To think that Oxbridge is overrated?

[colouredcrayons]

And we should encourage our children to focus on more than just two top universities. They don’t even give you better careet prospects these days either.

We heard part of a phone-in on the radio this week where the subject of essay-writing services was being discussed. DD is a 2nd year at Cambridge and remarked to me that there is no way that she would be able to submit an essay she had bought because in her 1-1 or 2-1 tutorials, anything she writes is scrutinised and she is asked to explain her reasoning etc.

She is racking up student debt by being there BUT I think Oxbridge is better value in terms of the contact time she gets in these supervisions than other RG institutions where tutorials or lab sessions have tens of students per academic.

I think it just a fashion label - like a Ralph Lauren jumper compare to primark jumper

There are some really interesting comments on here, some I have different experience of.
I work for a US company, with a highly sought after grad scheme and I promise you that Oxbridge buys you no advantage whatsoever at grad selection. However I can imagine that there are some professions where it will be an advantage.

@Numptysod 🙄 What a ridiculous comment. All you have to do to afford Ralph Lauren is be wealthy. Are you saying that all you have to do to get into Oxbridge in the 21st century is be rich?

I'm sure Numptysods comment had no other purpose than mischievous provocation ...

Numpty by name numpty by nature

It was supposed to be light hearted 😊😊

Oh....

lacked the other extra curricular activities that many WC don’t have as I didn’t play an instrument, sail, do some amazing gap year, do the DOE and so on.

I have said this plenty of time, but it bears repeating. Oxford (and Cambridge, AFAIK) tutors are absolutely not interested in this stuff. I am an Oxford tutor. I have spoken to many tutors in my College in different subject. I have spoken to many tutors in my subject from other Colleges. No-one is interested in this stuff, nor is is it part of official selection criteria.

More generally, Oxford and Cambridge provide a very specific type of education (in Colleges, in tutorials, usually with fairly traditional courses and assessment). It is brilliant for some, but not all.

I agree with you, irregular. We had a talk from someone from Cambridge on admissions at our son's school, and it was very clear that they have moved to a more objective "points-based" approach to selection, which is all about your aptitude for your subject. I was very surprised that he specifically ruled out any interest in your extra-curricular activities.

That's a change from my day (30 years ago), where you felt that they were looking for "rounded" individuals who did more than just study, but I assume they have realised it creates a barrier for some applicants. I don't doubt there are some crusty old dons who are looking for someone who fits a mould ("he's a real Trinity man!"), but I sense they are the dinosaurs and more are as you describe.

If I were running a world-class lab in an Oxbridge department, it makes sense that I would looking for someone with a brilliant mind for scientific detail and couldn't care less whether you've built a school in Africa. Of course, there's the suspicion that they bend the rules, eg to admit a someone who can row, or whose father is offering to donate several millions, but I've got no evidence that they do.

Of course, there's the suspicion that they bend the rules, eg to admit a someone who can row, or whose father is offering to donate several millions, but I've got no evidence that they do.

Given the revelations recently from ivy leagues in the USA would anyone be even remotely surprised if the same was going on over here???

I don't think this could happen at Oxford. (DH and i discussed this as we have knowledge of both systems from DH's jobs). There are too many different people involved at Oxford and the development office has no mechanism to influence the people making admissions decisions. You would have to bribe a dangerously large number of people!

IMHO Oxbridge offers something intangible beyond just the teaching. Spending my formative years in Oxford, I used to go to the Union with a friend's brother, sneaked into the odd lecture and certainly benefited from the social aspects.
I applied to Cambridge and was shocked to receive a low offer with no entrance exams or special papers needed.
The teaching is variable - depending on what you want out of your course and who is teaching. I hated some of the set papers. However, the university ran a course for me - I was the only one sitting a particular paper one year so had one on one tuition for the entire course. It was fantastic and eye opening.

I loved the supervision culture - often it was 2 or 3 of us for a couple of hours a week on each paper.
Loved the amazing range of people there and let's not forget the May Balls and formal hall.
Having said that it was the first time in my life where I actually had to do some work and think and the first time I ever revised. Being challenged academically was a shock to start with.I just wish I'd made more of it now. I'd give anything to go back and spend days holed up in the UL reading rare books.

You would have to bribe a huge number of people, but also, if it were that easy to fiddle things, the very small number of crusty dons would be massively outweighed by the far larger number of young lefties desperate to diversify the intake.

Crusty dons don't do admissions. They get professorships and sit around writing books and drinking port. They farm out admissions to far lowlier people, who generally don't adore the reputation of Oxbridge as a toff's paradise and want to change it.

There have been fairly well-publicised kerfuffles about cash for places at Oxford down the years, like this one, where a donor and old member's son wasn't admitted to Trinity:

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1365968/Admission-by-donation-ruled-out-at-Oxford.html

and this one which happened while I was at Oxford, and which is rather murkier -- journalistic sting, Sunday Times reporter posing as a banker, two Fellows involved fired, but suggestions that cash for places had happened at that (comparatively poor) college before:

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1388770/Two-quit-in-Oxford-cash-for-places-scandal.html

On the other hand, the journalist who tried the same sting at three other colleges at the same time was rebuffed at all the others.

I have to say that I imagine that this would be less possible than ever now, when there is such scrutiny on Oxbridge's admissions.

I can say of my own experience at one of the most public school-dominated Oxford colleges in the 1990s that I just applied and got in. I had no connections, no coaching, no school support, and I'm from a family where no one before me had even finished secondary school, far less gone to university.

Great architecture. brilliant parties and with only 3 formal teaching hours a fortnight and a college library open 24/7 so I could structure my study (or lack of) as I wanted - what's not to like?