense & they face me that health issues but it's just not spoken about.

This year I taught a y7 child (middle class) who doesn't want to be a doctor and is terrified of telling his parents in case they are disappointed. He wants to go to Oxbridge and study chemistry or physics instead - hardly a disappointing ambition for a 12 year old.

Rape culture, lack of understanding about Consent, even racism were present at every University I went to in the 80/90s. Oxford was the first place which talked about Date Rape when I was there, it had a vastly overwhelmed Counselling service, and there was no talk of the issue of young men being preyed upon by more senior men (young women were beginning to be seen as "out of bounds" or "dangerous").

Interested to note op hasn't made any comment, also would like to know why the original question

@TamaleHot I'm truly sorry you had such a miserable time

I'm not dismissing your experience - of course people have a desperately unhappy time. Some people thrive, others done. The same is also true at other institutions - although the circumstances at Oxford and Cambridge are obviously substantially different to other universities

No one is saying your experiences aren't valid, or acceptable, or that everyone has a wonderful time and no one struggles or finds it a difficult and miserable time

it's just disingenuous to make the generalisation that because you had such an awful experience, that it must be like this across the board, and the entire institution is rotten

*others don't

And anecdotally the pressure placed on those white public school kids is often immense & they face me that health issues but it's just not spoken about. Yep. The people I knew who had mental health issues, serious drug problems, eating disorders etc were ALL from public schools. Whereas working/lower-middle-class comp kids (like me) tended to shrug off all the pressure off, knowing we'd exceeded expectations just by being there...

"Worth it" - it's only worth it if you WANT to do it. Nothing is worth it unless it's something that gets you to a place you actually want to be.

I graduated in 1979 from an all women's college at Oxford. Having gone to a mixed comprehensive and grown up on a council estate, I stuck out like a sore thumb amongst all the girls from Cheltenham Ladies and Roedean. I was totally intimidated. Also, I was a very immature eighteen year old and having no real responsibilities other than to attend my weekly tutorial and even having my room cleaned and my bed made for me probably didn't do much to assist the maturing process in my case. However, it did get me away from the place I'd grown up in and showed me another side of life.

Yeah. They boost you in jobs market.

It was definitely worth it for me. I was at King's, Cambridge, in the mid 90s. I come from a state school and deliberately chose a college which had a high state school and female ratio and was known to be politically left wing and less stuffy/formal than many colleges.

It is definitely worth choosing colleges carefully as they are so different. Eg in my year, at Peterhouse there was only 2 girls in the year. Both dropped out. Magdalene was very macho/sporty/public school from what I saw.

I loved my time at King's, though with hindsight I wish I'd taken more advantage of the world class teaching and drunk less! Still managed to come out with a 2:1 though.

I am still great friends with all my King's friends now, 20 years after we graduated. It was so lovely, after years of being bullied or isolated at school for being too "swotty", to be surrounded by others who were as bright and motivated as I was! Socially, it was the making of me.

Intellectually, I did find it difficult to be average after years of being the best, and for a long time I lost confidence and thought I'd got in by "accident" and everyone else was brighter than me. It took me a while to work out this wasn't true.

The supervision system can be quite intimidating for introverts and the system does rely on you being motivated enough to do your own work.

I've felt having Cambridge on my cv has been helpful, but I'm in law where it's very academic, hierarchical and traditional. When I see oxbridge on CVs, I consider it a good starting point and it would help them get an interview but not the job.

Reading all of these 'oxbridge fab' replies and smiling - how many of us are putting ouor great academic qualifications at top universities to good use as housewives and mothers?!

I am sunshine11 - I'm a partner in a law firm as well as mum to 2 children. Have always worked part time since having them. But if I was a SAHM, I don't think my experience or education would be wasted.

In my opinion - it's massively worth getting an Oxbridge/Durham degree.
The level of education is outstanding; you are pushed very very hard and the skills you develop are excellent.
Having been to the above, plus an ex-Poly for a year, I would choose Oxbridge every time.
It's just a different level and it definitely opened doors for me in my line of work.
I didn't find it snobby (but I chose my colleges carefully).