Oxbridge 2021: another 6 months of fretting

[DahliaMacNamara]

Will they make the grades? How will grades be awarded anyway? What the hell are Cambridge up to with that nasty little clause?

@gingertom

Lurker here. DS has an offer from Cambridge. When he went to have a look (lurk?) there was a sign outside inviting offer holders to ask to look around. So i think it is definitely worth a call to see whether that is a possibility. It certainly made DS feel better to actually set eyes on where he may spend three years.

Ooh interesting! Thank you!

D1 has just returned to Oxford as her college finally relented, allowing anyone who applied to return for the start of Trinity, rather than May 18th. We took her and had a 1 hour parking slot in college, however, we had to check in at the plodge and were told we should spend as little time as possible wearing masks all the time and leave within 30 mins. So I would check directly with the colleges before making a trip to look around - pretty sure many are not letting anyone in. Having said that, I noticed Magdalen were letting tourists in at £6 a go, and offer holders I think they'd let in free.

Magdalen were also giving away a free calendar to visitors when they first re-opened.

Someone on Twitter wasn't allowed to return to their room in college, but was delighted to be able to tour the grounds and have a calendar to show them what they were missing.

Those deer parks don't run themselves Hogh 😁

Good luck to everyone on the A levels.

I woke up this morning to a dream (nightmare) that I was sitting in the school canteen and DD came to me to tell me very casually that she had just received a C on her Physics exam. I can't tell you how relieved I was when I realised it wasn't true. This is going to be a long month for both of us!

DS , with C offer, just been rejected by St A. Bit annoyed. Predicted four A stars and got almost straight 9s at gcse. Ranked first at his sixth form in the subject out of over a hundred students. I know it doesn’t matter, but what is going on there? Did anyone get science St A offers?! Have they got massive backlog from last year?

Is your DS applying from Scotland? The statistics for home student offer places are quite shocking. (I'd assume that it's because they don't pay fees?). Sorry it was a rejection. (Doesn't look like it was through any fault of your DS).

It's all very haphazard. No St A applicants at DD's school afaik, but a similarly high-flying Oxford offer-holder being rejected by other unis, while Oxbridge redirectees get offers from the same places. They must all be looking very closely at different things. Or pulling names out of hats.

@ClarasZoo

DS , with C offer, just been rejected by St A. Bit annoyed. Predicted four A stars and got almost straight 9s at gcse. Ranked first at his sixth form in the subject out of over a hundred students. I know it doesn’t matter, but what is going on there? Did anyone get science St A offers?! Have they got massive backlog from last year?

My DS has also just been rejected by St Andrews for physics. I suspect that St Andrews may have been stymied by making too many offers before the government (rather belatedly in my opinion) confirmed TAGs rather than exams this summer. That has understandably meant that St Andrews could not risk over-offering. I really do feel for those students who had it as their first choice.

DD has withdrawn from St. Andrews. Has to choose between Durham, Edinburgh and Bristol for her insurance. At Edinburgh students can take a very wide variety of first year options, astrobiology and astrophysics would be in the frame. Quite interesting components for an English Lit degree.

So a very bad day here.

DS did his further maths assessment and somehow 2 minutes before the end of the exam realised he'd missed a whole page of questions.

He did as much as he could in the small time left but the reality is there's no way (even if he aced the next exam) get an A star.

He's absolutely devastated and what's worse is that they were easy questions.

Absolutely gutted for him.

Not sure why I'm posting really as there's nothing to be done.

I have a tiny hope that if he does well in STEP he might be picked out of the summer pool - but it's a very long shot.

Oh no @DeRigueurMortis, your poor DS. Do you know what weighting this exam will have in the CAG? Will they be taking into account other evidence, not just the two exams? I really, really hope it works out for him.

The results are being based on mocks from last year and two exams this/next week.

He did well in the mocks but these have far more weight.

He basically lost 23 marks out of 100 .

I can't see any way he can pull that back.

He's beside himself and can't believe after all the hard work it's come to this.

It is so easily done, but utterly heartbreaking.

Yes - heartbreaking is the word for it.

Oh God, poor kid. Does he have any idea how the rest of it went?

It was his first assessment exam so aside from everything else it's put him in a pretty bad place for doing all the others this week and next.

He says he feels physically sick and hasn't been able to eat since he came home.

It's so shit when there's absolutely nothing you can do to help

Oh sorry I think you meant the rest of the exam - he thinks what he did do was good and with the other exam could pull it back to an A, but not the A star he needs for Cambridge.

so easily done.

I think I feel sick for him too. But he doesn’t know he can’t pull it back. My DS had a terrible Oxford interview - stress and panic and he couldn’t answer the basics. He was convinced he blew it but he got the place.
This is a funny year - the rules for CAGS are not predictable. I hope he can put it behind him and fly in his other exams. Fingers crossed for him - never, ever give up.

@DeRigueurMortis I have been lurking and wishing you all well (mother of a happy Oxford fresher - I remember clearly the stress and anxiety from last year). I am devastated to read what happened to your DS and have everything crossed for him.

Surely where a pupil makes an unusual error teachers can exercise discretion, especially in a year in which schools are using widely different criteria for awarding grades? I really hope he gets what he needs.

Echoing Flyonawalk - I felt sick for you both, @DeRigueurMortis when I read your post last night, but don't give up hope. I hope he can put it out of his mind so he can concentrate on his other assessments.

@IrmaFayLear

so easily done.

Especially when they don't necessarily know what to expect to see on the paper, I think? With standardised exams you know the format. This year it's anyone's guess. I hope he can get teachers to take a sympathetic view.

@DeRigueurMortis

Oh sorry I think you meant the rest of the exam - he thinks what he did do was good and with the other exam could pull it back to an A, but not the A star he needs for Cambridge.

I think you need to keep very calm and contact everyone who needs to know about this. Firstly his teachers. If he is an A star pupil they should really still give him an A star. Secondly, contact his Cambridge college and explain what happened. Cambridge want the best mathmaticians - they should, in my opinion, look well beyond this. They may even be able to reassure him that even he only gets an A that it is STEP that they are really interested in. If I was in admissions, which I am not, I would certainly not care about this small mistake in the greater context. Please do contact them. They don’t want to trip people up and I think you may find them helpful. If all else fails they should let him resit in October and come the year after, but I really think that they will reassure you that this won’t matter. The A level is the “easy” bit and STEP sorts them out. Do it ASAP so you can reassure him before the next exam.... good luck..