If your dc has had an offer for Oxbridge, what grades did they get in a levels and g.c.s.e's?

[DrMadelineMaxwell]

Just gauging the 'average' level of successful applicants. Dd is applying for Cambridge and I'm curious as to what makes a successful applicant.

TIA.

[Quadrangle]

Should say His friend, who has had A* in every single exam he's ever taken

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

I think that the SS STEP offers are mostly for those who have already taken STEP pre application, or for overseas students who have different educational backgrounds. Most cambridge maths offers are very standard A A A, 1,1 in STEP. Some specify the second A* has to be in Physics, thus rendering it in the modular system effectively offer.

Imperial do seem to be a place that gives out quite different offers to students based on goodness knows what.

I don't really know about other subjects.

[CornflakeMum]

LRD - no, I didn't misunderstand, that's exactly what was discussed. I was equally surprised and even questioned if I'd understood her correctly.

It's not just Oxbridge either - Bristol contextual grades are usually 2 grades lower. So DS's offer for Bristol is A*AA but his friend who went to the 6th Form College (after being in Independent education for all his school life) was offered AAB for the same course.

I don't have an issue with the concept of contextual offers, but the way in which they are determined is flawed. Someone can be living in a £2m house on the edge of 'Quintile 1' area and be eligible.

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

Bristol are very open about their contextual offers.

[Needmoresleep]

Equally, my observation is that bright well taught students who enjoy their subjects and want to engage in University life, will do well at a number of good UK Universities. Students we knew, who were near misses for Oxbridge (pool etc) appear to have done just as well elsewhere as their Oxbridge educated peers. In several cases, that is very well indeed. London Universities and those elsewhere, will offer different teaching and student experiences. What does seem important is how a school prepares students for University level study, which is different from just getting grades. And though Oxbridge's tutorial system is pretty unique, other Universities will offer an equally challenging education with teaching approaches which may suit some better.

(OK, my DC dislike writing essays, so argue that not studying at Oxbridge offers some real advantage. Oxford educated DH disagrees.)

[CornflakeMum]

Quadrangle - Maybe he didn't have what they were looking for at interview, despite good grades?
Yes, I agree, this is likely.
Oxford admissions tutors made the point that 90%+ of their applicants will probably achieve their 'standard' offer anyway, with a majority over-achieving it, so they could fill their courses many times over.

It's a dark art IMO . A friend's daughter was told by her tutor that they looked favourably on her application (compared with hundreds of similarly qualified others) because she played the bassoon, and the current bassoon player in the college orchestra was in Third Year and leaving...

[irregularegular]

You might find this helpful.

www.ox.ac.uk/about/facts-and-figures/admissions-statistics/undergraduate/additional-info/qualifications

[irregularegular]

And it is true that at Oxford all offers are standard offers.

[CornflakeMum]

OhYouBadBadKitten - yes they are. Information here: www.bristol.ac.uk/study/undergraduate/entry-requirements-qualifications/contextual-offers/

And using their methodology, you could live in this £2m+ estate house with 7.4 acres in an area that has a low rate of progression to higher education and be eligible for a lower offer.
www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-61096177.html

[Needmoresleep]

Cornflake, yes you might get the place but it can be a mixed blessing.

Yes it is good that doors are open for kids without educational advantage, who have used motivation and determination to achieve the contextual grades and expect to continue to use that same motivation and determination when they start. But scraping into a demanding University course as a result of winning a postcode lottery suggests you might not have the skills in place to thrive. DS did not envy those on his (economics) course who did not have FM A level. Yes the content was covered at Uni, but at a cracking pace.

DD is at Bristol, with plenty with contextual offers, and says others have noted her academic confidence. She is not completely sure what they mean, but thinks it something she gained from two years in a very academic sixth form where it was a given that you understood the content, did the work and got the grades. All without much fuss.

[user369060]

I don't have an issue with the concept of contextual offers, but the way in which they are determined is flawed. Someone can be living in a £2m house on the edge of 'Quintile 1' area and be eligible.

There is not one unique way of determining contextual offers.

Bristol use contextual offers as a recruitment strategy and reduce offers (usually by one grade, not two) for students from schools and colleges with below average results.

Oxbridge do not use one single criterion for contextual offers and in any case, in general, do not reduce the offer grades. You can verify this using available online information.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

It is not a postcode lottery. It is much more complicated than that.

I have to say, either you didn't understand this person, or they were (for some reason that escapes me) deliberately lying. Or, perhaps you're slightly exaggerating for the sake of a good story?

[CornflakeMum]

LRD - I don't appreciate being called stupid, or a lier or a troll thank you .

I had a lengthy conversation with this lady and she had no reason to lie. She said that for this round of applications they were under a lot of pressure to reduce the standard offer for state school applicants and increase it for independent school applicants and these could end up being 2-3 grades apart in some cases.
The data linked to below is from 2016, so now 1 year out of date. I expect we will see the data from this round of offers reflecting this offer range.

user369060 - if that is the case, then I'm not sure why our local sixth form college, which has been rated Outstanding by Ofsted for the last six years, and has results across the board which are above the national average, should be included in the list for contextual offers at Bristol? Perhaps they are also working with out of date information?

As I said, it's an imperfect system, and people can play it to their advantage if they wish.

[user369060]

But now you just softened your claim - difference between lowest and highest offers being two grades is very different from dropping/raising offers by two grades (i.e. 4 grades from top to bottom).

Ofsted rating is not part of the Bristol contextual offers list. It is possible for a school to be Ofsted outstanding but still have much than average results, due to demographic intake. Full criteria are given at

www.bristol.ac.uk/study/undergraduate/entry-requirements-qualifications/contextual-offers/

Results are not the only criterion, though, as the link above explains. Up to date data is used.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

I didn't call you stupid, a 'lier' or a troll.

I do think that, for whatever reason and however it's happened, you're passing on claims that have no basis in reality.

[FordPerfect]

OhYouBadBadKitten - looking at recent FOI requests on STEP it looks as though the S S offer (common up to 2015) has been replaced by a more standardised approach with 1 1 the most common offer now (if I have read the data correctly). The candidate I was thinking of was at the tail-end of the period up to 2015 and educated in the UK.

LRDtheFeministDragon - asking for an A in a 4th A Level is arguably asking for more than 2 grades above the standard offer of 3 A Levels.

[comeinpax]

I don't think Bristol has done itself any favours with "the list." My DD's comp has high FSM, lots of bright MC pupils too, so is not on the list. It gets great results for a comp, in part, because of the epidemic of tutoring where we live in SE.
Tactically, also, one might look at Bristol's extensive list and rule it out on the numbers game. You'd be up against loads of students from list schools who'd have a better chance of getting in.

[irregularegular]

The way it works at Oxford is there are (usually) different benchmarks applied for getting an interview for "widening participation" candidates, particularly in those subjects where a large number of candidates are not interviewed. A WP candidate must have at least two "flags", one indicating that the school is relatively low-performing AND one based on socioeconomic characteristics of their postcode. Just school or postcode alone is not enough.

This will work slightly differently in different subjects, but for PPE there is an entrance test and a recommended (not strict) cut off for interview. This recommended cut off is lower for WP candidates. However, they would still have to be predicted to get at least the standard offer (AAA for PPE).

Once at the interview stage, there is no magic formula. Judgements of potential are made based on all the information available. But yes, roughly speaking we would expect to see higher GCSE marks from some schools than others. That seems reasonable.

And everyone gets the same offer.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

A friend's daughter was told by her tutor that they looked favourably on her application (compared with hundreds of similarly qualified others) because she played the bassoon, and the current bassoon player in the college orchestra was in Third Year and leaving...

I cannot believe I missed this gem.

I'm sorry, but this is utter bollocks.

For one thing, college orchestras generally have no issue going beyond college to find people who can play, and for another, no way in hell are they going to accept someone to do extra curriculars. Why on earth would they want to?

[MontyPythonsFlyingFuck]

"However they are at an Independent School, so this probably worked against them"

What a crock of crap. 7% of UK children are privately educated. 50% of Oxbridge students are privately educated. So, proportionally, there are seven times more privately-educated than state-educated students at Oxbridge.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

It's not quite as bad as 50% (though it should be much better!).

[brizzledrizzle]

But scraping into a demanding University course as a result of winning a postcode lottery

Getting AAB at university is not scraping in though is it, it's respectable grades after all.

[brizzledrizzle]

^at A levels

[user369060]

Getting AAB at university is not scraping in though is it, it's respectable grades after all.

Students with several grades below the average incoming grades do not tend to do well on high tariff, challenging courses. They have a much higher drop out and a much higher rate of lower degrees (Thirds and 2:2s).

The current funding situation encourages high tariff universities (not Oxbridge, but other RG) to take more students at the bottom end. This is not fair to the students, when they have a much lower chance of succeeding.

AAB are certainly respectable grades. But just as a student with "only" an A at GCSE tends to be much less likely to get an A star - B at A level, so somebody with "only" AAB may be much less likely to get a 2:i in a STEM course that usually requires A star AA.

[Needmoresleep]

brizzledrizzle - context?

Many studying maths or science at Cambridge will have regularly gained close to 100 UMS on maths exams. AAB are respectable grades but in some subjects would not get you close to interview, and why STEP is used to further differentiate. Humanities are different, and grades less predictable