Stupid question about Oxford

[User5274959]

We're hoping to go to the open day so hopefully all will become clear, but can anyone explain how courses work at Oxford?

So you apply to an individual college, then if for example you're doing archaeology and anthropology, is there an arc & anth department in each college? Or is there one department across the whole university and you mix with other students doing the same course?

There are 7 colleges that offer it - they seem to say intake of 30. Is that each presumably?

Can't quite work out the structure of it and whether tutors, lecturers and facilities are separate to each college or work across them.

There is a central department where things like lectures are run, and you also have tutors in each college who organise tutorials

In practice, it really doesn’t matter which college - you might have a preference on location, style etc but all are doing the same course

I’m not sure about the specific course - 30 per college would be way too much - imagine that’s split across the 7

So there will be a central department somewhere and lectures will be there with whole year group. Tutorials are within college in small groups so you get to know those students better. My dh’s tutorials had 4 people in and were designed to discuss opinions on the lecture material in depth.

Colleges are primarily for living eating socialising. Teaching and research are in departments. But many academic staff are assigned to both a college and a department. So they might be first year tutor to only the students in their subject at their college and then be the primary point of contact after that.

In science, more teaching is departmental (because labs are big etc) and in arts, more is organised within the college.

Thank you, that makes sense and also explains why they all said 30.
Wow - so 30 for that course across the whole uni 😳

No that will be 30 over the whole uni.

There are university departments - but in practice humanities are taught largely via 1:1 tutorials in college whilst sciences are taught via 1:1 tutorials and labs etc at across the university.

archeology and anthropology will have a lot of university level input.

A college accepts you / offers a place and is responsible for internal exams.

My husband read History and was largely taught in college (with occasional forays outside for specialist subjects) whilst I read a Science and spent most of my time in the department.

There's one university subject department which runs lectures etc and then colleges who take students in that subject (varies by college and subject how many but often only 4 or so per college per year) and often your tutorials where you discuss essays etc are at your college. The intake will be across all colleges so only a few students per college.

Subjects are taught by university faculties ie one per subject/group of subjects, but the teaching staff and the students are drawn from different colleges. You apply to a college for your chosen subject (schools are usually good on advising which college) so, if you are successful, you will be at eg Exeter College (college) reading history (faculty). The college is home base for students, where they live, eat and, in most cases have their closest friendship group. That means college friends who are probably studying different subjects, with other, faculty friends studying the same subject.

As previously said, 30 will be across the whole university. DS is at a large college but they only have 7 or 8 Maths students per year.
He goes to the Maths building for lectures with students from across the University but his tutorials are nearly all in College. In his first year all tutorials were in college but as they go into years 2&3 and start to specialise more, they may have to go to other Colleges for tutorials if their own has no tutor for that particular module.
All meals are eaten in College Halls (unless in private / self-catering and the majority of socialising and sports are College based (unless playing Varsity).
The Colleges organise their own social events and everyone thinks their College is the best ;)

These are the 7 colleges which offer Arc & Antrop:

• Harris Manchester College
• Hertford College
• Keble College
• St Hugh's College
• St John's College
• St Peter's College

The colleges will set their own target of the number of places they are likely to offer each year but it's not set in stone.

It will vary a bit by subject. In mine, I never set foot in the subject faculty (though went to lectures which were university wide) - but I also had very little teaching in my own college. I did in my first year, but the two tutors in my college who taught my subject had specialisms that I wasn't interested in, so for the following three years almost all of my tutorial teaching was at other colleges which partnered with mine for my subject. But it made no difference socially - all of my friends were in my own college (but mostly doing different subjects).

DS was the only person in his college, in his year doing his joint honours. They typically accepted one person per year, although there were a couple of others doing single honours in each of his subjects. He made good friends in college and in the faculties but I think he'd have liked to meet someone doing his exact subjects.

Most senior academic staff have a joint appointment- they have a contract at a college, for which they teach a certain number of hours and take responsibility for organising the studies of the students in that college. They also have a contract with the university, which involves teaching centrally organised classes, giving lectures, and examining. (Some staff will be college only or university only employees.) Any college that offers Arch and Anth will have someone in-house who is responsible for those students. The students will also have tutorials at other colleges so they can be taught by specialists in particular subjects, and go to central classes.

I studied a similarly small and adjacent subject - at college there were 2 studying that subject in the year above, just me in my year and just 1 student in the year below.Only 20 or so in my year in the uni as a whole. I was allocated a tutor in college who taught me for the first two terms of my first year and after that pretty well all my tutorials were with dons from other colleges. (Most colleges have arrangements so that when someone wants to paper x they know to send them to don a etc etc). The out of college dons send report to the in college tutor at the end of term who reviewed it with me. Unless you went to lectures there would be relatively little interaction with the faculty until third year when it co ordinated the special and further subjects. A & A will also have some class and field work in earlier years which would be co ordinated by the faculty. I do know however that they don't always have enough fieldwork placements to go round and so some students end up having to scramble around to find their own. Its possible that some modules might be joint with those studying class arch and ancient history.

Another thing to be aware of is that the older, typically wealthier colleges will typically have more subsidised living arrangements. Not always, but worth comparing

My DD did Archaeology and Anthropology at Hertford College (2015 entry). PP's have covered off the teaching structure well already. Yes 30 is across the whole university with students spread across the colleges. There were 27 in total in DD's year, 4 of them in Hertford. The open days are excellent for getting to grips with how it all works. DD was at a state school with little experience of the Oxford application system, so the open days were also essential for her to learn about the process, as she also had to explain to school what they needed to do - e.g. to set and mark papers in time for submission to Oxford as part of the process.

If you/your DC can, go to more than one open day, and visit the different colleges offering the subject they want to study. There will be opportunities in each of the colleges to ask loads of questions.

You specify the college you would like to apply to in the application process, but are not guaranteed to be offered in that college. If get through to the interview stage, the applicant will stay at the college they applied to, and be interviewed by them. They may be called for interview at other colleges. My DD was interviewed by Hertford and Magdelene (which offered that course then). She was offered a place by both and was then able to choose her preference. Or at least that was the process then.

Hertford has a high intake of state school students, were one of the first colleges to admit them (and also female students I believe) and DD felt comfortable there. They also had additional bursaries for lower income families which was really helpful for us.

As PP's have said, tutorials etc. were within colleges. Also worth noting, each college has it's own library, and with such small numbers doing a subject in the college, there was ample access to reading material. DD did not need to spend a lot on books etc. as so much was available. HTH 🙂

Nowadays applicants don’t get multiple offers from colleges. They can choose their first preference and may be interviewed by another college but they will only ever get one offer

I also presume most reading material is online nowadays.

Each college would typically only have 5ish students for each subject. The college will have a tutor who sees each of those students once a week 1:1 (or 1:2) but lectures etc would happen at the Department along with students from other colleges. 30 will be the number across the whole university.

Thanks all, very interesting and helpful.
Dd is also from a state school, Hertford college sounds good but we will go and look!

She knows it's a very low acceptance rate and is also excited about the prospect of the courses at places like Exeter, Birmingham and York (that one is archaeology only)

It really doesn't matter about state school attendance these days. There are at least twice as many students from state schools as from privates. Both state & private are all surprisingly normal. DD went to a college with one of the lowest state school % and loved it.

DD (state) is now at York. Their archaeology courses are excellent. One of her friends did a joint archaeology degree at Oxford and is now loving her specialist masters at York.