Cambridge offer - DS might want to turn it down

[AndyFloss]

DS has a Cambridge offer. He's delighted, but he is now starting to consider whether he wants to go down this path of unbelievable pressure.

If he commits to getting in, he'll be under massive pressure to achieve the required grade for 4 A levels PLUS the step exam (Maths).

This is making him think that although he could really push himself to do it and he has the capability, it is possible that once in, he'll be under unbearable pressure for 3 years. And all for what?

He potentially risks getting a lower grade in his degree, whilst if he goes somewhere like Warwick, also good for Maths, he could do very well and also have a nicer life.

Of course he then goes back full circle thinking that if he rejects a Cambridge offer, he'll regret it for the rest of his life.

I'd love to hear opinions please.

@Gladioli23 exactly my DS's
Experience recently with an English degree. It drove him nuts, listening to friends at other universities mopping their brows over a couple
Of essays a term when he has two a week, and they were dissected in detail afterwards in supervisions.
Not all degree are equal!!

when he has two a week, and they were dissected in detail afterwards in supervisions. Ok it means that essays are by necessity more rushed which may not suit some students but in return the system provides a huge amount of individual feedback from the academics. allowing rapid improvement. This is analogous to the privilege gained from the teaching at certain top private schools compared to an average comprehensive.

AndyFloss your DS has done incredibly well to get so far but as said by you and PPs the selection process is certainly not over since this is Cambridge maths. One step at a time - there is no Immediate rush for a decision on firming but his efforts with STEP preparation will help his university maths wherever he goes.

@sendsummer
I'm not criticising the workload. I think in fact that's what you sign up for. DS came from a comp and actually thought it was amazing. I'm just pointing out that universities vary hugely with workload and expectation and Cambridge is at one extreme. I think this is one of the things OP's son is pondering.

No need to decide now! Start the STEP preparation and see how it goes and how he feels about it closer to the time.

Students at other top universities have less handholding and therefore require more intrinsic self motivation and independent learning. This is again analogous to the qualities needed for a pupil to do well from a less well funded comprehensive compared to the likes of Westminster and similar. Also less frequent essays usually mean a greater depth and breadth are expected.

IME from STEM students coming from the likes of Imperial or Warwick (the latter for maths) workload is as intense but there is far less opportunity to ask help for difficult topics.

Can you back up those thoughts with evidence sendsummer

'Also less frequent essays usually mean a greater depth and breadth are expected.'

Really?

@sendsummer I am afraid you are talking a complete crock of shite. “Handholding”?! Ha ha ha.

And not every student has been to Westminster. If you care to look at the statistics, I think you will find that students come from a range of schools. My dcs went to an ordinary comprehensive.

Back to OP, as others have said, it’s an opportunity not to be missed. The workload is insane, but there are many, many compensations! Plus if you like the subject, you tend to quite enjoy the work.

My one caveat is that ds reported that some students really didn’t like the college system: they wanted kitchens and never ate in hall (ds was appalled at their wasting their money!) but this was only the odd person.

My DS really appreciated the beauty of the place. He came from a shitty comp which had windows falling out and areas cordoned off bc of asbestos. He really didn't want to go anywhere less than gorgeous!
And the library facilities... wow. We heard tales of booking in and queuing elsewhere, all adding to the stress of study. But the presence of college libraries along with the UL meant there was never that pressure.

‘Handholding’ is a rather loaded way of describing the Oxbridge supervision process, @sendsummer. Done properly it exposes, indeed focuses on, the student’s weakness, week after week.

At W, I and indeed the other RG universities there may be the opportunity for something less intense in Year 1, but it is a shadow of the Oxbridge system. After that for the most part you must seek out help and feedback on your weekly assignments if you want it. Such work is generally not turned in. (DH is an RG Maths professor, I am in STEM.)

Whole STEM Faculties, very much including Schools of Maths, devote endless meetings to developing strategies for enticing students to attend office hours where their lecturers or personal tutors can give them this help. But uptake is generally minimal - students loathe exposing their ignorance. I would not call Oxbridge supervisions ‘handholding’.

I agree that it takes an independently motivated person to succeed at W or I. I suspect this means that they, like the rest of the RG STEM Schools, have a greater proportion of students scraping by rather than thriving.

Quite. Supervisions are the opposite of handholding! They take over arguments, they challenge and expose. Frankly if you've done a shoddy essay you'll be quaking at the prospect of supervision!

'rake over arguments' is what I meant!

If I summarise what it sounds like to me what sendsummer is saying:

Oxbridge select students with the highest exam grades, including the very difficult STEP papers in maths, then babies them through poor, rushed work.

It's not very logical.

dd is another student from a comprehensive with little history of sending students to Oxbridge, she swapped to a better state school sixth form, which she was lucky to be able to do.

My DH turned down a Cambridge offer for Computer Science and went to Warwick instead.
Never regretted it, never looked bad.
Who knows what his life would be like now if he had gone to Cambridge? But he didn't, he took another path and it turned out well.

Admittedly - a while ago now! But, the pressure to accept the Cambridge offer was pretty high!

Cambridge supervisions are solo, Oxford with one other. I don’t know which is worse! When you’re on your own there’s nowhere to hide, and with another person there’s the real danger that they might present a brilliant piece of work!

He is suffering from self-doubt, possibly even "impostor syndrome" and is catasrophising. He needs love and support and reassurance that you will always be there offering loving support no matter what.

He wouldn't have the offer if he wasn't capable of the course. They will have had multiple times more applicants who were equally bright and qualified, and your DS made the cut. He should be proud and rightly so.

If he doesn't get the grades that's OK. He will still get a good degree. There is no need to turn down the offer in case he doesn't get the grades - but those grades are within his grasp.

TBF if he succeeds he's not exactly then going to be "under unbearable pressure for 3 years". If he gets the grades he is assumed to be adult enough to choose for himself how much work he is going to put in. He's not going to be forced into lectures. However, he wouldn't have this offer if he hadn't already proven that he loves his subject and will enjoy being fully immersed in it in the company of other equally intelligent and interesting people - he will love it.

Turning down the offer comes from fear of failure. Failure is always possible when we strive to achieve something hard, but shouldn't be feared so much that we don't try. Please do what you can to help him overcome his fear and do the best he can.

Warwick is really bloody good for maths and still carries pressure as a prestige university, so I wouldn't take study pressure into account as its likely to be the same. The main thing I'd worry about with Cambridge is coping with the social rituals and whether he will get the same level of extracurricular opportunities as his peers as they tend to be very expensive and working during term time is highly frowned upon, but only you would very able to judge that. I really wish I'd been encouraged to apply to oxbridge though - I had the grades and just the connections you make there open so many doors later, including internationally.

@sendsummer

Students at other top universities have less handholding and therefore require more intrinsic self motivation and independent learning. This is again analogous to the qualities needed for a pupil to do well from a less well funded comprehensive compared to the likes of Westminster and similar. Also less frequent essays usually mean a greater depth and breadth are expected.

IME from STEM students coming from the likes of Imperial or Warwick (the latter for maths) workload is as intense but there is far less opportunity to ask help for difficult topics.

Former arts student at Oxbridge so can't speak for maths (or indeed for the 21st century) but this was the exact opposite to my own experience. In my first two years, I had a supervision each week, total of one hour contact time, and other than that was left to my own devices. I had undiagnosed ADHD and it was appalling. I struggled like crazy.

Friends who had gone to other universities to do the same subject had tutor groups, structured lectures, handouts, etc. They had far more support and handholding than me.

Thankfully for me the third year had more group work and structure and I managed to pull a 2:1 out of the bag. But it wasn't because of handholding.

Re the above, I would say that the drive to think Oxbridge is the Holy Grail is wrong. It won't suit everyone. I was fairly miserable there.

I didn't go to Oxbridge while friends did. Cambridge was (bizarrely) massively cheaper cost of living because of the short terms and college accommodation only charging for those.

So much more teaching time and marked work at Cambridge than other Russell Group. We had 2 essays marked per subject per year...

Much better access to library texts - because of college libraries as well as uni library - probably less of a thing now.

Much better social sport and other extra curricular activities- for whatever level you fancy from teams made up of anyone hanging around the college to university/national level competitors. Same went for music - having college level opportunities as well as university wide made a massive difference to the number of opportunities to find your thing. I fell away from my musical instrument at uni because there was nothing below the (amazing) university level ensembles while friends at Cambridge enjoyed playing in college.

Cambridge suits some people and not others. It would have been unbearable for me so I didn't apply (despite ridiculous pressure from my school - I knew my own mind and had supportive parents). Friends who went had a real mix of experiences, much like any university.

We go on and on about needing to find a good work / life balance as adults. It is just as important for those attending uni imo.

That said, this could easily be a post-offer wobble. He doesn't need to make a decision for a while yet, so he should put it to one side and focus on his A levels and STEP preparation. Let some of the emotion of getting an offer subside before choosing.

He should give it a go- he'd regret it if he didn't even try I think.

I thought it was an interesting point that was raised around the college admissions scandal in America a few years ago.. they were all struggling to get into the universities, but none of the students struggling with the curriculum when they were there!!

@EatSleepRantRepeat

Warwick is really bloody good for maths and still carries pressure as a prestige university, so I wouldn't take study pressure into account as its likely to be the same. The main thing I'd worry about with Cambridge is coping with the social rituals and whether he will get the same level of extracurricular opportunities as his peers as they tend to be very expensive and working during term time is highly frowned upon, but only you would very able to judge that. I really wish I'd been encouraged to apply to oxbridge though - I had the grades and just the connections you make there open so many doors later, including internationally.

What does this mean?

I really don't think extra curriculars are that expensive?

At my college the JCR funded all college levels clubs including football kit etc, in full, except for the Boat Club which charged £40 per term (£5 per week, imagine it will be a bit more a decade on), for 3 sessions out on the river and 2 on land. We had the kit to run everything from croquet to board games to football to a choir to a film club to a musical in college at 0 cost to students. We had a free gym as well.

If you wanted to go to formal hall it cost £12 for a three course meal and you could bring your own wine.

Things like may balls are expensive but they are a) optional and b) once a year.

Our college also used to provide a subsidy to cover the cost of participation in university level sport as well - which is more expensive but isn't necessary unless you're an elite athlete as there's so much at college level. They also offered scholarships for those in the college choir to cover some of the costs of that and they got 2 free 3 course dinners a week as well.

Obviously I recognise different colleges are different but I am very concerned that there's the impression that Cambridge is too expensive to attend because of "social rituals" and expensive extra curriculars.

I had an offer from Cambridge to read engineering and I turned it down in favour of Bristol. I have never ever regretted it. I got the grades for the Cambridge offer ( 3x A at that point), but it just wasn't for me at all.

@EatSleepRantRepeat, your comment that ‘working during term time is highly frowned upon’ at C is fascinating. May I ask if this us across all subjects and social groups, IYO?

In the physical sciences and CS I would think that for even the cleverest attending supervision without having done a modicum of work would be absolutely excruciating. I can imagine that someone really clever could perhaps squeak through a History or Literature tutorial on the basis of knowledge retained from lecture or a quick read.

Happy to hear opposing views on both counts!

BTW I agree that C&O and the connections made there do retain a deeply, unjustifiably disproportionate influence on outcomes in this country. I sympathised with the PP who had no way of signalling to the Civil Service that her Oxbridge degree was particularly hard earned (I have no vested interest, having been educated abroad, but believe from observing PG students and post docs that this is usually true), but I welcome the move by the CS overall.

[quote poetryandwine]@EatSleepRantRepeat, your comment that ‘working during term time is highly frowned upon’ at C is fascinating. May I ask if this us across all subjects and social groups, IYO?

In the physical sciences and CS I would think that for even the cleverest attending supervision without having done a modicum of work would be absolutely excruciating. I can imagine that someone really clever could perhaps squeak through a History or Literature tutorial on the basis of knowledge retained from lecture or a quick read.

Happy to hear opposing views on both counts!

BTW I agree that C&O and the connections made there do retain a deeply, unjustifiably disproportionate influence on outcomes in this country. I sympathised with the PP who had no way of signalling to the Civil Service that her Oxbridge degree was particularly hard earned (I have no vested interest, having been educated abroad, but believe from observing PG students and post docs that this is usually true), but I welcome the move by the CS overall.[/quote]
I assume they mean working for money, which isn't allowed.