Take a gap year and reapply to Oxbridge?

[tyngedyriaith]

DD has been rejected from Cambridge. People with far worse grades have gotten in. She's disappointed. She mentioned retrying next year if she exceeds the standard offer?

Is it worth it considering Welsh fees are going up next year?

I would suggest a possible reason people you advise have a low rate of success is that you've filled their heads with nonsense.

Leave them to the admissions office for advice. It's free, it's from the horse's mouth, and it won't lower their chances.

I believe you.

Bobo you might want to find a new username because lots of people are calling you Bob.

This thread has kept me entertained all day ! On another note the comment above 'my DC felt pleased and lucky to get in' is probably relevant. We see some threads from other people who s DC are shocked and gutted not to receive a place and I'm guessing who' s apparent arrogance and entitled attitude may have played a part in their rejection. No one can assume their grades will get them a place. I would suggest if you genuinely think you can do better at interview next time (and that is backed up by the feed back) and you really want the Cambridge course for all the right reasons then by all means try again. If you think you should have got in because you've got better predicted grades than someone who got in then it's probably not for you !!

Not, of course, that there's anything wrong with the name Bob. Bob is a fine name, within reason.

Haven't read many responses so apologies for any repetition.

Friend was rejected by Oxford but applied to the same college again a year later and was accepted. Ended up getting a top first so they obviously got it right the second time!

FWIW, I was turned down by the Oxford college I applied to but given an open offer. Didn't hit my AAA target (got AAB) but was accepted by one of the colleges anyway. So it's always worth persevering if your DD is keen and committed!

LRD - the admissions office does not give advice that meets the needs of international applicants. It's a starting point only.

Have we jumped the shark ? Re a thread I read before a while ago - where is Bertrand when you need her to pop in with a joke about Hildegard of Bingen?

On a more serious note it seems to me (someone correct me) these courses are just getting more oversubscribed, and for good reasons, so even in my DS's time it is harder this year. I do not know enough about the French school system, but I would have thought a bilingual French / English family cold look up the advice on the websites as well as anyone else. Ds's school absolutely advised against any paid consultancy which claimed to be able to increase your chances of an Oxbridge place ( not saying that is what you do Bob(o) )

If international applicants and their families consistently have so many questions, it's because websites/open days/the British Council/admissions offices don't answer them! There are all sorts of quite recurrent concerns that French applicants have that are never addressed by the university marketing system.

I am more than aware of all sorts of agents and consultants who tout for business in this area. They are in fact meeting a very clearly expressed need though not all of them are any good.

Also, French schools do not necessarily support applications to university outside France and applicants need help negotiating a reference and grade predictions from their school.

Bob we have a family member who is Polish and managed to read the admissions advice even with English as his third language and who got into Oxford no problem taught PPE during his PhD no problem and is now an Economics fellow at a (very nice) Cambridge college no problem - consultants were never required. The thing is that consultants make a mystery out of things which are really very simple because otherwise they'd be out of work. He's done Oxford undergraduate admissions and currently does Cambridge undergraduate admissions and I think would be very anti any idea of impenetrable mystique, whatever the national origin of the applicant.

The admissions office will give appropriate advice to all candidates. It is very unlikely to be bettered by people peddling conspiracy theories from a position of complete ignorance of the process.

There is no impenetrable mystique but admissions cannot give advice on how to persuade your school who is refusing to do so to write you an appropriate reference (for example).

LRD - you have touching faith in your institution but you would do well to travel a little and gain some perspective.

Bob no, surely - I thought in a previous thread you said the problem was that these rich French kids lacked the cultural capital required to penetrate the Oxbridge process, so surely travel and broad perspective is exactly what people who want to do well don't need?

I'm not lobbying for anyone. I am, however, curious about how people navigate through several educational systems and how you make a proper assessment of the available opportunities and get good value for your time and money, and get a good start in the world of work when you leave education.

French schools do not necessarily support applications to university outside France

Now that's a different problem Bobo , but it still seems to me that if you can get a reference / grades / I assume PS equivalent etc you still do it as per how the university you apply to wants to see it which by and large isn't hard. If French schools are against UK applications - that's different. But still, go at it from the target university requirements back to the applicant IYSWIM , rather than thinking there are (unproven) more complex things at play

Basilisk - people have been asking me (I have never volunteered to help) questions about applying to university in the UK from France for years. They are not stupid people but their cultural perspective on HE is different and things that seem obvious to you just aren't. Another example: lots of French schools want to give very low grade predictions whereas, as we all know, UK schools tend to over predict. No website in the U.K. can help an applicant address this.

I don't think I do have touching faith, no. But I do know how the admissions process works. You don't. You have never participated in it. And when you are asked to explain why you believe such implausible conspiracy theories, you take refuge in dark hints about 'insider' information.

I don't understand what you get out of it? I can see it makes you feel nicely self important, but why on earth would you need to impress anyone on here? It's an anon forum full of people who don't even own family silver.

LRD - it's an open conversation. You add very little to it (unlike others). You seem to think you have the right to tell poster (me) that they have no legitimacy to even think about this issue. Are you in the habit of censuring people? Your attitudes veer from the naive to the authoritarian.

If it is an open conversation, then patently, I do have the right to contribute, yes.

The reason I'm doing so is because I think it's worrying that misinformation about Oxbridge admissions gets around. I'm certainly in the habit of censuring people who spread it out of anything other than ignorance. Though, I suspect you meant 'censoring', didn't you?

OP,

I'm the mum of a successful reapplicant. . He was pooled by Oxbridge last year but didn't get an offer.

He got pretty good A levels. Others on this thread have DCs who did better, but he got A* in the subject he wants to read and top levels within that. He also wrote a good personal statement. I don't know what the school said about him but they have consistently underestimated him.

One interview went well. The other was a bit iffy, by all accounts.

The extra year has made him better at his subject. He continues to read in it. His gap year includes one thing which is relevant and was mentioned in his personal statement.

He has also gained maturity. He has had offers from two other top RG HEIs and was fully expecting to go to one of them, with pleasure and grace. I.e. He had recognised that he might v well not be accepted by Oxbridge or indeed one of the other v highly regarded HEIs, specialist in his subject , because competition is so fierce from both UK and international candidates.

If you think your DC can cope with rejection twice, and can organise a worthwhile gap year, no problem reapplying. A year at their age makes little difference. . If not, don't waste time and get on with life.

What's my qualification for saying this? Well , apart from being a mother, I used to be in touch with the senior admin of quite a few HEIs for my job. In general, the feeling was that it was easy to spot the top five or ten per cent. Thereafter there were so many good candidates it was difficult to make a choice. I can't imagine things have changed.

I meant censuring.

Lack of transparency is a huge issue for international applicants. The naive or perhaps disengenuous insistance that the admissions office can provide applicants with all they need to know does not fool them!

Censuring is the judgypants one.

Censoring is the causing-lack-of-transparency one.

HTH.