To ask was it all worth it for DD 1 to attend a super selective grammar school when she is so down on herself because she won't be going to Oxbridge like her three best friends.e

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DD 1 YR 13 is hoping to get offers from Warwick , Bath or Surrey Universities. However, despite potentially having the choice of three great Uni's is feeling extremely low this evening, unbelievable i know but with three of her closet friends likely to get offers from Cambridge and Oxford is feeling 'stupid!

Do these extra selective girls schools create the idea for normally very bright girls that if you are not Oxford/Cambridge bound you are mediocre .
Out of sympathy DD 2 year 10 who is at the same Essex Grammar school as now informed me she intends leaving the school next year and will not go to University.

so many derogatory sweeping generalisations about oxbridge students on here. It would be laughable were it not for the fact it makes improving access even harder than it is already. I was the one kid in the decade who got in from my comp. did I have a great time? Yes. Did I go on to become a mega millionaire and have a career only oxbridge could have prepared me for? No. But I make a reasonable living doing something I enjoy for some of the time. I’m getting on a bit so I set the bar low for work enjoyment so some of the time is a win for me would I have enjoyed another uni? Too right. Do I want my ds to go? Not particularly.

What amuses me is that some of the other uni names mentioned on this thread were at one time known to be the preserve of public schools - maybe not now, as I said I’m old and things change. I’m also lazy and CBA to look up figures on % public school entrants

Oxbridge courses tend to be wide in content and not single subject. This can put candidates off who know where they want to specialise straight away or are not strong enough across a range of subjects. To the pp’s saying other places are better for politics. They may well be but you can’t just study politics at Oxford or Cambridge or you couldn’t in my day. It was PPE and SPSS.

Oxbridge courses tend to be wide in content and not single subject. This can put candidates off who know where they want to specialise straight away or are not strong enough across a range of subjects. To the pp’s saying other places are better for politics. They may well be but you can’t just study politics at Oxford or Cambridge or you couldn’t in my day. It was PPE and SPSS.

I don't think that's true really. I accept you have PPE and SPSS, and Cambridge is a little odd in offering Natural Sciences.

But you can't do a joint honours degree at Cambridge (though you can fudge it), which means there are more specialised degrees than in many places. And there are some very specialised, very niche subjects there (ASNaC springs to mind).

I know many people who went to Oxbridge, most have very successful careers but not many enjoyed their university experience.

@moochew that's sad but not at all representative. I went to Cambridge, I had a brilliant time, as did the majority of my peers.

Maybe friendship groups tend to be formed of people having a like experience so nobody ends up getting a representative picture? Some colleges were definitely happier places than others which would make a difference.

Surely they cannot expect everyone to go there? At most a school gets say 5-10 oxbridge candidates? Most schools are delighted with 1 or 2. If they are telling them all that they will get in they are seriously misleading people.

It varies so much from school to school and across the country though, so I think to say at most a school has 5-10 candidates is an inaccurate generalisation, as a super selective grammar will obviously expect a higher than average number to apply to/get into Oxbridge.
Some schools never have anyone apply/go and having 1 or 2 would be a cause for celebration, whereas the school my children attended (a state comprehensive in one of those cities) regularly has 10-20 successful candidates.

Yes this is what the independent schools are aiming for so pupils are pushed towards Oxford and Cambridge, therefore I imagine she has in fact been told this. That’s what people pay the fees for to get that high level of academic achievement. Maybe not for your case but the majority of those at these level schools are aiming for Oxbridge.

Some colleges were definitely happier places than others which would make a difference.

That's definitely true. But also, it's such a tiny snapshot of anyone's life. The whole feeling of a place can change in just a year or two, and for undergraduates institutional memory stretches at most to four years. You end up with a situation where students will say with absolute certainty that 'everyone' has 'always' been stressed and pressured, and it is just 'the culture here'. Then things shift, for whatever reason, and there's a new idea about what has 'always' happened.

It's true of any university, but I think it gets intensified in colleges because they are so small.

Yet the leading independent schools in the country, with close ties to Oxbridge, only manage about 25 percent a year?

So even the top don't manage that?

However this is not the school's problem. It is yours and hers. She was encouraged to apply, she was given the predicted grades.

'Only' 25%.

That's masses!

It's totally fine and healthy that 75% of a school year group don't go to Oxbridge. Honestly.

Of course its massive and healthy, but people saying its the aim of the elite schools are getting it wrong, it can never be the aim for all students. The global top 10, UK top 10 maybe.

I don't know that that follows - it seems to me quite likely a school would push all students to aim for Oxbridge, knowing full well many wouldn't make it. I think it's deeply cruel and stupid, but there we are.

In a not totally dissimilar way, Oxbridge pushes all students to get firsts, knowing full well it's not a sensible goal for everyone.

@SarahAndQuack there are just 30 undergraduate course at Cambridge. There are more than 30 courses at Manchester just beginning with ‘a’. The route to studying sociology, or electrical engineering or just Arabic or social history, isn’t as clear at Cambridge as it is at other universities. It can be quite difficult to spot the course you want to do and have a feel for how much of the other stuff you will have to do before you get to study the area you want. So the OP’s daughter could not have studied just politics, she would have to have read either history and politics or human, social and political sciences.

YANBU - so much pressure these days - In my relevant experience graduates from Warwick, Bath and Surrey are far more employable than Oxbridge. They tend to focus more on employability skills.

Additionally there are far more career options post A level without the need for a degree or degree apprenticeship options out there now - learn whilst you earn without incurring the huge debt.

Best of luck for your daughter :) I’m sure she won’t need it - sounds like a smart cookie x

I think we're actually saying the same thing but drawing different conclusions, @lob?

Oxbridge courses tend to be single-subject (ie., they are not wide in content in the way 'English, film and media studies' might be, or 'History with French').

There are far fewer very general courses at Oxbridge (despite a few exceptions such as PPE, already mentioned).

Most universities run more courses with more overlap between them, and many also allow for joint honours degrees, which Cambridge doesn't.

However, I do agree with you that choosing any course, at any university, can feel a bit daunting because you have to check exactly what's in the syllabus.

Did you tutor her to pass the 11+ out of interest OP?

I find that kids tutored to pass an exam but who aren’t ‘naturally’ bright often suffer with self esteem at some point during their education. If you’ve made out grammar and super selective was the be all and end all, what do you think she’s going to make of not getting into a ‘super selective’ university?

I know Oxbridge grads who were not at ‘super selective Grammars’ and plain old state school. None of them tutored.

So I guess the answer is no, it wasn’t worth it. Like Private schools don’t always guarantee great grades - people assume an elite school does more by the association of status. It doesn’t. I speak as one who knows the state and private education system.

I’m sure she’ll love uni wherever she goes.

Wondering if my child went to the same school. She had exactly the same situation with her friends and if we had the choice again we probably wouldn’t make the same decision again. Massive pressure and she often felt less than adequate. However, she is now enjoying a non Oxbridge uni. Your daughter will hopefully find the right uni for her.

Did not do that much tutoring for DD 1 but we did loads for DD 2 who was desperate to attend the school her sister attended !

DD 2 thought the school was 'amazing' now is a bit disgruntled .However, in the near future will hopefully accept that with the high grades it achieves comes a bubble that presents exceptional achievement as ordinary . This being noticeable to her because her projected GCSE grades as of Feb yr 10 of 2 9 s, 4 8 s, 3 7 s and the really disgraceful 2 6 s are the grades of one of the weaker pupils !.

I never wanted her to follow her sister to the school , but DD 2 was determined to go . Thus, unlike her sister who required a little tutoring to pass DD 2 required 3 hours a week for a good 18 months to make the cut for the school.

I went to an absolute bog standard Scottish comprehensive in the late 90s. There were three of us encouraged to apply for Oxbridge. I went for an interview at Cambridge, and although I loved the place, was totally overwhelmed by it all. I didn’t get an offer, and I went to Edinburgh instead. Masters done overseas, and PhD from Glasgow. I didn’t love any of the universities I went to - but I did get something out of each one, and my ‘Not getting into Cambridge’ hasn’t held me back in a terrible way! I work in a different Uni now - and the one thing I would stress is that where matters less, the older you get. Finding the right fit is way more important than an institution top of a league table. Going and visiting, and speaking to the department will give way more of an idea on fit.
Also - if you’re tutoring teenagers to get through exams at school, university will be a struggle for them. Let them achieve at a level which works for them - and provide endless love and support. Then it’s less likely to be a terrible shock and challenge for her in September.
Good luck to her!

"i think the reason she did not is the fear of rejection from said Universities."

I think one issue is that it's often quite a public process to apply to and be rejected from Oxbridge. With most applications - job applications, for instance - nobody else need know. But with Oxbridge other students tend to know you're applying, particularly if there are special Oxbridge sets or sessions. And then some schools announce the names of the successful applicants, so people will know you didn't get in. This may be less the case at large 6th form colleges, I don't know.

So the feeling that other students will know you failed may deter some students from applying - obviously as adults we know you should never let other people determine your actions in this way, but I think it's quite a 'natural' feeling - fear of public failure/rejection, particularly at that age.

I don't think the school can be blamed here either. The child was encouraged to apply, her predicted grades are high enough. It was entirely her decision not to apply.

Obviously no reason she should have applied if she hadn't wanted to, and there are lots of other excellent universities available, but it's a bit silly to feel stupid because she didn't get in somewhere she didn't even apply to. Of course she could have applied and not had an offer. That wouldn't mean she was stupid either. Just that she wasn't one of the best candidates. There are far more suitable applicants than there are Oxbridge places available and PPE is one of the most competitive courses at Oxford.

My daughter went to Oxford. She didn't originally want to apply but I 'made' her go to an open day where she fell in love with it. I remember the talk given for her subject (not PPE) which did a lot to dispel the Oxford myths and stereotypes and made her feel that it was worth anyone applying if they were predicted at least AAA.

There’s a lot to be said for allowing a child to go to the school that they really want. Particularly if they’re prepared to work hard to get there. Good on DD2 for putting so much effort in.

Tutoring doesn’t necessarily push children beyond their natural ability level. Some children just need a bit of support in certain subjects, or more generally best practice for academic work, to achieve their true potential.

Don’t fork out for uni unless she wants to become a lawyer or doctor or similar. Get her a small business loan, and look for an idea that will best support her talents. Believe it or not you can ask google about business ideas. She will be streets ahead of any of her friends, much more savvy and hopefully richer. She will also gain valuable life lessons, something which no uni provides. A friends daughter went to a top uni, all she gained sadly, was a drug habit. Unless needed for a specific career path, uni’s are an over rated institution that keeps your child from being a part of the real world. That’s my opinion anyway.

Tutoring for the 11+ trains children to pass a test, and rather as with driving lessons and the driving test it's very often the case that the process doesn't actually equip the candidate with the skills that they will need in the applied context.

I'm not saying that this is necessarily the case with the OP but it's pretty common for parents to throw everything into the admissions process and then assume that they can leave the child to it once they actually get in. If you are sending your child to a very high-achieving school then you have an additional pastoral responsibility even over and above the usual parenting of teenagers.

I feel a bit odd with my criticisms of my daughters school because i am a supporter of selective education. My problem is that a school should not be selective to a point where projected grades in old money of 2 A* and 7 As for a year 10 girl are deemed average.

I think you can see with these projected grades DD 2 is correctly placed in a selective school. Thus, the tutoring we did was to ensure she was where she wanted to go also she has always kept up with the pace of work. The two subjects where she is one of the weaker pupils are in French and Math's where her projected grade 6 attainments are deemed poor. Grade 6 at these two subjects would but her in the lowest achieving 20 or so students in Math's/French.