Do people find it hard to adjust to life after Oxbridge?

[TsaritsaAlexandrinaPapanicholous]

Do you think it’s harder than normal to adjust to life after university if you want to Oxbridge?

The system and way of life is very different to other places. The bubble amongst very bright and driven people isn’t found elsewhere (other universities sure). Getting to live in beautiful buildings and go for dinners etc.

Unless you graduate and move into a high paying job, it seems hard to come down from especially if you’re not from a rich/posh family.

What a weird view of Oxbridge.

Do people think that Oxbridge students spend their whole time having deep intellectual discussions that would be far beyond the comprehension of non-Oxbridge people? Or that they sit down to glitzy formal dinners every night?

Because it really isn't like that at all. Or at least it wasn't when I was there. Pretty sure we behaved much like any other university students! Maybe with a bit more work than some universities, but by no means were we spending every spare hour working. I definitely remember a lot of nights in dodgy clubs...

Then when I started my first job I definitely didn't think "oh, my colleagues are all uneducated stupid plebs". They were all just as bright and intelligent as any of my Oxford friends and I certainly didn't think I was "coming down" from anywhere special or having to adjust to being around a different kind of person

I think you make of uniersity what you want from it. I wasn't at Oxbridge and didn't try and no one had been from my school in the NE, but I made university wha I wanted of it - chamber choir tours abroad etc. Other people did other things.

What I do think is a key issue is all students starting work for the first time find it a massive change. I have had 5 children make that change now and it is the real world of having to get up, get the train, go into work (although not every day now thanks to post pandemic WFH rules), work whetyer you like it or not and come home tired with not much of the day left and repeat that from age 21 to 68. Welcome to the real world, students.......

I agree with this.

It’s not Oxbridge though, it’s our whole education system. We spend our formative years focusing on academic achievement. Other skills are being developed along the way but not judged or graded in the same way and are not relevant to getting into university etc.

Then we hit the world of work where your academic ability is just one of many skills needed and in some careers largely irrelevant. It can be a bit of a shock for those used to being at the top.

Not all colleges offer three years’ in-college accommodation, though, and you’re talking only three eight-week terms pa.

In answer to your question, OP, no, I had a wonderful time at Oxford in the 90s, a WC girl at one of the more trad colleges, gloriously beautiful and stuffed full of Old Etonians and Harrovians, but was ready to move on at the end of my time there. I’m an academic now, and I recognise entirely similar wobbles in my departing undergraduates — friends dispersing, career and money worries etc. That’s not institution-specific.

Think this is such an interesting question. I went to Cambridge in the 90s from a state school, and I would say I did struggle afterwards. In fact, part of me thinks I've been struggling ever since. I can honestly say they were the best 3 years of my life - and maybe that sounds really sad, but also, I feel so lucky that I had that experience. I met people who I'm friends with for life, I spent 3 years studying a subject I LOVED and that I found hugely stimulating and satisfying, I was lectured and taught by some of the most respected people in that area, I had the best time socially, I was in a beautiful environment. What wasn't to love?

After uni I went abroad for a couple of years to work, and had a great and interesting time, but it took me a while to adapt and accept the people I met there. I used to get frustrated that the conversations we had just weren't the kind of conversations I'd had at uni. I got my head round it eventually, but I've had to consciously do that ever since. I still know that when I meet up with uni friends I will have conversations that I don't have with anyone else. Again, maybe that says more about me and my capacity to make friends outside of that environment. But also, I feel lucky that I'm still part of a group that is so engaged with the world, passionate, funny, intelligent, interesting.

I would also say - to echo an earlier comment, that I think I do struggle with the obvious comparison between what I've done in life and the stratospheric success and careers that some of my peers have. It is weird being in a group of people that are so successful - still my good mates, but our lifestyle paths have diverged quite considerably since we were all students together (not everyone - thankfully!). Sometimes I feel like the dullest person in the group.

So, yeah, I don't regret going to Oxbridge for an instant, and I would encourage (some of) my children to go also because I think it's an incredible experience, but for me certainly there is a sense that nothing in life since has ever matched the intensity of that time.

I didn't go to oxbridge (too naughty!) but I'm interested in the thread as I met a lady recently who works at the same firm as my DP (quite prestigious) and she fascinated me. Late 30s and came to 2 separate parties I was at wearing an Ox/Cambs hoodie and talked about her time there all night. She wasn't a recent mature student. This would have been coming up for 20 years ago.

I did wonder whether this was common, to be stuck in the bubble so firmly for so long.

An ex missed it so much he went back to retrain and talked about the place a lot.

I've just never known of this culture elsewhere.

I did wonder whether this was common, to be stuck in the bubble so firmly for so long.

My guess is that it's not that common, more that you notice when someone is frankly a bit weird about anything.

This.

Though, I did notice that graduate students at my college were sometimes playing out all kinds of Brideshead fantasies waaay more so than the undergraduates — some of them, from what I could gather, hadn’t got in as undergraduates, and were making up for lost time. Lots of punting with gramophones and hampers, if not teddies and debagging. In fairness, they were enjoying themselves.

I went from a grammar school. Had an absolutely amazing and quite Bridesheady time throughout and still feel very nostalgic about it 30 years later. The come-down was a bit tough for me, not least because at the end I split up with the boyfriend I'd been with the whole time, and went back to live with my parents, commuting to do a PGCE including a teaching practice in a very rough school. Back down to earth with a big bump!

My DH did a bit but only from the point of view of you are told how smart and wonderful and special you are and get all your As and A*s... Then go to Oxbridge and enjoy farting about at bops and whatnot. You are there for 3/4 years living your best life while being told the future belongs to you and your pals....

Then you plop off the education conveyor belt and find yourself in an office job somewhere crap like staines/sunningdale/ hanger lane and you are working alongside David and Suzy who got 2:1s in sport science / sociology from Nottingham and reading and you think.... Oh shit have a ruined it.. did I miss my shot?

Most of DHs uni mates are either doing very boring law things varying from okay to great pay, earning a pittance in academia or the pressure caused them to crumble a bit. One of his friends has a first and is a qualified lawyer but had mental health troubles combined with bad luck. He is back home doing shift work in bars in his mid 30s - it's very sad

@Catlord in the US where I grew up it is very normal to have a lifelong loyalty to your alma mater and wear the odd merch well into middle age! Seeing someone with the same is an automatic bond. But the experience doesn't define them.
I think 'real world' life is a shock for most post grads, no matter what the university. Work is very often dull and repetitive in the early years particularly. The kids I know who went to Oxbridge/Durham/Imperial/LSE are not doing any better than those who went to less prestigious unis. Nor, as it happens, those who didn't go to uni at all.
One shouldn't expect a great life and job to be handed to you just because you went to a top of the league table uni - surely people don't still think that? My daughter is applying to Cambridge, but should she go there I don't think she expects it to be the golden ticket at all. And she is not so naive to not see that it is an exceptional time - to hopefully be enjoyed - but certainly not a lifestyle that will continue beyond those few years. But that is no reason not to go!
And yes if she does get in I may well wear a Cambridge sweatshirt myself! Or a Bath one or a ....

It may just be an individual psychological thing. I enjoyed my degree (not Oxbridge) but was keen to progress into adult life so getting married at 21, baby at almost 23, qualified as one of the youngest solicitors in the UK when I was only 23, bought first house at 22 with husband - that is all a very different picture from someone who sees university as their best life/goal whereas I wanted financial independence, children, to move to London , pursue my hobbies and career.

Most students don't plan their future to that extent though. Loads study a degree subject with a view to working in that field, but not down to the minute detail, except maybe for medicine and a few niche subjects.

'Way of life'? 😂
They may have shorter terms but Oxbridge students study, party, and look for jobs like any other student.
Did you even go to university OP let alone Oxbridge?

I had a good-ish time at Oxford 30 years ago. I'm Northern state-comprehensive educated; I went to one of the 'posh old' colleges. I don't know how much it has changed, but I don't really recognise the way people talk about Oxbridge now - yes, people were bright, and enthusiastic, but I don't remember many of us having an all-consuming passion for our subject or anything.

I would say quite a few of us found it hard to adjust from being students to the world of work, and some really miss(ed) that lifestyle and the proximity to friends etc, but I don't think any found it hard to adjust from the Oxford experience. My university friends have largely done well or well-enough in whatever they've chosen (in mine and DH's case that has looked like 'settling' a bit job-wise to lead the lifestyle we want rather than pushing for top jobs), but are 'normal' people. I'm not sure all that many of my local friends know I went to Oxford - it's not a big part of who I am.

They do say university is the best time in your life to find a potential partner - all those people your age, all wanting to date (or most of them) . I met my children's father in my post grad year and we married that summer just as I left. My mother would probaby not have met my father had she not gone to residential teacher training college and my father been a local medical student. My son met his girl friend at university.

Then you move into your 20s and for some it may not be quite so easy to meet so many people socially; however the biggest change whatever university you were at is having to get up and go to work every week day. Most degrees give you much more leisure time than a full time job does, hence the popularity of part time work in the UK for those who can make it work and probably hence wh the UK has such low productivity.

(I re-watched the TV series of Brideshead Revisited last summer e which took me back to those days of the 80s when the series was made - my siblings went to Oxbridge and I was at university when that version came out and my father was a huge Waugh fan so lots of happy memories and associations).

My DH did a bit but only from the point of view of you are told how smart and wonderful and special you are and get all your As and As... Then go to Oxbridge and enjoy farting about at bops and whatnot. You are there for 3/4 years living your best life while being told the future belongs to you and your pals....*

Then you plop off the education conveyor belt and find yourself in an office job somewhere crap like staines/sunningdale/ hanger lane and you are working alongside David and Suzy who got 2:1s in sport science / sociology from Nottingham and reading and you think.... Oh shit have a ruined it.. did I miss my shot?

Most of my male friends from university ended up in very highly-paid jobs in the city or doing cool stuff (one is a rocket scientist). The women not so much (bar one or two high-fliers). They generally did a fulfilling but not high-powered job (perhaps with a bit of travel) for a while (not an office job with David and Suzy in Staines), then got married, had kids and worked part time until dc were older. I followed a similar path, but in teaching, which was what I'd always intended to do.

I don't remember at all feeling like we were 'told the future belonged to us and our pals'. Who would even have been telling us that? Our subject tutors? You don't get pep talks about careers and your future like you do at school! People just had fun, did some work, graduated, and went into jobs they wanted to do, in many cases probably helped a little bit by having an Oxford degree on their CV.

I went back to Oxford back in 1984. I'd say that of the people I knew who have since become well known you could have predicted it on the first day they walked in.

I still have very mixed feelings about it. I'm proud to have got in - (those were the days when you sat an entrance exam) and my Dad said me getting in was the happiest day of his life so I'm glad I gave him that. But I feel I might have had a more rewarding student experience elsewhere. It was hard to feel comfortable trying things out - like writing for the student newspaper - when the other people doing that are already planning their career editing one of the nationals.

'Most of the people you know who went to Oxford?' How do you know so many? I only know 2- one who's is there now and a parent of DD's friend.

I think leaving university is had for a lot of people. I did four years doing teacher training, and starting my first job, and realising how hard being a teacher actually was, was quite overwhelming. I remember being 22 and facing the reality of this being my life for the next 40+ years and wondering how on earth I would be able to do it! Needless to say I only lasted 10 years before being burnt out and packing it in to be a SAHM.

I think this is ridiculous, Cambridge and Oxford are not the best institutions for a whole host of subjects while plenty of other universities have college style halls and beautiful buildings. My dh did PPE at Oxford and while some of his fellow students ended up running the country a lot are absolute wastrels.

My DS turned down Cambridge in favour of LSE and there are plenty who do the same.

The Oxbridge exceptionalism in this country is nuts.

I went to Oxford in the late 90s and hated it really - I am from a relatively working class background, was painfully shy, and just did not fit in at all. So I found quite the opposite to be honest - I was delighted to fit back in to normal life once my time at university was over - and during the holidays etc when I could be with my family and normal friends. Of course I did meet some nice people at university too - one or two of whom I am still in touch with.

I did not find the people I was at university with noticeably more intelligent than other people I have met, in terms of conversation. They must have been more academically gifted on average than most people you meet I guess. But that doesn't always have a huge impact on what people are like to talk to in my experience.

The cleverest people I know (in my view of them anyway - I know it's a hard thing to measure objectively) did not go to Oxbridge, either because they were not interested in doing so, or because they did not have the appropriate education/family support to get them there.

The Oxbridge exceptionalism in this country is nuts.

Agree, and it seems to be getting worse. There seem to be powerful trends that conspire towards a growing 'Oxbridge exceptionalism', just as we would hope for it to be diminished. One is the democratisation/universalisation of higher education: the more widespread the availability of higher education is, the more people want to confect a scarce commodity out of the alleged 'difference' of an Oxbridge higher education. Another key trend is the real reduction in social mobility: University education increasingly offers fuck-all in terms of social mobility, so there is a tendency to cling to cliches that offer a fantasy version of having been transformed by three years among honey-coloured stone.

Certainly a lot of the people who ended up running the country are wastrels.

@Walkaround I agree a lot of the ones who went into politics are absolutely bloody useless but dh has a whole lot of Oxford mates who have done pretty much nothing for the past 30 years. Generally the ones who did Classics / Greats etc and attended schools such as Westminster.