Oxbridge 2020 (8th thread)

[DadDadDad]

A thread to continue discussing entry to Oxbridge in October 2020 (less than nine months away ). All welcome, although this obviously will be of most interest to those with DS or DD holding an offer, and wanting to find a bit of support.

All too soon, 13 August will come over the horizon. Until then, ask questions... share experiences... discuss news and stats... write a poem... (we did briefly have some poetry on a previous thread).

With huge thanks to @HugoSpritz and predecessors for previous threads.

There might be some exceptional circumstances under which an offer could be withdrawn; DS's offer letter was two pages of formal wording and came with an additional document (several more pages) listing terms and conditions. I haven't read it, although he has.

But having more people than expected meeting the offer on results day is not a valid reason for them to withdraw the offer.

@sevenstars,bear in mind there are anomalies to the Oxford system pre filtering before interview ; DD has a very close friend who has a place for Biological science at Oxford; no pre-admission test, no submitted work. She had a jolly easy ride if such a thing exists compared to peers ( which she recognises!). She’s also quite brilliant and deserving I might add!

Do Cambridge not do humanities aptitude tests? Is it only STEP for Maths?

The numbers haven't been released for this year's application round sevenstars but up until this year at least there have been more applicants per place at Oxford across almost all subjects than for Cambridge. Applicants per place doesn't tell the whole story of course, but it's at least one factor which doesn't suggest that Cambridge is 'harder'.

I don't think the difference is huge, but it's been a clear trend across most subjects. Perhaps Cambridge is just too cold for most teenagers!

@Coleoptera I phoned the admissions office with precisely this question this time last year and they were very helpful. The colleges have different start dates to stagger the influx of traffic. I think it’s very unlikely that your two DTs’ dates will clash.

Coleoptera I think week 1 of Cambridge lectures starts on 8 October 2020, so I would speculate that they arrive the weekend before (I think they have a 5 day period of Freshers' events).

@sevenstars, DD sat the Cambridge aptitude test for History ; its called AHAA, lots of info on the uni website. It was an essay for 1 hr on source material and an MCQ for an hr on thinking skill type topics. She submitted 2 essays. Her bf who went for Oxford submitted 1 essay and the HAT aptitude test was 1 hr long. Oxford clearly know how to find what they want with elegant efficiency!!

Have been following for a while and prompted to de-lurk by stories of now grown up premmie babies who have done so well! DD is another 30 weeker with an Oxford offer of AAB (Adv Highers)

Think @DadDadDad should do an analysis of rate of prematurity in the general population vs reported rate on this thread. (Mine were all full term incidentally.)

PS @Coleoptera I've a feeling that Cambridge terms start slightly before Oxford's. All being well I will also be heading in both directions in October, albeit with a fresher and a second year.

Re the Cambridge version of Adjustment and STEP, the website says:

I applied for Mathematics / Mathematics with Physics – will STEP be a requirement during Adjustment?

Yes. Applicants being considered for these courses during Adjustment will need to have taken STEP II and III. The entry requirement for applicants to be considered during Adjustment is:

2A*A (including Maths and Further Maths) with at least grade 1 in STEP papers II and III

or

3A* (including Maths and Further Maths) with at least grade 1 in one of those two STEP papers taken.
www.undergraduate.study.cam.ac.uk/adjustment/adjustment-faqs

It makes sense that to be considered for Adjustment the applicant would have to have taken STEP, because to meet the 'non contextual' part, s/he has to have met at least the typical offer for the course applied for. (As well as having exceeded the offer for their existing firm choice).

Re start dates, you may not be able to get the precise dates quite yet - DDs college ran a warm-up course for her subject for a few days before Freshers itself. DH was pleased, it meant there was parking and no rush.
I believe otherwise it's quite tightly timed slots, and parking is a bit of a nightmare, so my guess is that it may be a matter or dropping them and their baggage into the welcoming hands of the student helpers, taking your car elsewhere and then returning later however you can. Hotels get booked up and are liable to hike prices!

@FingernailNibbler you can do one language at Oxford. But that means you have to do more or less every paper and can't, say, avoid medieval French, or linguistics (both of which I swerved as I did two languages).

@Coleoptera Term starts on Sunday 13th October (week 1) at Oxford so Freshers week is the week before, but colleges seem to have different dates in week 0 by which they have to arrive for registration etc. from what I can see. Wherever D1 ends up, we'd want to take her, hopefully over a weekend. I also arrived at university on my own - to find that my accommodation was still occupied and wasn't going to be free until the start of term. They'd not factored in freshers week... I spent my first week sleeping on someone else's floor!

Thankyou for answering my basic questions. It sounds as if the Oxford selection process is slightly less stressful than the Cambridge then, if only in the sense that if you don’t get through the aptitude test at the interview time, then that’s that. It must be more stressful to fail STEP or similar, after conditional offers have been made and having achieved better than expected grades!

Also, why are there only 30 or so courses on offer at each of these unis? I was surprised at this. It’s strange that Oxford don’t offer a Politics degree, for instance. I know there’s PPE, but that requires A-level Maths due to the Economics component and obviously there will be many very promising politics students who won’t have taken maths.

@cleopatra my ds moved in the Saturday before term started last October. We were given this date in about March. I think it may vary slightly by college.

That was Cambridge by the way

Coleoptera as a general rule the colleges which aren't hugger mugger with other colleges such as Wadham and Magdalen tend to arrive on the Sunday a week ahead of the first full week of the Oxford term:

www.ox.ac.uk/about/facts-and-figures/dates-of-term?wssl=1

Whereas colleges such as Oriel, Corpus, Merton or Lincoln, Jesus, Exeter have to stagger arrival dates. (In fact for Oriel I was given a narrow time slot randomly dependent on first letter of surname which bore no relation to geographical distance from Oxford nor the fact that I am not one's of nature's earlybirds).

Or rather, not one.

Also I don't think I quite made the time slot largely because I had no intention of leaving home at 4am, but no-one seemed to care :)

Oops, I meant 11th October. 13th is DH's birthday

@panttwizzler

Haha I hadn't thought of that. At some unis you do 2-3 languages. I can see the benefit of being able to focus on your favourite topics across two languages. I think at C you end up focusing on one by the end? DD felt one of her interviews they were probing to see which of her languages she would drop. If you have an ab initio, I presume you drop that to focus on your main one. Does that mean the interviewers for your A level language have more say than the AI interview tutors?

sevenstars I wouldn't dare suggest to my DD that the Oxford selection process is less stressful than Cambridge. She is one of the lucky offer holders for PPE. She had to sit both parts of the TSA in October then the anxious wait for the offer of an interview began. Her college interviewed less than 25% of applicants and planned to offer around 10% of applicants a place. She had to arrive in Oxford on Sunday and had separate interviews for politics, philosophy and economics before finally being allowed to go home on Wednesday afternoon. Not all applicants had A level maths, as Oxford simply suggests that history & maths are recommended for PPE but not mandatory. She is not predicted straight A*s for her A levels so the stress will continue until August. I don't believe a single offer holder thinks they have a place until UCAS updates on results day.