Which Oxbridge Courses / Colleges take most state school students?

[KingscoteStaff]

Is the state school/independent school split very different on different courses? Is it very different at different colleges?

Is this data available for last years offers/places?

Is it available for this year's offers?

I'm not sure what you mean by 'those parts of society that do a lot', MariaNovella?

Really? Is it not clear that parts of society are more intensely active than others?

What kind of activity are you referring to?

Any sort of activity!

Well, then, no, it is not clear that 'parts of society are more intensely active than others'. What is clear is that the activities open to people differ according to their position in society. I would argue, in broad terms, that 'those who do a lot more' are those who are having to hold down multiple jobs merely in order to pay the rent - but I guess those are not the people you are talking about, MariaNovella, since they certainly don't 'have more opportunities'. So it begs the question, who are you talking about?

You are confusing activity and employment.

What are you referring to then? Evening classes? Tennis lessons? You seem remarkably reluctant to explain.

Oxford MFL tutor here. In fact we have very few native speakers enrolled in our undergraduate courses.

We are very very keen to have more students from state schools. Linguistic ability is only one component of the course, however. The MFL courses at Oxford (and Cambridge too) are heavily literature-based. Doing an MFL degree is not unlike doing an English degree, only with the added language component. So one thing we are looking for is students who in addition to being gifted at languages, genuinely enjoy reading and writing about literature. So an applicant may have stellar language skills, but be more interested in MFL and say, business studies. In that case they would find MFL courses at other universities that would probably suit them far better than the Oxbridge MFL courses.

Candidates' exposure to reading literature in the foreign language before they apply to Oxbridge will differ dramatically according to their school curriculum, and that's OK. Often pupils from state schools will have read less literature in the language than pupils from independent schools. But if they enjoy reading English literature for pleasure, then that's a good sign. I don't mean that the course is entirely literature-focused (the structure is half language, half literature, and there are also loads of opportunities to work on history, culture, philosophy, film, gender studies, etc). But the literary aptitude is important!

We don't expect people's linguistic skills to be anywhere near native-quality when they start the course. However, there is a language test to sit as part of the admissions process (these tests are now administered in schools), and good knowledge of basic grammar is essential. There are sample language tests on the university websites.

I just wanted to say all this as it would be very disheartening if state school students decided not to apply to Oxbridge because they had not had holidays abroad, immersion in a foreign country, etc! These things are nice but definitely not necessary. What we want to find are people with passion to study the language (and with strong potential of course!).

That sounds really positive, openday. I hope you're at a college that does plenty of outreach to encourage state students to apply and equip their teachers to help them. My DD had very little help from her school and had to drive her application (not for MFL) herself – her teachers just weren't geared up to help her, as the school does not have a history of Oxbridge applications. The single most useful thing she did was attend an access day at the college that eventually made her an offer. Engaging with lecturers on the access day made her feel that this might be something she could do.

I did MFL at Cambridge and managed to swerve literature altogether after the first year - that was my main reason for applying there rather than Oxford. There were plenty of linguistics papers to choose from as an alternative. This was 20 years ago nearly but the course doesn’t appear to have changed a great deal.

Ah, cinnamontoast, I think you'd be hard-pressed to find an Oxford college that isn't currently obsessed with outreach and access! It's an incredibly pressing issue, and to some extent all the colleges are competing to attract the most state school candidates. Governing bodies of colleges (as well as the university as a whole) are very aware of the stats. From our point of view, there are nowhere near enough state school candidates applying. Some colleges get more diverse applicants than others because they are perceived to be 'friendlier' or 'less posh' than others. But the tutors at the so-called 'posh' colleges are just as keen to improve access (if not more so!).

Applications for MFL have dropped across the board though (at all UK universities, not just Oxbridge), which is bad for MFL as a discipline but good in terms of applicants being offered places.

I'm so glad that your DD benefited from the college access day. That is great to hear. I think loads of work remains to be done in terms of demystifying Oxbridge. Oxford and Cambridge are excellent universities, but many other UK universities are excellent too -- there are top-ranking students everywhere. I have taught more than one student in the past who has said that their school told them it wasn't worth applying to Oxford, and they applied anyway and got in and thrived. Part of the reason so many applicants from independent schools get into Oxford is that independent schools encourage a much bigger percentage of their cohort to apply every year. So a state school might have a couple of applicants, while an independent one might send literally dozens. It really is worth having a go.

And it's a shame about your friend's school, Kingscote. Has that school encouraged the rejected applicants to ask for feedback from the colleges where they interviewed? Are the applicants making it to interview stage?

I did MFL at Cambridge and managed to swerve literature altogether after the first year

Crikey, Ktay, I didn't know that was possible! Oxford has a linguistics option too so it's definitely possible to do the course with a heavy linguistics component. But it wouldn't be possible to swerve literature altogether after the 1st year!

openday, I wonder if the reason applications for MFL have dropped is because of the way they are taught at GCSE, leading to a decrease in pupils studying them for A level. I did French myself at university and was horrified that my DC were just expected to learn things by rote, without being taught the structure of the language. My DD is now doing French A level and found it a very big step up. She has, however, benefited from the small class size (just 7), since it is such an unpopular subject (at her school at least).

Really good news to hear that all colleges want more state school applicants. One thing that is probably quite off-putting for some is the attitude of some of the public school candidates. When my DD's friend was in Oxford for interview, an Etonian commented on finding out she went to a state school, 'Ah, you're the pity candidate.' She got an offer - I really hope he didn't!

As PP have said, Oxbridge can do all the MFL outreach it likes but pupils who have only come into contact with MFLs on their GCSE and A-level courses at badly resources state schools are generally inadequately prepared for demanding MFL courses at university. And, in addition, MFL graduates are not attractive to employers. Employers love recruiting people who are plurilingual - but as a side skill, in addition to a professional qualification or a vocational degree.

OMG cinnamontoast I can't believe an Etonian candidate said that. Given that half our intake consists of students educated at state schools, it's a grossly ignorant comment (not to mention rude). I can't imagine any of the students I teach coming out with a comment like that.

MariaNovella, badly resourced state schools are a problem in all subjects, not just MFL. I think your comments are unduly pessimistic. A lot of the skills needed to succeed at an MFL degree are covered in the GCSE English curriculum.

And, in addition, MFL graduates are not attractive to employers.
This is a common misconception, but it's wrong. A good university degree in any subject (especially if it's an Oxbridge degree) is attractive to employers. My former students have gone on to get all sorts of different professional jobs (most of them not directly related to MFL, but the MFL degree is certainly not holding them back!). How do you think graduates in English and Classics and History and so on get jobs? MFL graduates leave with the same abilities English graduates have (the ability to read and process a lot of material quickly, express their ideas clearly in analytical essays, etc.) and in addition to this they have the foreign language skill.

openday - when I talk to current Oxbridge students who attended badly resources state schools, their opinion is that you can reach a reasonable level of preparation in STEM by teaching yourself from the textbook. This option just isn’t realistic in MFL.

I’m talking about very smart students who would love to learn a MFL and whose colleges will subsidise this. It’s not something they do not care about - on the contrary.

It’s also much harder to get A or A star at languages than others A levels. At DS’s school (state comp) only the native speakers seem to get them regularly - and these are candidates with a slew of As and A stars in other A levels. He has an Oxford offer for an ab initio niche language but he’s genuinely worried about getting the A in his language - the rest of his class all have German speaking parents or have lived in Germany. He chose to keep it up after AS despite having better results in the one he dropped; tbh I’m slightly regretting that as three As including the other subject would be straightforward - German is far from secure. Whether that’s teaching or syllabus I don’t know. He’s good at aptitude tests so I don’t (genuinely) think it’s absolute. Hey ho.

I don’t agree, btw, that MFL graduates are equipped with the same skills as History or English degrees. IME the analytical writing skills of MFL graduates are significantly less good than those of History or English graduates.

I am a MFL graduate. I speak lots of languages. I spend a lot of time with students and employers.

openday you say that you don't have many native speakers on the undergraduate MFL courses and this conversation has been had before, but a young family member, fluent in three languages by virtue of parents and the country she's grown up in, has just cruised into Oxbridge to study joint honours in two of her three languages. Unfortunately, DD having just about been persuaded that she could give it a go, has retreated again. It bears out everything her siblings say about native speakers at Oxford. Can you put a vague number on the proportion? It's a big deterrent for the pity applicants, so numbers might help.

I’m also highly aware that prospective MFL students can be quite cagey about their exposure to languages outside school. The daughter of a friend of mine read French at Oxford. She never revealed the fact that her maternal grandmother is French and that her mother always spoke French to her.

Well, that's all very depressing.

I don't mean to minimise the difficulty of doing MFL in an under-resourced state school. My DC are in state schools, and I'm a governor at a school which was in special measures at one point.

But in terms of getting into Oxbridge, if you can master the grammar to a decent level (and I know that's still a big 'if'), then the level of spoken fluency is less important. We know that students will make a big leap in terms of speaking during their year abroad.

If your DC has faced school hurdles in the study of MFL, then it is definitely worth flagging it up in the UCAS statement. We are interested in potential and in what students have managed to do with the opportunities presented to them thus far. If they've had less opportunity to master the language, that isn't their fault.

Students begin the first year of MFL at Oxford with frankly vastly different levels of linguistic aptitude. Due to the intense teaching and high amount of individual attention, they tend to be on a much more equal footing by the end of the year. There are also extra grammar classes available for people who arrive under-prepared.

So while the course remains highly competitive, I would hope that people who want to do the course would apply, despite the hurdles.

goodbyestranger - I have, over the years, sadly concluded that MFL academics in the U.K. are in fairly deep denial as to the truly inadequate nature of MFL teaching in UK schools and the relevance of their degree programmes to the real world ie the one where clever people would like to earn a living commensurate with their equally able peers from other disciplines.

If your DD would like to learn a language there are excellent and really quite cheap courses run in most countries for students.

openday I love the idea that schools will say that the quality of MFL teaching in their school is or was dire! There's not a cat's chance that DD's school would outline the full horror of the results over recent years in the MFL dept, and hers is a superselective grammar! It's just never going to happen.

Also, in terms of the personal statement as opposed to the school reference, any thing smacking of a criticism of the teaching would be vetoed by the Ho6 and even in some alternative reality where it slipped by unnoticed, I can't imagine that anything defensive or negative would really enthuse an admissions tutor. They're just going to think a student is a moaner, and no-one likes a moaner.

goodbyestranger - yes, I hadn’t thought about that, but it is blindingly obvious that your DD’s school is not going to want to publicise sny weaknesses in MFL (which are systemic weaknesses - really not the fault of individual schools).