Another path to greatnesses

[chopc]

I woke up around 4:30 this morning and it hit me like a tonne of bricks. Couldn't get back to sleep so thought I will have a go and starting the new thread. Hope the title is not too cheesy

Agree, @sandybayley - Oxbridge want the best. They don’t let great candidates get away that easily.

And as for employment prospects... actually a great many students like - nay, love - their subject. Some of ds’s peers were genuinely “passionate” about History or Maths or Classics. They didn’t see Oxbridge as a means to an end at all.

Where I work ( global corporate finance) we start the recruitment process blind so I don’t know where individuals went to Uni.

I could be wrong but lots of employers conduct their own tests. Even significant ore interview tests. Oxbridge doesn’t open the doors by being an Oxbridge degree alone. The grads have to stack up against other grads. However it’s true, I think, that a lot of them do. But a lot from other universities do as well. Definitely in disciplines like Engineering or Architecture for example.

Obviously some DC who are extra passionate about their subjects are likely to carry on in academia and teach it. I don’t think some of them would consider doing anything else. Nothing wrong with that at all but plenty of grads from other universities can compete with Oxbridge grads but it very much depends on the job.

@chopc
@goodbyestranger
Thanks for support and understanding earlier. Much appreciated.

I may have missed it if anyone else has mentioned this but has anyone seen the latest update from those who have offers from Cambridge? There is a new stipulation

www.cao.cam.ac.uk/system/files/publications/ug_terms_of_admission.pdf

Which says Oversubscription

1. If, as a result of circumstances outside the reasonable control of the University and/or your College, the number of applicants meeting the conditions of an offer of a place on your course exceeds the number of places available at the University or at your College, the University and your College will allocate places on a fair and reasonable basis. If you are not allocated a place at your College on that basis, the University

and your College will, wherever possible, try to offer you one or more of the following options:

(i) assist you to move to another College where places are available;
(ii) offer you the opportunity of deferring your place to the next academic year;
(iii) offer you a place on another appropriate course; or
(iv) support you in moving to another institution.

So an offer but not a guarantee of an actual place.

Yes, some employers are now interviewing graduates being deliberately blind to the university attended as long as they got AAB or higher A levels and a 2/1 or higher (as you need a filter otherwise too many people).

Just checked on line.... CV blind even - law firms: Mind you this is if you get to interview stage. I presume they look at your CV before that stage. www.thecorporatelawacademy.com/forum/threads/cv-blind-interviews.1214/

Clifford Chance.
MacFarlanes.
Mayer Brown.
Ropes & Gray.
RPC.
A&O.

Well if the do on line tests, phone tests and all other things in between they still might get the same candidates going forward. The other issue is getting diverse candidates to apply in the first place.

@OnTheBenchOfDoom I saw that on the other thread. Ouch. Hopefully it means if that’s what you want rather than deferring, rather than Cambridge unilaterally deciding. They’re hedging their bets because of last year, but not nice for the poor offer holders who have already had such an awful time of it.

@quest1on I do see your point about college allocation and I hope that Cambridge has similar overview to what Oxford has. But the applying to a specific college system is so entrenched that it would take a lot of dismantling to change it. And even then, the living quarters in the colleges can be so different I’m not sure how it can be just.

Personally, I believe it’s a shame schools advise applying to or avoiding certain colleges depending on whether you’re private or state school. It seems a strategy that, if it works, will always benefit students at certain public schools who will have years of data from many applicants. State schools, comparatively, will have less such data to draw on. But I appreciate others won’t share my view and they may be right not to.

The data showing ther percentage state/indie , male/female, white/BAME and so on is all public so anyone can look and see those % splits. You can see which colleges are increasing their state to indoe ratios and indeed it has been well publicised that over the next 4 years this is set to increase further to the state school applicant's benefit. I would always advocate apply to the one you liked the best (if you had a chance to visit) whether that was because you liked the location, you liked the accommodation or just felt welcomed by the staff/students who showed you around. You may not end up there and may end up at another college but you certainly won't end up there if you don't apply unless you were lucky enough to be allocated to it or pooled there.

However, I do get the point that a specific school can see where it may have enjoyed certain successes for their own pupils but sometimes this has no rhyme nor reason to it either.

You've all been very chatty, just catching up!

Interesting to read about becoming a lawyer. My dd is another budding lawyer. Dh is a solicitor and he said when she was very young she would be very well suited to law. Dd stubbornly denied it for years until recently when she realised he might be right. She did some work experience at my solicitor cousin's small firm a year or two ago which she really enjoyed and they were very impressed with her.

But it's early days and she may change her mind. I think it's good to keep an open mind about future career options; university opens up all sorts of thinking. Dd loves acting/drama and also TV/media - I can see her maybe getting into television to do research, would be really interesting.

She turned 18 yesterday! Had a lovely day, fancy balloon arrangements in the lounge, table centre decoration with twinkly lights etc....I had a short film professionally made with birthday messages from her friends (she LOVED this!), cake, presents and personalised chocolate board with her name on.

I now have 2 adult children! Thank goodness for dd3 (nearly 14).

That's worrying reading about Cambridge. Must be awful to get so far as to get an offer but turned away at the last minute.

@bendmeoverbackwards your daughter's birthday celebration sounds wonderful- what a great lockdown birthday!

Thank you @Pumpkintopf she actually said it was better than last year's (very average meal out and row between dh and dd3). I'm so happy she enjoyed it.

Happy 18th birthday to your dd @bendmeoverbackwards! Been catching up on all msgs here, have been chatting to dd over weekend and think She is going to go with Durham, it's far but we can fly out to newcastle then catch taxi to Durham etc been looking at lots of pluses some negatives too but more positive on the whole.

That sounds great @par05 what subject is she studying?

Still no news from Durham here, it’s not looking hopeful

@bendmeoverbackwards english lit, and I'm sure you will hear soon alot haven't heard yet so 🤞 it will be soon xx

Durham really can be very late. 1st Feb is not a reason to give up hope. DD didn’t hear from them until March and that’s not unusual. There’s no medal for getting early offers.

@bendmeoverbackwards

Durham are always the same every year, they don’t do clearing so allocate in batches. Most of my DS’s friends who applied for the more popular courses, Lit, History & Law, haven’t heard yet, just those that applied for the smaller courses.

If you look at the statistics (I think they were posted on TSR), as much as Durham is a popular choice for some, it still over offers by 4 or 5 the number of places it has for each course, applicants can after all, only go to one Uni!

My DS got his History offer a couple of weeks ago, however I’m sure this is related to a pretty horrendous set of extenuating circumstances that was put forward (medical). In the main, Durham will have dealt with International & contextual applicants first.

Every year Durham are late out the gate. There is a thread up for Durham last year and as I knew Ds would be applying I made a mental note that they could take a while.

Ds has an offer from Durham, college confirmation is out at the end of this month so that may decide things for some who already have offers.

Still waiting to hear from Durham here too - English Literature. Not getting anxious, but do wish they would hurry up so DD could have all her options.

She asked for feedback last week from Oxford but we are not to expect it before 15th Feb. Just hoping it will be helpful and won’t be another setback for her

@bendmeoverbackwards belated birthday wishes to your DD. If it puts your mind at rest, my DD is also still waiting to hear from Durham for the same course. Keeping fingers crossed you hear soon. I've absolutely no idea what takes them so long.

If students are not reapplying I’m not sure if can be helpful. In what way? It’s just confirmation that others were deemed better and isn’t of much value in the future because you won’t be doing anything remotely similar.

I would try and be happy with being good enough to try and getting closer than some applicants do. Look forward. Not backwards.

DD may consider re-applying if the feedback is such that it would be worth it (but that's probably unlikely). Helpful in the sense that she can act on it in her future Uni career, for example, not being willing to debate other perspectives in the interview. I am just a bit worried that the feedback might dent her confidence without giving her anything to work on IYSWIM.

They won’t say anything horribly negative, Stitchintimesaves9. Ds’s was that he was difficult to draw out in interviews. He was very shy and nervous and, moreover, he himself felt it was a fair cop and that he wasn’t up to it on that occasion. The test score was valuable information as it tells you where you are on the scale of applicants.

@xeniaisasociopath

Not sure what your problem is but your user name & response suggests you’ve got a bit of an issue with another member, which is unpleasant.