Oxbridge Aspirants 2022

[TangoWhiskyAlphaTango]

Hi not too sure if there is another thread started as could not see one. May be waaaaaay too early but wondered if any other parents out there who have a child applying for next year?

Dd would like to apply to Cambridge to study History and Politics in 2022. She is at a state A-level college doing History, Politics and English Literature. I have never had to push her towards studying she is a very motivated child and wants to give Cambridge a shot (a very long shot as we know!). Her GCSE results were good but not top notch (9s in History, English Language and literature and the rest 7s and 6s) so not sure how much this will affect her. So far her A-level essays are coming out at As and A* and those are her predicted grades so if she continues on track that should meet the criteria.

She reads a lot of extra curricular stuff and has a genuine passion for politics, has joined the local Labour party youth group. She has applied for the summer programme at Cambridge & is part of an Oxbridge group that the college puts together.

It feels like a such a long shot and the stats of actually getting in are very low only 18% of applicants successful in 2019 so I am trying to tell her not to get her hopes up whilst actually supporting her!

She is my first born so I have never been through this before. Anybody else out there? Would be lovely to hear from you.

It’s one thing saying you take the PS with a pinch of salt and in context. Sure, we all know they did that. But to say they don’t read your PS (or reference) at all, simply because you are applying from certain schools is another matter.

If it’s such a joke for them, why go to the extra step of requesting the SAQ?

Clearly my post should have said "none" rather than nine 🤦‍♂️

I have been avoiding that thread. They stress me out and I am monitoring my BP three times a day!

I do think Oxbridge needs to stamp out some practices - for example, the taking of calls from the head of top public schools (I don't mean the perfectly normal ones here!) to smooth the passage of little Boris, or little Dave or little Toby... some personage recently wrote an article in the ST about this a while back and actually had the temerity to blame the state schools for not doing this. Hey ho.

As for the PS, that whole system probably needs rejigging. Some places don't read them at all, some say they are very important, some make huge long videos about what they should be like. They are very hard to write if you are applying for joint or multi discipline degrees or applying for different degrees at different places. DS's teacher said he 'couldn't tell what DS is applying for' from his PS.... that'll be because it's 5 different degree combinations! And they take hours and hours to get right and edit.

@moch11, the poster you're referring to doesn't explicitly say that they work in Cambridge admissions, though it's easy to infer from the post that they do. Applicants need to produce the best PS they can without getting bogged down in worries about anonymous forum statements by people with unproven credentials.

That's interesting, Piggy. I would have liked DS to consider single discipline degrees as well as the joint one which is his choice for Oxford, as it would open up choices of good unis for him, but he couldn't get his head around how to write a PS for X+Y at some unis and then X on its own at others.

Thanks to everyone for Worcester info. My understanding is that he won't be disadvantaged by applying to a massively oversubscribed college - that the subject Dept do the admissions and they will find him a spot at another college if they want him. I guess the risk is the gamble of being offered a college that is less popular, but I know everyone says if you get a place, college doesn't really matter.

Thanks. Sorry to be alarmist and yes, Cambridge or not, I hope that poster is not genuine.

It is irritating viking. DS is applying for HSPS which is unique to Cambridge and the only one of his choices with anthropology in it (and he makes no allusion to anthropology in his PS). His other choices , thus far, are social and political sciences at York (most similar to Cambridge but minus anthropology), Policy, Politics and Economics at Birmingham (so economics rears its head!), straight social policy at Bath (who definitely read the PS and may wonder why he is blabbing on about other stuff) and possibly either economic and social history with public policy at Glasgow (aaargh now there's history!) ; Government , policy and society at Edinburgh or applied social sciences with quantitative methods at Sheffield (aaargh! maths now! And we took out references to quant and qual research methods in PS because it went over character limit...)

It's tortuous!

Wish he was just doing history or something...

DD is still struggling with choice of college, which I know is silly. For Cambridge, does anyone know anything about Magdalene, Clare, Gonville, Peterhouse, Emmanuel? From a comprehensive school and non-monied background. She's quite a down to earth type, who gets on with people pretty easily.

Ds went to one of those. Comp boy, and we certainly don’t have much money! He got on with everybody. A few were posh, some rich, most people just normal middle middle class.

Btw, ime of recent Oxbridge candidates - they were asked about their personal statement - not in detail, but as a springboard, so if you hadn’t written it or were exaggerating you were toast.

If you look at the link ealing posted a short while ago you will get soem helpful admission stats.

All of those are quite traditional (you can tell because some have nicknames or ways of referring to them that those in the know know! )

We had Magdalene, Clare and Emmanuel on the list at various points : got knocked off in favour of less traditional colleges.

Has your DD got any criteria yet?

It's HSPS @Piggywaspushed she's mentioned Girton so far because it has a pool and she swims currently 4 days a week. Hopefully school will also have some suggestions.

I've seen people mention acceptance rates etc. Can anyone tell me where I find these stats? Is it as simple as a Google?

This is the one to manipulate @ACloseMatch

www.undergraduate.study.cam.ac.uk/apply/statistics

Oh snap re HSPS!

Does he have a bike/ride a bike? Girton is the furthest college.

It might be worth looking at proximity to Sidgwick site. We liked Homerton and Fitzwilliam but they seemed too far from lecture sites (DS can't ride a bike!), although it had lots of other advantages. Selwyn won for us because of location.

She not he! Apols!

Thanks @ealingwestmum that's fascinating!

We'll have a proper look tomorrow. She's off with a school thing just now, and I have work to do but tomorrow we should both have some time. I want to read a bit about open applications too.

Her other applications will be for Politics and IR. She's discounted a couple of places because she knows them well and doesn't want to live in the city, even though they are great courses. One in particular she was very conflicted about, but I know the city (small town) is not a good match for her so won't push it. So, her other four will likely be LSE, UCL, Leeds and one other (possibly Kings).

@Piggywaspushed she does have a bike, but hates cycling in London. I'm not sure how she'd feel about cycling somewhere quieter.

One thing to bear in mind with Girton being so far out. If your DC is doing science subjects there are often lectures, supos and labs on the same day. There is sometimes no time to go back to college in between. Some students like to study in department libraries etc so that’s fine but it is hard to pop back for lunch or whatever.

For anyone else hoping to get on with stuff on UCAS form today... that section of their site is down for maintenance all weekend...

For those who can't get to Cambridge but might like an idea of what goes on there, the Alumni Festival is on at the moment. There are lots of free events online and you don't have to be a former student to sign up. Just ignore the questions about your college etc on the registration form: only those questions with a * are compulsory.

Unfortunately it began on Friday and it's too late now to register for anything but Monday's and Tuesday's events, but there are plenty of those. There's also this tour of Murray Edwards' gardens which is currently available on demand.

Cambridge undergraduates are not back yet, btw.

@VikingNorthUtsire

My uncle told me that in his day (mid 60s), the clever boys at his school did O Levels and A Levels early in order to spend the whole of their last year being prepped to pass Oxbridge interviews and tests.

It may very well have happened, but I hadn't heard of it as routine.

What I do know, from the experience of several friends who were at grammar and independent schools in different parts of England in the late '60s and at the start of the 70's, was that the "top set" took O levels in the equivalent of y10 and then spend 2 years doing A levels. Then, presumably if their results were good enough and they wanted to, they began a 3rd year Sixth, being prepared for and taking Oxbridge entrance papers towards the end of the Autumn term. Then they left school and had 2 terms doing a shortened gap year, beginning university aged 18.

I'm not sure what happened if they didn't get an Oxbridge place. AFAIK it was common to reapply to Oxbridge or other universities, but whether school taught them for the rest of that year I don't know.

There used to be seventh term entrance - pupils stayed on for one term after a levels to sit the exams. It didn’t involve doing a levels early.

I sat fourth term (ie same as now) in 1987 when 7th term has ended recently enough fir my exams to still be called 4th term - the two systems ran side by side for quite a long time. My husband is only 4 years older than me and he did 7th term.

I am not sure that my girls’ school offered it.

My dh (who is in his mid 50s) did his O levels and consequently A levels year early. Then did a term preparing for Cambridge, and then had the rest of the year working before heading off to University. As a pp said it was the whole of the top set at his selective school who did it this way.

Application gone to school today. Scary.

Good luck to your DS2 @Piggywaspushed.