support thread for those of us who have DC submitting UCAS applications in the next few months

[mumoverseas]

Thought we should all get together and calm each other down/mop fevered brows/hand around glasses of wine etc. We've seen other go through it over the past few months and it will be our turn soon.

DS has just got his AS results which were not too bad. AAAB. The B suprised him as it was for maths and we'd expected a B for french which he had not studied for a few years as sat his GCSE early. He says he will re-sit one of the maths modules and one of French ones to get a higher A

He (we!) has been considering various Unis over recent months and has visited 4.
PS is all in hand as is extended project (whatever all that is about) but time is creeping by and not long now til his mid Oct deadline (one of his choices is Oxbridge)

There has been so much in the papers over recent days about the lack of places at University at the moment and stories of how so many good students did not get places as they didn't put 'insurance' choices.

How is everyone else coping and how do we get our children to make realistic choices?

oh dear - I am sorry to hear that news, I was hoping we would all get invitations

the kidsmom - sorry you had bad news too.

morning all, very sleepless night in the overseas house
seimum it was the place that shall never be mentioned again DS still hopeful about the 'new Oxbridge' (Durham)

I'm just pretty shocked he didn't even get an interview. I know he is PFB and I'm a little biased but his teachers said he had an excellent PS,one of the best they'd seen,was predicted A*AAA, he had done 2 x WE in a solicitors office, a mini pupilage and done outdoor clerking as well as studying GCSE law in his own time when 14 and getting an A grade. What the hell do they want? I can't see how he can have possibly done any more to show his interest in the subject.

To be honest, I wish he'd applied for Cambridge (which is what he'd wanted to do for years as he loved it after going to a 4 day law conference there) but one of his teachers persuaded him to apply to Oxford instead.
Right, that is my whinge over

DS very keen on Durham but I have to confess about preferring him to go somewhere slightly closer to home (not saudi of course but our UK home) Durham is a very very long way and I wouldn't be able to visit him easily

thekidsmum so sorry about your news too. Arseholes to them

JGBMums am [shocked] that you think I'm the sort of person that would eat a Greggs sausage roll! M & S please. No doubt you think I'd wash it down with a fruitshoot

Hope everyone is doing ok? At least I can get on with my life now and not spend every waking moment lurking and refreshing on student chatrooms/hotmail

i am so sorry mos, what have school said? have any of his friends had any luck? thinking of you all. (you over for christmas?)

MOS and thekidsmom ? very sorry to hear your outcome. I know how you feel because I actually spent the first 3 days at the beginning of this week psyching myself up in preparation for bad news from Oxbridge. This is so that the crash won?t hurt so much should it comes, if at all it comes. And then late Wednesday evening, DS e-mailed saying he?s got an interview. Even before I read the e-mail proper, I had a feeling it was good news because DS only e-mails once in a blue moon. True enough, it was a Cambridge invitation. Feeling slightly better now but still it?s not over yet. Not until the fat lady sings. And let?s hope she sings me a happy song in January.

gosh, you lot are up early? Shouldn't you still be in bed on a Saturday?

Thanks MABS no one else has heard yet. Hope he isn't the only one rejected (sorry, that sounds very selfish of me but hope you know what I mean?) Not back for Christmas, DS1 and DD1 are coming out here. Think he needs a delivery from hotel chocolat

peteneras well done to your DS. When is his interview?

Thank you MOS. Interview on 6th December at Trinity.

i am jetlagged Mos :( sure he won't be only one without an interview. I am at school Mon for meeting if you want me to deliver anything? x

peteneras good luck to your DS for the 6th.

MABS might take you up on that

Thanks for all the kind words, folks. I'd pass them on to DD if I thought she'd hear them. She's gone off to work this morning so that will be a distraction...

What she cant understand is why she didnt even get an interview. She has all the stars on her grades you'd expect, and all the plaudits. It could be down to the ELAT or the written work but maybe we'll just never know (although they say they'll feed back)

Luckily DS is home for the weekend and he's been throguh exactly the same thing so was able to talk to her last night....

Personally, for this year group, I'm happy with any RG and she already has one offer so in the long term we'll be just fine...

thekidsmum I feel your pain. Its the not knowing. Its DSs first real rejection and I think we both keep wondering why? He sounds so good on paper and thought he'd done really well in the LNAT. DH thinks its because he is not double-barrelled

At least our DC have other offers. DS has 3 and 2 are RG so he is very very lucky. Also, I was talking to someone this morning whose nephew was offered a place at Oxbridge but flunked their A2s. How awful would that be next August to realise your'd lost your place! Rather this way although it would have been good to get an interview.

Well done to this with offers/interviews. Sorry to those with bad news, but poo to Oxbridge! DS1 had interviews at Cambs, was pooled and had to go back for more interviews at another college who picked him out of the pool. Found out a month later that he hadn't got a place. Suppose was good to get all the interviews, but just was v stressful really - prolonged the agony. Got 3 other places (for medicine) and has been v happy at his med school. So although they may be disappointed now, ultimately your DS/DDs will be v happy with their other choices.

You're absolutely right mumof3teens - our DS went through the whole interview process with 3 diff colleges at Oxford 2 years ago and he got the 'no thank you' envelope a couple of days before Christmas and now couldnt be happier where he is, so it comes right in the end.

Que sera, and all that...

It is very hurtful when you receive the rejection (I still remember mine clearly). DH's was worse he is brilliant at Maths and everyone had just expected him to get into Oxford. Not only that his older brother had gone to Cambridge the year before.

It does fade though and I am glad that I at least applied to Oxford rather than wondering whether or not I would have got in. I wear the "Oxbridge reject" badge with pride.

Fingers and toes crossed for Durham MOS I absolutely loved my three years there and so did DH.

Second here for Durham,and really although it is very far north (and v cold at the mo)the transport links are pretty good ,straight up the A1 or direct train,much easier than say Exeter .My dh did Law at Durham btw

thanks for all your kind words ladies, very kind of you.

Like you say, at least he gave it ago.
Fingers crossed for myy DS at Durham (for law mrswoodentop)

mos sorry to hear the news. You are probably not in the right place to hear this ATM but I'll say it anyway.
Everyone gets knockbacks in life. The earlier they happen, the sooner you learn to deal with them. So it's a rotten thing to happen but, as they say, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger.
Good luck to all.

thekidsmom and MOS - I do wonder about the Oxbridge entrance tests/work to be submitted. It seems that they are the only things considered when it comes to deciding who gets an interview - certainly DS1 was told by his school last year that he was a couple of marks off the cut off pass mark for the TSA ( the exam for PPE) which is why he didn't even get an interview - his personal statement and reference would not even have been read by Oxford. All that is a bit odd isn't it - a multiple choice exam taking precedence over his knowledge of and interest in economics and politics and his exam performance to date. But I guess they get so many fantastic applicants they are able to take such an arbitrary test.

And yes, i know he's very lucky to get an interview but he's heard nada from his other four choices.

senua thank you, I know you are right but he is my PFB The thing that gets me, is that he is so very bright. I struggled as a mum with a young child/ren working part time to qualify in his chosen career and I couldn't have written anything nearly as good as what he had written. Makes me laugh when I read about parents 'writing' their DC's PS as if I'd have done that he'd have stood no chance of any offers anywhere

Fififi seriously! (said in grays anatomy voice) They really don't read the PS or anything else initially and just go on a multi-guess exam? DS doesn't even know how he got on at LNAT. Presumably badly which then rules out his second choice Uni which also requires LNAT.

Am so glad I started this thread, you guys are fab, really supportive. I love you all (said in Oscar style voice)

Good luck to everyone who is still waiting to hear or who has interviews coming up

Ooh! Another adult who watches Grays Anatomy - thought I was the only one amongst a load of teenage girls ( DD2 and her mates who all think every headache is a brain tumour!)

But, no I don't know if what i said is "seriously". But it is certainly what DS's school said to him. Could have been a ploy to make him more confident that his other choices wouldn't also turn him down, but it did seem from the reults sent out in about March if i recall that all those above a certain score got an interview and all those below didn't. This meant that some boys not as strong on results/predictions got an interview while others didn't, though most of thosae didn't actually go on to get offers.

xx

I LOVE Grays. TV here in KSA is shite so we watch dvds all the time. I have a very melodramatic/hypocondriac (sp?) teenage daughter too.

I am now regretting my decision to have 4 children. The thought of going through all this again 3 more times is very traumatic.
If I HAVE to go through it again though I am wondering whether to get DC3 and 4 to take up rowing to increase their chances of Oxbridge?
Yes, I know they are only 4 years old and 21 months and we live in a desert with no lakes but............

DD1 has been invited to visit Bath, but hasn't had an offer (yet, fingers crossed ), and their website says they're not making Maths offers till January as they've had so many applications. I thought you only were invited to visit after an offer was made? Seems strange?

sounds hopeful shrinking. From what I've read (all my cyber stalking) it appears that if you get an invite then an offer should follow. Fingers crossed

MOS have you checked Durhams own tracking system to see if your sons application has been passed to a college. If it has this is as good as an offer.