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?

Orlando I'd agree except in this instance the DD is predicted A/A in all subjects and thinks she can get an A if she continues with English as one of her 3. Unless things change this year an Oxford Classics offer would be AAA.

goodbyestranger - are you talking about M and O? Ds nearly applied to M but its reputation for hounding students was a bit off putting. We toured O at open day and were both at the accommodation divide - if you paid X you got a basement with no window and no internet reception. If you paid Y you got a penthouse with ensuite and view of dreaming spires. And apparently it's very cliquey.

Ds did four Arts A Levels. If you do three then an EPQ is a good idea. At interview ds was asked a)why he hadn't done an EPQ and b) what would he have done it on had he done one. So they are looking for depth of interest in subject. The other thing is that if you present yourself as doing four, they may make a 4-A Level offer, as otherwise anyone could say, "I'm doing six!" just to look good and have no intention of carrying on with six at all.

Lobster - re the UNIQ courses - good idea to change for something less popular. My dd wrote her personal statement the night before and got a place and thoroughly enjoyed the week (got about 5 free books I thnk!) It gave her chance to find out about the colleges and was very helpful with advice on personal statements, entrance exams etc. She didn't end up applying though because the subject she wants to do isn't offered at Oxbridge. It seems that her UNIQW friends that did apply did well with interviews on the whole.

As to four subjects - my dd has carried on with 4 purely because she finds the one she would have had to drop the most interesting and because she wouldn't use the free time gained by doing 3 to work! She is still predicted A/A*s.

Rhoda I am talking about M - shame because it's so incredibly pretty - but not only am I not talking about O in fact I have a DS there, who's been exceptionally happy with his lot. I get what you mean about the accommodation divide but at least all the categories of rooms are mixed up. No, I'm talking about C. Big C not little C* that is.

(I've adopted Bob's cunning plan of capital plus asterisk which I hope is adequate disguise....).

This thread is brilliant

Lobster If your DD is going for Oxford for classics then PM me if you want a bit more advice. (Can't really offer anything other than v general if she wants to go become a filthy tab though.)

Oh, and Orlanda I was worse than your DS. I chose both to apply to Oxford and my actual college on the basis that my favourite fictional character had 'attended' there. This despite not having looked round Oxford at all because my parents only took me to visit Cambridge, which they decided I should apply to as it was less posh. They were furious with me!

My college wasn't my current username, BTW. (This is after a different fictional character... the theme of my life emerges...)

Had Balliol accepted women in my day I should have been tempted to apply there on the same basis.

I chose the college I went to because of an article that had just appeared in a colour supplement all about the wicked, decadent and glamorous goings on that went on there. I thought that sounded splendid!

Thankyou all. This is the magic of mn - actual real life advice based on real "inside" experience which is a whole different layer of information that you just can't get from an official website or prospectus!

I think I've just about cracked the "Capitals code" and figured out which colleges Goodbye and Rhoda are referring to.
I'd love to hear more about the different colleges' reputations.
So far we only have what they say on their websites, which all seem to be different variations of "hardworking but friendly"
DD has drawn up a list of about 12 but would love to narrow it down further before we visit.
Her favourite on paper is little C. But we are completely clueless and have no real idea what the differences are.

She chose it purely because it looks like it has a strong Classics department and because she likes the idea of a smaller college, and it looks quite pretty in the pictures.

She also likes the look of big M, but I have a feeling that might be very different.

Thankyou for the link Errol, she hadn't found that one. She has now applied for it, despite leaning more towards Oxford.

(I have no idea what a filthy tab is Somerville! But will pm you, Thank you)

DD has a meeting with her head of year tomorrow to discuss the A/AS level decision. Your advice has really helped me to weigh up the choices.

Of course, it's her decision and only she really knows how she feels about the workload etc, but it's nice to be in a position to offer well informed advice should she ask for it.

Lobster as luck would have it I have one currently at little C . Little C is completely beautiful and very friendly - DS is a medic so by definition has had to work fairly hard but he's also managed to do plenty of extra curricular stuff and his social life there has been extremely good, right from the start. Little C is notable for being very strong at Classics, so it might well tick the box. It currently has the advantage of just having completed a massive programme of refurbishment in terms of undergrad accommodation so your DD would have neatly avoided all the hassle of that. At the moment I think the new boss of the college is trying to get the college gardener to tidy up the very pretty gardens which were intentionally 'natural', but apart from that it's a fabulous college despite being hemmed in by two more doubtful neighbours, one of which collared a nice garden which used to be owned by little C and which students at little C can now only look out over. Fair to say that DS's first year room had a window which was right by M's chapel and the bells were very, very loud, and regular, but he learned to live with them.

As further luck would have it I have also had graduate recently from big M which I have to confess being especially keen on, largely by virtue of the feeling of space. DDs tutors (Law) were exceptionally good in every respect, both as academics and people, and again, the new library is now complete so your DD wouldn't have to navigate plague pits being dug up around college as my own DD did. There's an ongoing problem with one of the accommodation blocks but that being sorted at the moment I think. It's hard to go wrong with big M. I suppose the only slight meh are the first year rooms which are above Sainsbury's on the main road but not much first year accommodation in Oxford is world class so that's only a relative gripe.

Hope that helps.

Parking to dump or collect clobber is easier at big M because the porters open the gates and let you into the quad for as long as you like whereas M St is a nightmare for little C (or O - thanks boys). You're allowed only a tiny amount of time to negotiate ancient windy stairs with boxes etc and then have to try to get out with all the other parents going in every direction and after that you have to pay a fortune if you want to go back to say a proper goodbye. But that's another very minor gripe in the scheme of things, obviously.

DD is having a whale of a time at big M* ( not the M where fun goes to die). Agree with goodbyestranger about ease of unloading. DD is in the accommodation they never show you on Open Day - spectacularly grotty- however, really tight knit group of friends there and even closer to the college entrance. Parking available in Rose Lane. And the new library is spectacular!
DD chose it because her subject teacher at school thought she'd love the main tutor and DD wanted a big college that wasn't too political. We went to 3 colleges on the Open Day. big M was the least friendly but one of the student volunteers explained that the peeps with more fun things to do were off doing them instead. Colleges where 2nd years live out will have significantly more volunteers from our experience (clearing out and then coming back to squat in someone else's room for 2 days isn't all that appealing ). DD has actually found big M to be really friendly once you arrive.

I wonder how the new grading 1-9 will affect admissions in the past. It's accepted that GCSEs have become pretty meaningless and that univeristies were finding it hard to distinguish between candidates. I have a suspicion they are now going to look at the number of 9s a candidate has achieved especially in the subjects their chosen degree course relates to.

Lobster A tab is a nickname for Cambridge students (derived from Cantabrigian) and sometimes we'd call them filthy tabs - entirely affectionately, except during, say, varsity matches for the major sports.
(I first heard the term filthy tab at a friendly in my sport, against Cambridge, during my first term. At the swanky college dinner we hosted afterwards, I naively asked the flirty tab beside me what their equivalent term for us was. "Fucking cunts," he said.

Also, that reminds me that if there is a sport she might achieve Blues level in then look and see what support individual colleges offer. I got lucky that mine gave quite a bit. (A few hundred pounds every time I competed at Varsity level and they also reimbursed a lot of my travel/equipment expenses.)

I stil live fairly locally so every year I have friends arranging their teenager staying with me while they look round, or requesting advice or whatever. The single most important piece of advice, I've found, is to remember that it is not a one time shot. Most of them who have fulfilled subject requirements and not got a place have gone on to get a first at another great university and then have come to Oxford for their Masters or D.Phil.

cowgirls - already, with AS on its way out, Cambridge has introduced its own admissions test for at least some subjects, I think Oxford already had them.

Other universities will presumably be - as used to be the case before AS - more reliant on predicted A level grades plus the evidence of gcses.

Sorry if I'm being difficult, but why do posters feel the need to identify colleges by initials only? It's not difficult to work out anyway, and just helps perpetuate an unhelpful air of privileged, insider information that is not for the "likes of you". Why not just be transparent?

I'm a tutor so don't name my college, but then I don't give its initial either.

I think you need to look back at a couple of the previous posts of Bob's to work it out irregularegular. It was light hearted pure and simple though admittedly not at the cutting edge of comedy.

Too much for me to read!

Thread is quite bonkers...

Can I cause yet another deviation?

How much college choice matters for an MPhil. DS considered Universities and courses carefully, and narrowed it down to the two that most closely aligned with his interests. (And fees, which vary greatly from University to University.) The "Oxbridge" factor did not come into it, which seems normal at this point, though one of the two is Oxbridge. Then for various reasons, including wanting a referee to return from sabbatical and wanting to have something to say about his UG dissertation, left his application until shortly before the deadline. He then realised he needed to choose a college, and phoned me despite the fact I had about as little idea as he did. (I better be careful - I might find myself in Bob's position.) It took all of about 2 minutes to decide on somewhere that met the criteria of being central and obscure. I don't think even fictional characters went there. You would not want to miss out on a University place because the College had too many applicants, though I assume there is some sort of pooling.

Does it matter? More importantly, is this something that might be asked at interview? Would he have been better off trying for a richer college, ie are bursaries Collage based? What sort of accommodation would Masters students normally get?

Its odd. The MPhil is two years, only one year shorter than a first degree, yet there seems little weighting given to the punting and backs side of things. I assume that MPhil students mainly just work very hard, which to be fair is what a lot of UGs do.

Sorry, question was "how much does College choice matter"

Can't do the X or x as I don't know how many colleges of that initial there are, or indeed whether the college he has picked warrants a capital. I suspect not.

NeedMoreSleep - fortunately I was in a great position to give DSS1 access to information on Cambridge colleges, since (living) members of my family have been at most of them. He went on a visit but, just as importantly, chatted to cousins/aunts/uncles.

TBH the advice was to aim high - go for whatever looks most comfortable for you. He did, and he got it.

Ah, what is high? And why does it matter?

Needmoresleep don't worry, they do pool. DD2 had to move from her undergrad college for postgrad since that college didn't run the subject she wanted to do and she ended up at a nicer college than the one she initially applied to IMO (not the college initials).

And on the initial front, I thought the fact that there's only a single O college in the whole of Oxford and Cambridge made the teasing clear - but equally it may in fact do more to bolster irregularegula's accusation :)

There are lots of criteria. DSS1 wanted to live very centrally and in a rich and comfortable college.

That wasn't well put. She applied to one college for postgrad and got moved to a different, at the very least equally nice, college in the application process. She wasn't wild about going to a postgrad only college so it worked out well but of course there is a considerable chance of being pooled to a postgrad only college but some people may prefer that anyhow.