• Question: Was it hard to get into the unis you got into?

    Asked by zazzy to James, Marcus, Martin, Rob, Suzanne on 16 Mar 2012.
    • Photo: Martin Zaltz Austwick

      Martin Zaltz Austwick answered on 16 Mar 2012:

      It was quite competitive. One tip is that Oxford and Cambridge have different colleges, and that some of the newer colleges are a bit easier to get into and less stuffy.

      I went to a very new college! But don’t let that put you off if you want to go to an older college, they are very good really.

    • Photo: Robert Thompson

      Robert Thompson answered on 16 Mar 2012:

      Physics at Durham was quite competitive when I went, The College I went to was also very competitive to get into.

      Unlike Cambridge and Oxford the You are accepted into the University rather than the college at Durham, so if you are good enough you get in. You may how ever not end up in the college of your choice.

      When applying to competitive universities it’s always good to show that you can add value to the community, eg. by playing an instrument or being members of school councils.

    • Photo: Marcus Gallagher-Jones

      Marcus Gallagher-Jones answered on 18 Mar 2012:

      I guess I’m in the same boat as Rob since I went to the same university. As he said it’s not just about the grades you also need to be interesting as a person so really try and play up your hobbies/experiences.

    • Photo: Suzanne McEndoo

      Suzanne McEndoo answered on 18 Mar 2012:

      I had to get reasonably good grades, but it wasn’t one of the superhard ones like law or medicine. In Ireland we get up to 100 points for each result for six subjects, so the maximum points is 600. I only needed to get 500.

      It’s also a bit different from the UK in that getting into uni was only based on exam results, we didn’t have essays or interviews or anything like that. This can be nice because the uni’s can’t discriminate against anybody because of sex or race or anything, since the selection is done by computer. On the other hand, it doesn’t take into account how interested or suitable you are for a course.

    • Photo: James Boone

      James Boone answered on 18 Mar 2012:

      I actually had a fantastic opportunity getting into university. I did really badly in my A-level exams because of switching schools and personal disruptions, but Sussex University offered what is called a foundation year, where you basically do a year re-learning the A-level stuff and a bit more. I passed the exams at the end of the foundation year and that allowed me to do the Theoretical Physics degree that I wanted to do. I went on to do a 4 year MPhys course and then a PhD, so I’ve been very lucky but it was also a lot of work!

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