Oxford pooling system

[PeterTavy]

Can anyone please explain the Oxford pooling/ two college system to me?
DD has very belatedly (and somewhat optimistically, as she good but below- average-for Oxbridge GCSEs) decided to put Oxford down as one of her Uni choices.
I understand the Cambridge pooling system because they make it very clear how they operate but can anyone explain the Oxford system to me?
She currently has no college preference because she's not familiar with any of them really but doesn't want to make an open application.
She looked at the college league tables and the ones she liked in the prospectus came out as last and middling. If she puts one of these down, is it less likely a second college will consider her?
If she chooses a large popular college e.g. Christ Church, is it more likely a second college will look at her?
Her school does send a few to Oxford each year but doesn't seem to share any info about previous offers/ colleges/ characteristics etc. and doesn't have an Oxbridge group/ special preparation, which is fine, but it's hard to get any information beyond the prospectus.

If you are a good candidate, then you will be offered to other colleges for interview, and 20% of applicants are offered places at colleges other than those they applied to. Or you may be given an open offer, where you definitely have the offer of a place (subject to grades) but will be allocated the specific college at after results day.
If she really has no preference, just make an open offer. Or choose the college she likes the look of. Either way, she is not disadvantaged.

Oxford publishes some information about individual schools' applications and admittances. Look on the website.

I know that both Oxford and Cambridge state that college choice makes no difference, but for Cambridge at least that each college has its own way of looking at applicants, so college choice could make a difference in practice.

Bobochic, can you point me in the right direction? I can only find statistics by school type e.g. comp/ private/ grammar and region rather than actual school names and college choices?

www.ox.ac.uk/about/facts-and-figures/admissions-statistics/undergraduate2014/additional-info/applications-and-acceptances-ucas-apply-centre

College choice MUST make a difference, but I don't think there's a way to play it to your advantage. Years ago, DH was fished out of the Oxford pool. He had applied to a college (A) which took a lot of people to do his subject and was rescued by one (B) which took fewer. He couldn't have known, though, that B wouldn't get a lot of strong applicants that year. I think in her shoes I'd just pick one.

At an Open Day last week I spoke to several admissions tutors and they all said the same thing don't try to second guess the least popular college. If you are a strong candidate they you will be offered to other colleges, who will take you rather than a weak candidate that applied directly to them.

Many thanks Bobochic

I agree it's a mug's game trying to choose a college using statistics. I think a pin in her list of ones she likes the look of is probably the way for her to go!
Unless someone can suggest a couple for someone who is friendly, laid back, outdoorsy, at state school, loves singing, hates the thought of a college full of people from "The Riot Club" ...

Apart from Douglas Booth apparently....

This might be interesting and a link within it to the colleges

www.thestudentroom.co.uk/wiki/How_to_choose_an_Oxford_College

PeterTavy which subject? That's crucial to the Oxford system of pooling.

Also, how strong is her application? For example what were her GCSE results? That's likely to affect whether she's more likely than others to be pooled pre-application. Because there's pre as well as post application pooling, depending on subject. And this year DS3 even had a request for an interview from another college between his first and second interviews at his original college, without that college having a clue what was going on - but the latter took him anyway. It's a fluid old 'system'!

I don't think you've said enough for anyone to offer up suggestions, except probably avoid ChristChurch. Give a little bit more as a pen picture!

But off the top of my head from what you've said so far, I'd say Teddy Hall.

Apparently the newer, not very pretty not very central colleges are amazingly popular!

I read on an Ask An Admissions Tutor thread on the Student Room that the least popular college one year gets a huge spike in applications the following year, as people desperately try to find a way of gaming the system. Likewise huge numbers of people suddenly find a burning passion for Old Norse and Celtic when they look at the admissions statistics.

We are pretty clueless, and ds chose a college he liked the look of but wasn't terrifically popular. The university seems to be pretty adamant that some colleges offer no places at all to first choice applicants if they are deemed to be substandard.

Molio, info about the pooling process and college choices for history and medicine would be very useful. I don't want to identify which is DD's exact subject but her friend, who has a similar outlook, will be applying for the other one so either/ both would be helpful. I hope that makes sense!

Her GCSEs were 9A* from a good state school. So very good by most standards, but not that great for Oxford. Her friend's are in the same ballpark as far as I know.

What do you mean 'not that great'? It is not possible to get better grades. If you just mean 9, not 13 GCSEs, Oxford knows perfectly well that a lot of schools don't offer more than 8 or 9!

She has 2A grades as well. The only other person whose GCSE score I definitely know and who went to Oxford to study DD's subject had 12A*s, but I realise that isn't the be all and end all for most subjects.

What is the pre-pooling and post-pooling system- I didn't know there were two?

I honestly think all you can do is choose somewhere you like the look of. As for interviews elsewhere or not, I don't think you can draw any conclusions! You might be a strong candidate and your college definitely want you and don't offer you elsewhere; you might be a strong candidate but there are so many of them that other colleges will interview you.

A friend of dd applied to Lincoln for history last year, had another interview somewhere else too and finally got an open offer. She was a bit disappointed to not actually be wanted by anyone until my dd told her that I'd read here that someone's dc had gone for a history interview at Lincoln and been told that they'd had something daft like 500 applications and had interviewed 29 (for ~10 places).

So have a read through the prospectus and the alternative prospectus, and also recent admission stats are available - it is clear that there is a difference in admission rates according to which college you put as your preference, whether you are admitted to your first choice or another, but it gives you no correlating information about the strength of the candidates .... So it might be that 'weaker' candidates are trying to game the system by disproportionately applying for seemingly less popular colleges? Who knows. Choose one you fancy, you'll probably love wherever you end up

Peter 9A from a selective state school is excellent. It just is, especially these days. 9A is not on the low side for courses at Oxford generally. It's fine, or more than fine, even from a grammar. A lot of schools now only take 9 GCSEs in any event.

But it's fair to say that specifically for Medicine at Oxford 9A does sit on the fringe - the stats are there on the pre-clinical website for all to see. A good BMAT should tip an applicant over into a call up for interview in which case the applicant will be interviewed at their college of choice and a second one allocated by the med school computer. The interviews happen over two days/ one night and there's no pooling beyond that. The college of choice gets the first option on the applicant and if they decide it's a 'no' then the allocated college can offer a place. A slightly weak BMAT with 9A unfortunately may well mean no interview. So - no pressure in November!

For History 9A* is very comfortable. The HAT score will determine to a large extent whether an applicant is interviewed - around the bottom scoring 25% won't get an interview but there's room on the borderline for manoevre. A lot of store is set by the HAT. History applicants might a) be reallocated before interview to another college if the college they applied to has too large number of strong applicants or b) interviewed at another college before their own college interviews start (usually if they're particularly strong, as a standardizer) or c) they might be properly pooled, once the main round of interviews is over or d) have a weird inbetween interview call up which proves a mystery to the powers that be :). It's probably fair to say that the colleges which tend to get a lot of strong applicants applying seem to be good at 'placing' the good applicants for whom they themselves don't have room, so I'm dubious about the usual 'gaming'. My feeling is that it could work in reverse.

In terms of college choice it's very personal and the usual advice is that it doesn't matter - that you'll get to really like wherever you go. I don't see a great deal of merit in an open application I must say - all it seems to do is take away any power of self determination. So: whereabouts in the city would they like to be? Does central matter? Does size matter? Does reputation, or character, matter? Corpus is particularly flush with fellows for Medicine and is a very beautiful college with most of the building work recently finished (should have added: does scaffolding matter?!). With History, it's pretty wide open :).

Peter applicants for neither Medicine or History routinely have 12A*.

Great info and advice thank you, much appreciated.

Mansfield has a reputation for having a high percentage of state school pupils.
Molio is spot on with her advice on medicine (my dd had an offer for one of the old, pretty colleges with 8 A* & a high BMAT). Unfortunately her A levels didn't quite go to plan so she went elsewhere!

Don't dismiss Christchurch, DH (definitely not posh) was there and his group of friends are very diverse (top public schools, grammars, unregarded comps,) they are all lovely and were very happy there.
The whole 'Riot Club' thing was barely noticeable.

Mansfield does offer history but not medicine though.

Lady Margaret Hall? Friends at St Anne's were very happy as well.

Decorhate it still seems unbelievably harsh given her other grades. I really hope she's liking the place she's at.