Oxbridge schmoxbridge?

[Randomword6]

I'm just wondering, my kids all rejected the idea of Oxbridge as dated and elitist, and I didn't go. It was thought back in the day that going to either was a guarantee of a good career, but is this true now? Does it depend on the subject?

@KeepingKeepingOn I'm not negating Oxbridge graduates' individual efforts, just making the comment that doors disproportionately open for them and the privilege that gives you. Privilege was once described to me as having the wind behind you when you're cycling. You don't notice it as it speeds you along. It's only when you turn round and the wind's against you that you realise the difference it makes, which is a battle a lot of non-Oxbridge graduates are contending with.

A large number of Oxbridge colleges are very wealthy and very well placed to help students with hardship funding, particularly care leavers and students from low income families. They're a good place for them to apply, but sometimes have the added issue of imposter syndrome to deal with, thanks in part to a few stereotypical Oxbridge students they're sharing their well-earned space with.

People haven't closed ranks, you were just out of order to someone politely trying to explain things you claimed not to understand and to plenty of people saying Oxbridge can give a lot of financial help. Of course Oxbridge isn't necessarily best for everyone because of its very fast-paced ambience, or it doesn't offer the right course. I wish your son well wherever he goes

This. It screams of the person not making the cut, rather than turning them down for moral reasons.

There is a huge amount of guidance online and in person, both from the universities and other sources.
Yes, it’s a confusing system if it is something you haven’t encountered before. I clearly remember this myself and having to research/catch up quickly. But it isn’t impossible. At that age, I contacted colleges/department directly re:what I needed to do, read etc. and they were incredibly helpful and generous with their time.
It isn’t for everyone - it can be extremely intense (academically and socially).

I fail to see how you’ve been ‘set upon’ and no-one is negating your experience or opinions. From what I can see, posters have only taken exception to you because of your rude post.

The Ihlaria and potscardpuffin points are fascinating to me. I can hardly believe the Ihlaria view point so am analysing my (middle class but non Oxbridge) self so see why. I suppose I feel postcard was really helpful and detailed and yet the detail was regarded as awful by ihl when clearly it was very kind of postcard who tok the time and trouble to explain. You can lead a horse to water but if it won't drink then it will not benefit from the education on offer and there are plenty of others who will.

Also if a teenager is not bright enough to look things up (which is much easier than when I had to cycle to newcastle library just to look up which careers paid the most in career books when I as a teenager) then they don't deserve to go to university really and plenty of othes in the survival of the fittest (which is life) will do so.

I agree I am one of the ones who didn't try Oxbridge (no one from my school had been to it) but my sibilngs did and their children aer there now so given 5 of my children have graduated from elsewhere I have an interest in where people go and how they end up.

Most of all I support Ihlaria's right of freedom of expression on here however. It is always useful hearing different views.

I think overall the fact it may be a lto of effort to learn how to apply to Oxbridgte (or indeed any university) never mind a huge effort do well in your A levels is really what our meritocratic society is all about - you put in that effort and you get the benefit or you cannot be bothered and you suffer and then more fool you I say. It sounds like the Ihlaria child is puting the effort - well done and might get the prize unless seduced by the false charming smiles of lesser places perhaps......

(Politely ignoring the row) I do think it's worth saying REALLY LOUD AND CLEAR that Oxbridge student accommodation IS CHEAPER THAN ALMOST ANY OTHER UK UNIVERSITY, ALL THE WAY THROUGH YOUR DEGREE.

That alone is a message worth getting out there to parents and students who are baffled and alienated by all the flummery.

I suspect food and booze in-college is considerably cheaper than many other places too.

Re college choice - stick a pin in, choose at random. It barely matters. If you're offered a place you've a good chance of being reallocated to a different college anyway.

@RampantIvy I think this is a valid and balanced comment. I take your point on people having first-hand experience of these institutions being biased. I am certainly guilty of that!

As you say, Oxbridge isn't right for all bright children, but I would encourage any child who thinks they have a shot at getting in (and even those who don't) to visit and form their own view rather than letting (understandable but unsubstantiated) preconceptions affect their decision.

As children are easily influenced, the important thing is that the grown ups around provide them with the confidence to consider Oxbridge as an option, then step back and try not to let their own views unduly influence the child's decision-making process.

This works in both directions. I'm sure many children were pressured too hard to get into Oxbridge when they would have flourished better elsewhere. Similarly, many excellent (mainly state school) candidates are dissuaded from applying due to a sense that "Oxbridge isn't for the likes of us".

I wish the issue of Oxbridge wasn't still so fraught with baggage, but I think it will be for many years yet. Sadly, I think the likes of BoJo, Truss et al. have rather set us back on this front.

Loving your use of CAPITALS to
make your point @PacificState 😂 But it is a point worth making. DS1 and DD are both at Oxford and it's so much cheaper for accommodation than practically every other UK university. Food also hugely subsidised.

Yes sorry @HoneyMobster 😂 but it's so counterintuitive I think it should be better known, especially as we face a few years of financial distress for just about everyone. I suspect a lot of families assume it will be hyper expensive when in fact the opposite is the case.

Also, the oxbridge colleges can provide bursaries for students who need financial support. The old, rich colleges tend to have lowest rents and be able to be the most generous so from that POV a random choice of college or assuming a newer one is more 'for the likes of us' isn't necessarily the best idea.

Why are we conflating success with monetary value? I can assure you a lot of these high earning grads will burn out / be miserable, if not worse - been there!

I rejected my offer from Emma at Cambridge in 2013. I went to another RG. I do earn a lot, I am successful blah blah

My colleagues did go to Oxbridge - also high earning - so detached from society, so unaware of issues in the world, not well rounded but intelligent.

It's a great uni with good opportunities. But the highest earners I know, the millionaires, the well to do, are all entrepreneurs / builders. They didn't even go to University.

Also it IS expensive, it's the reason I rejected it. It's not the expenses on paper it's everything else, the secret societies, the May Ball, all the events - they're HUNDREDS a ticket. Socialising with wealthy students, ski trips etc. It is known to be inaccessible even when you're there - there's a blood FT article on it.

I knew someone who was offered a place at Oxford and didn't take it due to what he perceived as elitism and anti-Irish sentiment.

If I could have gone to Cambridge, I'd have bitten their hand off though! I am also Irish

Don't believe everything you read. Shame you were put off by what's mostly myth rather than bearing much resemblance to most students' everyday reality.

Surely, all those are optional?

I went to a public boarding school. It was ‘home from home’ for those going to Oxbridge from this school.

The school boarding houses had masters that had mostly come from Oxbridge. Each master’s Oxbridge college was listed in the pupil handbook. They would keep in contact with their colleges. I overheard one of my teachers telephoning to chat to one of the colleges about my classmate.

We had a big old dining hall with long tables we would go and have food in. Each boarding house had its own common room, it’s own colours and crest. You were very much part of your ‘house’.

In the first term of Year 12, a select group were picked ‘to go to Oxbridge’ and tutored each week. The master would be instrumental in picking which college to apply for and looking at the personal statement. The Oxbridge dates (exams etc) were listed in the pupil diary, given to Year7s upwards.

Unsurprisingly, a lot of pupils went to Oxbridge. And a few ended up teaching back at the school.

I am not saying this is inherently bad (although the phone calls were over-stepping) but for those saying the college system is not confusing, I wonder how many went to a school like me?

@delilahhey the thing is, accommodation and food are non-negotiable, and are considerably cheaper at oxbridge.

All the other things you mention are very much discretionary. DS1 is in his second year and has done none of them except the ball (which was admittedly v pricey, but in no way compulsory). Definitely no ski trips or secret societies (although I suppose the whole point is that I wouldn't know... 😂)

The whole Cameron/Johnson Bullingdon Club bollocks has done so much damage. (Entirely their own fault of course.) I was rejected by Oxford but had an interview and was so intimidated by the serried ranks of public school kids. My brother went and his social circle was all children of titled gentry and Cabinet ministers. 30 years later I have been genuinely surprised by how socially ordinary it is now when I've spent time up there seeing DS.

He knows a couple of public school people I think but most of his friends are just absolutely bog standard kids from bog standard schools, and I say that with love and respect having been one of those kids myself and having produced two of them. Just totally ordinary, normal young people who happen to either be very clever in one subject or get a bit lucky with the selection process - in the nicest possible way, I wouldn't say the ones I've met are even unusually clever, although I'm sure there are lots of unusually clever people there, as there are at all good unis.

Oxford is not full of braying Sebastians these days and, just as importantly, it would be possible for someone on a tight budget to go to Oxford and spend a lot less than they would at any other uk university (unless they're Scottish and don't have to pay fees) because housing and sustenance, the two biggest line items in most student budgets, are so heavily subsidised by the colleges. Any young person for whom budget is a serious consideration should be aware of this and I think it would be a real shame for people not to give it a go because they think it's full of people from a different planet. It used to be, but it's not now.

Oxbridge and a very few other universities are academically elite institutions and worth attending if the student has high enough ability to benefit. Don't be put off by Guardianistas. Th

Oxford is not full of braying Sebastians these days

It never was entirely full of them! My DF went to Oxford on a scholarship directly pre WWII - his father had started out as a casual farmhand (hired in the marketplace Hardy-style) who'd then worked in a coke works.
Maybe that's one of the reasons my DD and one of her cousins weren't intimidated by Cambridge.

@ErrolTheDragon no, true - my dad went to Cambridge directly from a South Wales mining valley in the '50s! But the admissions stats tell a pretty strong story about the decline in proportion of public school entrants over the past 30 years. (DS1 is given to believing the fact that he got in and I didn't says something about his intellect compared to mine <strangling emoticon> and I have to restrain myself from shoving the graph under his nose)

@ErrolTheDragon it’s not myth… I run an education company now, I’m far more in the know than the average parent due to the consultancy side. There will be children who choose not to do these things, those children are missing out on experiences.

yes they’re optional but they are also almost mandatory to ensure the network that is so buzzed about by going to Oxbridge.

then you’ve got the fact you are not allowed to have a job whilst at the university. Then couple that with living in one of the most expensive cities in the UK.

it is expensive.

When DD was in year 12 she and several of her peers went to an Oxbridge day in Liverpool. I think it was part of the outreach programme, and schools were invited to select Oxbridge potentials to go along so that they could dispel a few myths, which are clearly alive and well judging from this thread.

DD and her friends were very unimpressed with the presentation from Cambridge who gave the impression that they weren't bothered, yet felt that Oxford wanted them to apply to them. This was in 2016.

DD wasn't Oxbridge material. She is bright, but not superbright, and not passionate about learning the way Oxbridge students are, but it gave her food for thought.

Her old school usually sends a couple of students to Oxbridge every year. There were 16 hopefuls when she was in year 13, but most of them didn't even get an interview. But at least these students are encouraged to aim high.

No jobs in termtime, but good paid internships possible in the summers... and bursaries for those that need them.

You're talking about people 'missing out' on things which don't exist elsewhere.

None of the things you’ve mentioned are in any way common amongst students here; balls and events are the only things most of them attend, and in fact lots of them do the balls as working tickets where you get half the ball off and work the other half. They can do a fair few that way! And there are also plenty of summer “events” (basically boozy discos in a tent) that are far cheaper and preferred by many students. As for ski trips and secret societies? Very funny! There are lots of “societies”, but they are vastly more likely to be the college drama group social, or a society for reading Tolkien and drinking hot chocolate in your pyjamas, or watching avant-garde Iranian film in the college bar.

The idea of networking to get graduate jobs via social events is laughable! Graduate recruiters are not hanging out at drinking societies. They organise careers events in co defending venues to woo the kids with cheap booze and presentations about how great it is working at a magic circle law firm, just like they do at any other uni.