Oxbridge Applications

[Bibibayliss]

Dear Mums

My daughter is planning to apply to Cambridge next year. She will be taking her entrance tests this October. A company called Oxbridge Applications, ( not endorsed by Oxford or Cambridge) provide consultancy services on entrance tests, interviews etc. Has anybody used them or has any feedback about the company.
Thank you in advance

I agree with Goodbye.

The parents of kids at schools that do a poor job of support Oxbridge applicants (because of lack of funding or experience with the process) are unlikely to have the money to spend on expensive consultants. Pretending that these organisations have anything to do with social mobility is disingenuous in the extreme.

If your child's school doesn't "have their best interests at heart" and you have £££ to spare to spend on consultants why wouldn't you just move school?

How on earth can you say that "external advisors can make a huge difference" whilst admitting in the same breath that it's a totally unregulated market? How can you advise anyone to spend money on a consultancy that is likely run by people with no more insight into Oxbridge admissions than my cat.

Moving schools isn’t straightforward, as any MNer knows. And schools can be good at educating children and simultaneously bad at steering them through the HE process.

Of course it's not, but a school that is actively undermining your child's university application process is a pretty extreme situation.

There's all the difference in the world between a school that is "bad at steering [students] through the HE process" and one that actively does "not have their student's best interests at heart", no?

PCohle - I am very certain, from what I have read of yours on this thread, that you have children’s best interests at heart. It would also appear that you have never come across a school that has ideas about its students’ HE that are very far from aligned with a student’s own desires or best interests. Believe me: such schools exist! They may even be quite good schools with some excellent students.

The only example you've given of schools undermining Oxbridge applicants is stating: "Schools generally want their highest performing students to continue to the most prestigious HE in their own market."

So overseas, presumably independent, prestigious schools that are focused on their leavers destinations.

Maybe such schools exist, I have no idea. What relevance that issue has to social mobility in the UK I also have no idea. To be honest kids at expensive international schools are not really where my concern lies regarding Oxbridge applications. If parents who have more money than sense suddenly lack confidence in the private school they choose for poor little Tarquin want to throw more money at consultants in the hope of buying him a place at Oxford then fine.

But telling kids at state schools that they need to spend money on consultants or else they will be disadvantaged in the application process is not only incorrect but morally reprehensible.

No one is telling children at state schools that they need to spend money on consultants.

But it is very wrong indeed to pull the wool over applicants’ eyes as to the state of the market. The Guardian article I linked to above that explains how U.K. students are losing out to overseas students for Oxbridge places is pretty hot stuff.

I kind of feel we've been here before with these ex pat 'mentors' who never seem to have been to Oxbridge themselves nor have had DC go through the process successfully nor are academics/ involved in admissions. It seems to be about being revered in their community abroad; admired for being perceived as having special insight into the Oxbridge process and unique powers. An essential premise is that Oxbridge applications are extremely hard to understand with myriad potential traps unless one consults these oracles.

anyone?

It's all bullshit of course.

I don’t think the company in the OP is outside the UK, though it doubtless does have international clients.

I'm not referring to that company.

Also, I don't find the content of the article especially hot: the universities have expanded numbers marginally and most of those additional places have gone to fee paying internationals - hardly hot, given the finances.

It is hot, given the endless media coverage that Oxbridge generate to try to convince the British public they are doing all they can to recruit the less privileged British. Any data, as opposed to PR, quickly shows this up to be farce.

I genuinely don't understand how you think Cambridge's announcement that it will allow pupils who miss out on receiving an offer to effectively reapply after receiving their grades is just PR.

It is surely a sincere attempt to increase access following data showing existing efforts haven't gone far enough.

What could they do to improve access that wouldn't, in your eyes, be mere "PR"?

Frankly I think one of the biggest obstacles to access is that able state school pupils are discouraged from applying because of misinformation from people like you that the application process is arduous and an old boy's club.

Where have I said that the process is either arduous or an old boy’s club? I haven’t. I have said that schools that may be good at educating their students may simultaneously be pretty bad at helping them get to university. Be wary of your school’s skill / agenda is wise advice to the unsuspecting.

I have not read everything but I do know that my son ( independent school) was positively warned off some of these companies , and they are legion, who purport to give you a better "leg up" to ( in Ds's case ) Oxford.

Aptitude test past papers ( well when DS applied) were readily available on the internet. These IMHO are worth reading and studying. Wider reading - yes ( DS was humanities) of course worth doing and actually probably DCs already are if they are genuinely interested in a subject ( or watching relevant documentaries or listening to radio programmes. )

I just wonder how much insight these consultants have when both schools and ( at an open day ) Oxford warn you off them. Of course they will have some insight by talking to past applicants and looking up stuff on the inter web , but I am not , really not, sure they are worth the candle.

I do sort of see your point @MariaNovella , but I think encouragement to apply ( which if you are going to spend ££££ on a consultant - presumably already done) and then researching admissions advice and online resources.

I am well aware that Oxbridge/LSE etc warn applicants off consultants. There are some almost touchingly naive paragraphs on Cambridge’s website telling prospective applicants that their schools shouldn’t be charging them for supplying a reference. While that would seem reasonable within the UK, imagining that schools outside the UK can always supply references for free in English shows no understanding of the reality of schools in other countries. Applicants, who are young and inexperienced, can be a bit floored by conflicting opinions - Cambridge on the one hand who says the reference should be free of charge and their school on the other who demands an upfront payment of €1000 before writing a reference.

@MariaNovella - fair play - I was only thinking of UK schools.

What good is also paying an external consultant going to do if your school is already charging you for a reference?

There are plenty of summer schools (outreach and paid for) run by or hosted in universities to help applicants with their HE application and aimed at UK applicants. There might be very good logistical or other reasons why students cannot attend these and might prefer a consultant such as the one in the OP.

Your school can, unfortunately, both charge you for a reference and need external advice on how to word it.

And so the consultant helps how exactly, in that situation? By charging 1000 euros or more to tell the school that references should be free?

(My cynical side the reference will be better by stumping up the cash to the school rather than to the bossy consultant).

If the school cannot write a reference in English, it is unlikely to also be able to understand what is expected of it even if it writes the reference in its own language. The school will need handholding and coaxing!

I have very recently witnessed a DC reviewing admissions for an international summer school. The school references vary unbelievably in style and quality and there is little correlation with other aspects of the application. Schools aren’t very good at this (notable exceptions: Eaton and Westminster).

Eton

Boo - I'm cooking - crossed posts. But yes exactly PCohle.

Eton