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

[goodbyestranger]

Funny you should name those two schools Maria since I have it on good authority from an extended family member (an academic with current admissions/ interview experience at both unis) that one of them tends to vastly over egg the merits of its students, to the point that the references are valueless).

[PCohle]

Cambridge's suggestions for the school's reference are below. I googled "Cambridge school's reference" and it was the first result, this took me 0.5 seconds.

Translate that into the relevant language send it to your school and save yourself the consultant's fee.

If your child is bright enough to attend Oxbridge they will be clever enough to do this.

[MariaNovella]

There is rather more to the style and quality (or lack thereof) of a reference than exaggeration of personal qualities, goodbye.

[goodbyestranger]

Well actually to clarify: all of the references from one school have appeared over the years to be so uniformly superlative that they're ignored even in cases where the applicant is, actually, superlative - as you would expect some to be, from both of those schools. But the fact is that by always bigging up applicants, certain schools lose credibility, as indeed they should when they failing to discriminate properly between applicants. Oxford and Cambridge are easily capable of readingreferences in context - they don't need a highly paid self serving middleman.

[goodbyestranger]

Cross post Maria.

Piffle.

[MariaNovella]

PCohle - I can assure you that some of those instructions would be very hard indeed for some cultures to understand. A translation would not suffice.

[MariaNovella]

To be fair, the references that I am referring to weren’t academic references. They needed to describe suitability of personal characteristics for a very specific short course. The point was whether the schools actually addressed, with data based on knowledge of the student, the fit between student and course.

[goodbyestranger]

Well Maria since you seem so concerned about access for less well off UK students then probably the cultural lack of communication doesn't matter too much - unless you're actually being outrageously snobbish about applicants from less well represented parts on the UK, and assuming that culturally they don't understand the language written and spoken in Cambridge.

[PCohle]

If a student isn't academically able enough to make those very clear instructions comprehensible to their school, despite differences in educational culture, I suspect they would not be a successful applicant in any event.

[MariaNovella]

PCohle - can’t you see that a student cannot give instructions to its school on how it should write a reference? It’s not about ability, it’s about the nature of the relationship.

[goodbyestranger]

What I can see Maria is that you have a finger in this particular rather ethically dubious financial pie. Are you or one of your DC involved in this sort of consultancy?

[OVienna]

My sister in law was steered away from Oxbridge by a school advisor who told her she'd never fit in socially. Another colleague was advised similarly and told Exeter was a much better choice instead- because in the 1980s it was a positive magnet for working class northerners accd this teacher. He took her advice; "I was the only person who wasn't from within 30 min of Guildford."

They both laugh about it now.

My Pil would have been in no position to challenge the school. These services may well have a place - but people who find them probably have sharper elbows anyway. Leaving it to the school is andi bad advice though.

[MariaNovella]

I think the issue of access (not just to Oxbridge) is a fascinating one. There is a burgeoning market in the UK with more and more people working in the sector - inside schools, inside universities, summer school and course providers, consultants, agents, HE fairs, cultural organisations, roadshows. Jobs galore. Why pretend otherwise?

[PCohle]

But an external consultant can't give instructions to the school either - there's no relationship at all!

Up thread you said "applicants rely on external advisors to help them navigate the admissions process including very difficult negotiations with schools".

I entirely agree that students can't give instructions to the school on to write. That's exactly why I think consultants are valueless. Schools just won't listen - either to students directly or consultants.

[MariaNovella]

Schools most definitely listen to external consultants.

[goodbyestranger]

Our school would tell any external consultant to fuck right off, and fast.

[goodbyestranger]

Ours is a state school though. It sound to me as though you're moving in very well oiled circles Maria, monetarily.

[PCohle]

So you think a school absolutely wouldn't listen to a translation of the official Cambridge university website provided by a student, but would definitely listen to the advice of a private consultant (which as you have admitted down thread is an entirely unregulated industry with no meaningful qualifications)?

To be honest I think you should worry less about university admissions and more about the terrible schools you seem to have experienced. Your experiences seem bizarre and wholly unrepresentative.

[MariaNovella]

That’s fine, goobyestranger, because your children’s school is fully in the loop for competitive HE applications. Other children’s schools are not.

[MariaNovella]

PCohle - I don’t think it, PCohle, I know it. There really are lots of external consultants about. And while some schools have very large and well resourced in house university guidance, others don’t and are pretty grateful to be able to outsource hassle.

[PCohle]

You know it based on what though?

You've said repeatedly that you aren't involved in the industry so presumably you are only drawing on your own experiences and those of your children?

I, and other posters, wholly disagree that schools will listen to external consultants (but not official guidance issued by the universities themselves ).

A school that is actually "outsourcing" the writing of a university references to a consultant paid for by the student in question is acting wildly unethically.

[goodbyestranger]

True, the school is in the loop. But the school would also, quite rightly, have the gravest doubts about the ethics of any so called commercial consultant.

[BasiliskStare]

@MariaNovella - no you are right - a pupil cannot tell a school what reference they want - and frankly if this were possible the reference would be pretty much valueless. An outsourced reference I think would be pretty much disregarded - or should be .
My Ds's school doesn't even give out predicted grades ( correction ) they did not when he was there - it may have changed. ) . Ha ha - how bad it that. Am sure someone could come up with a business idea to look at previous grades and give him a prediction. for a big cheque.

[MariaNovella]

Schools don’t have to outsource reference writing in order to benefit from the assistance of external advisors in understanding what is appropriate. Some schools ask their students to draft their own reference (which is of course not the same as a student giving a school instructions) and have internal processes for this. There are lots of ways that external consultants operate and they have to fit in with the school. I have been to a lot of presentations by external consultants, working in both national and international HE markets.

[Hollybollybingbong]

In what capacity did you attend those presentations MariaNovella?