Parent of oxbridge candidate-peersupportneeded

[funnyperson]

OK so my DD is applying to Oxford for entry in 2011 and has a 75% chance of getting rejected so I am told by the Oxford website so I reckon a new thread would be helpful for us parents who may end up with joy or grief but in any event need to keep sane enough to support our loved ones. Any tips on maximising chances of success at this stage?

No passport photos handed in or even requested as far as I'm aware by DS...though I do remember DD running around looking for passport photos at some point - think that was after her offer though.

Hope so otherwise DS will be the faceless one...

'I am strict on his work submission and I require to know the outcome of tutorials and marks and attendance of lectures. I check he has the textbooks and I buy those required. '

My parents knew nothing about what I was up to at Oxford. I'd have died rather than let them know all my marks (apart from in important exams). Does you son mind all this?

Abr1de
Why bother to challenge a Mother who seems to have a good working relationship with her son? Anyway, Betelguese is not UK born and might well come from a culture with traditionally stronger family ties than is common in the UK.

Just off to bring DD back......will check kitchens in the college though I have to say it all looked spotless when we dropped her off. This morning she sounds like she wants to stay and (check out all the cultural stuff in Oxford...) go shopping.
Betelguese - I took a deliberate and conscious decision not to oversee DS university work in the first term of his first year. I figured if he didnt get stuff in on time or go to lectures then in the first term it wouldn't be a disaster but he would learn very quickly that his mum wasnt going to nag him all his life and take the responsibility himself. This was difficult to do at first but has really paid off and the pride I have that he has handed in his work on time and watching him do his own worrying about his marks is worth all the restraint on my part. I still talk to him though but I am able to be a more kindly mum as a result.

Regardless of where you come from, surely going to university is about growing up and sorting these things out for yourself?

I take my son's word for it though...how do you get to know DS attendance and marks? Does the tutor let you know? Does DS get a mark sheet?

Abr1de. You are right, it is an important rite of passage for UK students. I think not all cultures/individuals feel this to the same extent though.

It sounds like quite an undertaking for a parent!

Hello there Betelguese thanks for telling us all this it is really useful and interesting. I had heard from friends that Oxford is quite tough especially for the E and M course which is what your son is doing I think. However I had no idea that the college themselves do so much chasing up.
You are right in that the situation for my son is very different. He only has 4 hours of lectures and 4 hours tutorials a week and to be honest he looks forward to going so he hasn't missed one and indeed has gone to extra ones out of interest because he had too much time on his hands. I had thought text books would be a problem but much of the material needed is online and on the internet or in the college library so it hasn't been as much of an issue as I had thought. DS had to submit three essays this term and a class presentation all of which are assessed and if not submitted by the deadline, the marks towards the final degree are forfeited.
There are rules about students having to attend at least 90% of lectures and tutorials and a register is kept but as I said non attendance hasn't been an issue for DS.
I guess his very driven school education means university has been a nice surprise for him and he is blossoming.
He says he spends a lot of time reading etc but he does have a pretty girlfriend doing the same course so perhaps that sweetens the pill as well as the fact he loves his subject.
Never mind your DS will get a fantastic job in the end and mine will probably end up jobless.
I am taking on board what you say in case DD gets in though. She has come back with lots of lovely photos and has gone to sleep. She loved it there.

'Just heard the Lords have backed an increase in fees. Gutted and worried.'

Funnyperson, if your DD is going to university in 2011 then she will not be paying the £9000 tuition fees, She'll be on the regime as it is at the moment and stay on that until graduation.
Only students starting in 2012 will be paying the higher fees.

Also interesting seeing the comments regarding betelguese and wanting to know her DS's every academic move at Oxford.

My husband told me I was stalking DS1 by phoning him once a week in Nottingham!
I was ALWAYS interested in how he was getting on particularly at exam result time and he always did work very hard and got an MEng firstin the end. He would always phone me on exam result day, but I only did phone him once a week on a Sunday.

I do think you have to start letting them go and not be too much of a helicopter mum. Sometimes you hear them telling friends, aunties, uncles, grannies etc stuff you might not have heard and you just have to prick your ears up a bit more to learn a bit more of their lives you now know little about.

Regarding debt etc I read a very interesting thread on TSR about how many hours students are working to earn money. 10 hours a week seems a nice compromise for non medics. I will be helping DS find a job now he has settled in so that he doesn't get into unmanageable debt and also saves up a bit for travel in the summer. He also has to apply for Spring internships so there is a lot on.
I do agree with you that the pressures are high for this age group, mainly because to get a reasonable job they have to get a first class degree.
However I had 40 hours of lectures/seminars/lab work as a medical student and assignments and reading on top and managed to socialise a lot going to concerts theatres etc as did the rest of my year group and my parents never interfered. I am not planning to chase either DS or DD for their academics. I will be there to support them and ask them how it is going and hear with delight what they are studying so they can tell me what an ignoramus I am and save up a bit so that I can give them some money to be getting on with. Thats as much as I have the energy to do.

Goodness betelguese you make me feel quite the failure as a mum...I admit I was probably one of those awful pushy mums at the school gate for all three of my children at primary school and insisted my kids did over and above what was required for homework...but for my older two immediately they went to secondary school the school bag was off limits to mum and I had to rely on the school reports and parent teacher meetings to keep track. I remember in my DDs second year of secondary school being really taken aback when my DD's teacher told us at a progress meeting that her "homework was good...when it eventually got given in" . Up til then DD 9with me cracking the whip behind her!) has been a little teachers pet type! When my DH and I asked what we could do to help,suggesting that maybe the school could let us know if any more homework going forward wasn't done, the teacher raised her eyebrows and said "Ohh I think that is for your daughter to sort out don't you? How else will she get on in later life if she doesn't learn to organise herself and meet deadlines" She was 12 at the time!!!

So that kind of set the scene and DD1 and DS1 are remarkably self contained when it comes to work. DS is possibly better at talking about what he has done but only marginally. DD2 is slightly different, she's year 10 now so just starting GCSEs but has been suffering from CFS/ME for the past year and is mising lots of school. I've had to brush up on my knowledge to basically teach her at home in bite size chunks to ensure she keeps up with the class/work load. So I'm involved with her in a a way i wasn't really at that age for the older two.

For DD 1 I had no idea about these probation letters etc which you mention - blimey - should I ask her or can I assume that since I have heard nothing she is keeping on track?

I do miss being involved with DD and DS in a way but I put it down to growing up and fluttering their own wings which is as it should be....we talk about lots of other things, but not work..

As DS says , when he's earning silly money as a hedge fund manager I can't really be ringing him up to check he placed a buy or sell order on time...!!!

WIll postgrad fees go up?

My attempts at being a helicopter mum have been met with derision from both my children. For instance when DS studied economics I read Galbraith and Stiglitz (mainly because I bought them for him) when PPE was being considered I read Amartya Sen and when history was coming up I started on Disraeli but couldnt really abide Disraeli or indeed Gladstone and then with the psychology in the offing I read 'The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat' etc etc. However each time I attempted to discuss these in an erudite way with my offspring I was told that there was no way my addled brain could understand the basic concepts as well as theirs could and I was to stop being a helicopter mum. So that was that. I have read all these amazing books and failed to have an intellectual discussion with anyone about them. However I get the pleasure without the pain of being interviewed or examined. Hooray for being grown up.

WIll postgrad fees go up?

Well thats an interesting one and I suspect , yes.

DS2 is doing BSc Economics and I am thinking if he goes on to do a masters it will cost £9000 which is depressing as we are trying to get them both through uni debt free. Not sure if we will quite manage that with DS2 unless he gets any sort of a scholarship or maybe even lives at home that year and studies in London.

Its 3 years away so we will have to cross that bridge later.

funnyp . Love that story. Now where's Heat magazine.....?

postgrad fees - ahh yes, I hadn't really thought that one through. Are post grad fees government set? Off to research...

I have heard that the undergraduate economics these days everywhere is very maths based and modelling based and so quite hard and needing a lot of prep outside tutorials just to understand the concepts.
In this scenario what appears to work is the age old solution of asking someone from the year above for their notes, or even paying an MSc/PhD student for a bit of extra tuition.
I read an interesting book called the Indian Clerk about a maths genius who went to Cambridge and was intrigued to read that the undergrad maths students at Trinity Cambridge had very little contact time with tutors and so had to pay for extra tuition to do well in the degree.

Heat magazine? Some years ago I was asked whether I had read such and such in Hello magazine. I said 'What is Hello magazine?' LOL.
Heat magazine sounds ideal for me just now. (scuttles off to find one) Also I am going to make one of those papier mache snowmen you bash and sweets come out- I saw it on Kirstie's Home made Christmas.
Betelguese I hope you do not find all the discussion too personal the fact is I am in awe of your commitment and energy.