Continuation of Oxbridge 2025

[BananasAllofIt]

I for one still have a kid waiting to hear about interviews. Thought I'd carry it over...

Yes. Best of luck to all. Its going to be a looooooooong old wait for the decisions though. 30th Jan for C and 14th Jan for O. Seems from the theads that O interview invites were send outa bit later as term started later this year - where as C interview invites seemed to be sent in the usual week ..... but the decisions will be communicated a week later than last year. Swings and roundabouts.

Will have a long, cold, wet, dreary Jan to endure and distract until then.

Best of luck to everyone. DS’ friend has hers tomorrow and his is the week after. Then I think they should forget about it and focus on A levels. I would say that they should relax and enjoy Christmas but DS has mocks the first week of school in Jan.

Tbf, for a chemist that’s a much easier question to answer than, “How was your journey?”

Yes, or worse, "How are you?"

One out of two interviews done - Oxford Lingustics, with tutor + PhD student.

Have only heard back via text so far but DD seems very happy with it - did a tough problem and then some chat about language change. She said it was really interesting - I am slightly afraid that you are not meant to enjoy it that much (!).

The actual language interview is on Wed...

Good luck to all those whose interviews are coming up.

DD has done her 2 Oxford interviews. She was pleased with how they went and especially happy that we had no technical glitches (power only just returned last night after going off Friday night due to the storm).
She said the first interview was more general and friendly. The second interview was more academic with more challenging questions to get her teeth into and discuss.

@FloralGums What subject was that for? And thank heavens about the power, that must have been an added layer of stress.

Dc did their first interview. Said it was categorically the worst thing they’ve ever done, an unmitigated disaster. So that’s unfortunate!

@RunningOverTime I know this sounds like cold comfort, but I felt the same after mine and I got in...

DS has his interview tomorrow morning, first thing. He has spent all evening so far playing his guitar. I'm not going to interfere, if it helps him to relax.

My daughter had her first interview today (Oxford, Chemistry) and said the maths but didn't go well but the Chemistry bit did. She has another one tomorrow but has just received an offer from Durham which has helped her mood!

Fingers crossed for everyone with interviews coming up!

Ds has his on Wednesday and has had 3 practice interviews at school. The school only sends the one student every couple of years or so, so these are helpful teachers but realistically not experts, though their time is much appreciated. Today he had one with the headteacher, whose subject is the one ds has applied for. Following the interview, which ds thought went well, the head sent him an email of several links to look at, mainly about Oxford interviews but also a couple about the subject itself. Now ds is in a tailspin thinking the head thinks the interview didn't go well... I will be so glad when this is over though not looking forward to the wait, especially the after Christmas part!

Good luck to all your DCs, sounds like the interviews are going well. My DS hasn’t been given a date for his interview yet.

Three practice interviews is amazing! Well done that school. My DCs' school organised one practice interview, which I thought was brilliant (until now 😜). Their school sent one pupil to Oxbridge last year. A few applying this year, so they may up their number. DC1 being interviewed tomorrow, and is waaay more relaxed than me about it. Good luck to everyone (and your kids).

2 down here, 1tomorrow then potentially more next week. Agree we are all ready for a break!

My DS had his first interview today, next one is on Wednesday (he's applying for joint hons). He felt it had gone ok today, mainly relieved that no tech issues and the cat didn't try and sit on his laptop!

DS1 has two school friends who also have interviews this month, one for Cambridge and one for Oxford. One of them had his Cambridge interview today. DS1's is next Monday, his other friend has his coming up on a different day, not sure which.

I’m popping in from last year but just to say that the student room has a really good graph that someone put up here - but I can’t find sorry.

it got people to score how they thought their interview went 1-9. Then separated them into those who got offers and those who didn’t. And there was no correlation between score and offer. Graph would illustrate it better!

my YP knew the interview was awful. Floods of tears. But they did get in albeit to another college. And they knew it was a lottery to a certain extent on who got in.

it’s a brutal waiting game now especially for C. Good luck to all

Hello all, delurking for the company and support in the tense post interview - pre-decision weeks.

Child2 applying for PPE at O. Which is an act of bravery in itself as there is quite a lot of leg pulling in our family on whether he will morph into some sort of Boris fan-boi. But there is no denying his interest in the subjects so he should have a crack at it.

Yesterday's joint Economics / Philosophy interview was a mixed bag apparently ('I forgot how to math'). Today is Politics interview and then we get to all sit with the uncertainty throughout the holiday period, hooray hooray.

Any other PPE-ists out there? I'm quite interested in how they are dividing up the interviews...I've seen some people have had economics and politics combined, then philosophy, but Child2's mix seemed a bit...unusual.

Good luck everyone and I echo others who have said that there doesn't seem to be much correlation between how they think things went and whether offers are made - certainly DS thought he'd stuffed it up at every stage (and thinks he's going to get sent down after every exam cycle) but is happily in his third year at C.

I know it's very hard impossible but TRY and forget about it once they are done, so that they (and you) can enjoy the break before the offers are out.

@HarrietteVane DC is PPE.

genuinely seemed traumatised after the philosophy and economics interview yesterday. Said P was off the charts impossible. E not dreadful but felt like it was just maths rather than economics.

Politics today was apparently enjoyable.

hopefully will be out of mind now until January.

Thanks @RunningOverTime so it sounds like your DC's interviews split similar to mine. It's a pretty crunchy mental gear change to go from abstract philosophical thinking to quite practical economics analysis in one 30 minute conversation!

But nil desperandum, hopefully the warmer memories of the politics interviews will keep them both going over Christmas.

Anyone else still waiting to hear re times and dates for maths interviews?

Mine has one out of the way and another one tomorrow. Felt the first went okay when she came out, but then started doubting things as the evening went on. I think she was mainly relieved that the interviewers were nice people and put her at ease. Hopefully she'll be able to put it all out of her mind for a while after tomorrow.

Good luck to everyone interviewing this week!

I'm so bloody proud of DD. She's interviewing at the moment. It's an ambitious choice given her school background but the positive side is she has the Librarian and two subject teachers rooting for her.
I think the outreach work by Oxbridge really allows kids without much support to find the answers.

Any MFL double language people on here? DC surprised to have both languages in one interview - switching from one to the other is an impressive feat in itself! No idea now what tomorrow's interview will be about as felt it was all done today. Any ideas?