Applying for Uni 2020 :2: Offers arriving

[MillicentMartha]

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/higher_education/3655914-Applying-for-Uni-2020?pg=40

Previous thread

Brilliant. My sat nav once tried to send me down a tramway in Croydon. We get lots of issues with lorries & streets not built for vehicles as well.

The joys of Satnav which I am sure my DD will come to love and hate. I don't think Satnav actually works properly in Croydon- I've spent many an hour going around in circles and come face to face with a few trams!

She drove it back from Cambridge yesterday which has to be the most awful journey with miles and miles of roadworks, average speed cameras and narrow lanes forking off here there and everywhere - even I hate that route with 35 plus years of driving behind me.

DS's car is 16 yrs old with no satnav. He has grown up using google maps with integral satnav so hopefully won't end up on a tram line!! He tends to take the train to far-away places (and it's only 4-5 hours on the bus from here to Oxford )

TBF, DS had >90% chance of an offer on the UCAS tool with his predictions for all the unis he applied to. Durham and Oxbridge are not on his radar nor is he doing medicine so I’d be surprised if he didn’t get 5 offers. No reduced ones, rare for maths unfortunately.

Good point oneteen yes that DC did get a Durham offer recently but I don't think we know grades or other stats. The reference to banding of schools isn't in relation to Durham.

@hugo - I fully understand the contextual offers based on what school you took GCSE's but if you look at Durham stats which go into great detail on the split between state and private schools - The DD concerned would be counted as a state school applicant because she attends a state school even though her GCSE's were at a private school. Assuming the entrance stats are based on what school the applicant came from not the school they were at 2 years ago.

I wonder if they are categorizing applicants how they will categorize such an applicant when they apply to Oxford if indeed all Indie applicants are automatically given Cat1

It was Stats I was referring too and I would have thought that Stats matter when there is so much in the press about the imbalance ...so Cambridge will class a DC who applies from a state school as an Indie if they sat their GCSE's at an Indie but their A levels at a State school application on their stats? Durham will class the same student as a State school application?

I'm going to send a Right to Information request because I'm intrigued as to how this would work....

oneteen I think all indies regardless of how crap are being put in Cat 1 for context at the top uni I'm referrring to. It would take quite some effort on my part to get that wrong. In that it was very specific. Clearly if a student is at the top of the tree in his or her indie then there's not too much to fear but there's a very definite stride towards trying to level the field. As I say, not before time. I expect my own DD to be in Cat 2 (high performing state sector). Perfectly fair; she's been privileged educationally - no quarrel with that. But what's interesting is the apparently clear division between the indie and state sectors.

@goodbyestranger. I think it's fair...from what I have read Cambridge further applies concessions against selective other schools. What I am questioning is whether a DC who was at a private school but sat their A levels at a State school would be classed as State or Private.

Yes I get that that's your point oneteen. Mine is another. This year appears to be bringing in quite radical new developments - I don't think anyone can do much interpretation of early or reduced offers until the dust has settled.

I've looked through the Cambridge Admission document from 2018 and they don't define how they classify an applicant ...I would have thought it would have been the school/college where the application had come from BUT Hugo seems to think that its the school where the applicant sat their GCSE's (Cambridge) www.undergraduate.study.cam.ac.uk/sites/www.undergraduate.study.cam.ac.uk/files/publications/ug_admissions_statistics_2018_cycle.pdf

TBH I think Oxford said there would be radical changes - I think Louise Richardson as made it very clear that change has been too slow.

Yes absolutely. Here's hoping it will be an interesting year.

Oneteen this doesn't answer your question about the anomaly between GCSE & A level state/indie education, but it does prove that Cambridge don't categorise all indies as being equal in admissions:

their academic record, including GCSE and AS (or equivalent) grades and marks and A Level (or equivalent) grades or predictions, this record being considered in the context of the quality (but not type) of schools/colleges at which it was achieved

I know Oxbridge look at the school the DC's attended in terms of GCSE results - I still think that the school/college they attended when applying on UCAS is the school recorded on the Uni Stats....I cannot see how it could be anything other than this because it would work both ways e.g. a state-educated DC who went to private school would be recorded as state-educated and not private.

I don't know how Universities would address this ...it probably doesn't matter apart from Oxbridge/Durham who seems to be scrutinized...neither does the categorization for a lot of private schools who broadly select therefore any DC applying to Oxbridge are few and far between and would generally stand out when you look at overall school results.

Hoghgyni as you say, Cambridge. Cambridge isn't Oxford. Also, Cambridge tends to follow Oxford, eventually.

It's also a new or at least a more full throated thing for this year. Even on MN last year, there were major murmurs of discontent about indie applicants apparently 'losing out' at the top unis in the 2019 round. I don't suppose that even those top unis know yet what the numbers will translate to in terms of actual admissions, but it's an interesting development. For far too long the disproportionate number of independently educated DC at Oxbridge hasn't been fully explained by grades alone, so any redress of the balance has to be good.

Hmm, I wonder if this is a discussion better suited to the Oxbridge thread. Or perhaps it should be renamed Doxbridge?

It's slightly artificial to ban mention of Oxford and Cambridge when so many MN DC are applying to those unis as well. But yes, happy not to mention Oxford if it's too sensitive on the general 2020 thread.

Thanks. TBH the topic can tend to take over and is rather boring for the rest of us.

Sorry - Yes totally agree my apologies !

Millicent the subject of access is pretty broad. Sorry that you find it boring. I get that discussion of aptitude tests and submission of written work etc is incredibly tedious but tbh Oxford and Cambridge are just two other unis to which tens of thousands of kids apply each round. So on general themes such as access possibly healthier not to be too snowflakey about the mere mention.