I would like to ask all the students on the NRICH board who are considering doing Mathematics at university, would you consider Cambridge as a place to study? Or would they have some preconception that Cambridge is elitist and only takes the rich or "upper class" and they "would not fit in"?

Gordon

It should be explained that at the time of this discussion, there was a great deal of attention to this issue in the British media. There was a lot of publicity given to the case of Laura Spence, a girl from a Northern comprehensive school who failed to get an offer from Oxford. She did get an offer from Harvard, though this was for a different subject.

For those bewildered by the discussion of "offers", most offers of places at UK universities are conditional on grades obtained in A-levels. For Cambridge (and sometimes Warwick), the offer may also include STEP grades, as most applicants will obtain A grades at A-level.

Hi Gordon,

I've got a conditional offer at Trinity for Maths starting this year (I need to get 4As in CSYS), and I'm the first from my school to go. My school is by no means an 'Oxbridge school' and I had to go through a lot of the registration/applications completely unaided as my teachers had no experience in this field. But when I got down they were open and relaxed. Basically all I can say is that if you're good enough you'll get in, no matter where you're from. There is an argument that it might be easier to get in from no traditional backgrounds as they are looking to balance the scoresheet....

Neil m

Well, the scoresheet patently isn't balanced, so don't think there is any grounds yet for concern over positive discrimination.

Hey Neil, hope to see you there!
I also have an offer from Trinity for maths.
I'm not really sure where I fit into this recent Gordon Brown stuff because I go to a grammar school and so am naturally hated by Labour but am still not at a private school so I help the state school figures. I think that there is some prejudice at Oxford/Cambridge but also that if you're good enough you've a good chance of getting in. The Laura Spence thing was probably one of the worst possible cases the government could have chosen to make a big deal about because the facts of it make it pretty clear she wasn't descriminated against, just that lots of the candidates were as good as her or better.

I can't speak for other colleges but Trinity seemed really fair. I sat a test and then went straight to the interview where they just went straight in to looking at my paper and concentrated pretty much entirely on maths. They didn't seem to really care whether I had been a prefect or whether I played football for my school or what school I went to, just how good I was at maths and how I reacted to them telling me how to do problems I couldn't do.

It's interesting to know how many NRICHers are Cambridge applicants! Here's my take on Cambridge application procedure: I'm from the Dark Side, i.e. a private school, so feel free to hate me, elitist pig that I am. That said, I thought the interview procedure that I had (Queens' College) seemed to be designed to eliminate any bias due to previous schooling. The first 5 minutes of the interview seemed to be designed to test how much maths I already knew. The rest of 30min interview was pushing me beyond what I already knew (with me it was matrices, which they realised I didn't know much about then). Here at Queens', the majority of students I know doing maths come from state or grammar schools rather than private schools, but I have no idea how typical that is of other colleges.

Andrew-

Absolutely! I had prepared lots of stuff like how helpful I was at organising things, but I just got shoved in with lots of A-Level type questions in a test, and then quizzed about it afterwards. Does anyone have any copies of the Trinity Admissions quiz, by the way? There is one on the internet somewhere, but I forgot to take mine homw afterwards. When did you go? i was on the 9th December, 9am! Also what is your offer?

Dan-

Don't worry, I'm sure everyone hates you already;) I would guess that now the quota wants to be balanced, the elitism bit has moved internally and so there are likely to be more privateers at the big name colleges. Oh yeah... when do you find out about accomodation etc? I'm assuming its after you fulfil your offer, as I haven't heard anything yet.

I don't expect you'll hear about accommodation or anything like that until after the A-level results come out - probably early September. At least that's how it was at my college (Robinson).

James.

Hi Neil,
My interview was also on the 9th, I think at about 12 or 12:30 ish, I cant really remember. I know the paper you're talking about and I also did not take it home with me but would be interested in seeing a copy if you (or anyone) finds one. How did you find the test? It was harder than I thought it would be. My offer is AAB in double maths and physics, I also do economics but it does not count towards my offer, they don't seem to class it as a real subject! I also have to get two level 2s in step maths II and III.

I was reading about Harvard today, official Harvard admissions policy says that if there are two similar candidates on grades etc. then if one has had a parent at Harvard then they get in in front of the other candidate. It makes Harvard being held up as some wonderful politically correct establishment quite laughable really

I would say it should depend on the performance of the parent! Or toss a coin.

There is a copy of the admissions quiz on the internet: I can't remember where, but if you want I could e-mail it to you as an attachment, or perhpas if Michael is reading this he might remember where he found it! My offer is As in maths, maths 2, chem and physics. I'm also doing maths 5 (mechanics) but only applied to do it about 3 weeks ago (the exam's on Monday), so Cambridge don't know yet. I don't have STEP in mine luckily, but I was 'advised' to do it anyway.

James-

Thanks, that's what I thought...

Neil M

I think that this might be what you're looking for.

James.

Hello, Neil and Andrew

I also got an offer from Trinity. My offer is AAB and 1,2 from STEP II and III. Hope to see u there.

BTW, I don't think any Maths Faculty in the country exhibit any kind of discrimination.

Sorry for the short message but my browser keeps on crashing....

Kerwin

ANOTHER ONE! Is there anyone on this board who HASN'T applied to Cambridge?

At the very least, is there anyone who hasn't applied to Trinity?

That makes four that use this board! So about 1/10 of the intake in maths! Kerwin- I assume you're doing physics as your third one,.. most people seem to.

Neil M

Hi everybody,

I did write down some of the questions in the "admissions quiz" just afterwards but I've left it at school. I agree with Andrew - it was much harder than I thought.

It may not be entirely co-incidental that so many NRICHers are Cambridge applicants. I heard about the web-site from a maths open day in Cambridge - is this the same with anyone else?

Anyway, on the topic of Oxbridge elitism - here are the figures for entrance into Cambridge in 1998 (according to the prospectus).

From the maintained schools 1461 got in out of 5464, with an acceptance percentage of 26.7%.

From independent schools 1320 got in out of 3766, with an acceptance percentage of 35.1%.

So the proportion of acceptances from independent schools is quite significantly higher than those from maintained schools. However there are a number of possible explanations for this, which don't necessarily constitute bias on the part of the admissions tutors. On average independent school applicants will have been better taught - so they'll approach the interview with more confidence, and with a firmer grasp of the skills involved in their subject. This must be extra-specially important in maths.

In fact I think the fact that the acceptance rates are as close as they are is a testament to the interviewers' desire to assess potential rather than knowledge. This is obviously an exceedingly difficult task - and I certainly wouldn't have been that disappointed if I'd got rejected. (By the way I am very surprised they didn't allow Andrew to count economics - in the open day at Trinity for maths they said they preferred economics to chemistry, yet they are allowing people to count chemistry)

I think Neil's right that positive discrimination in favour of less traditional backgrounds may take hold over the next few years. Possibly the best way round these problems would be to change the rules such that applicants must withhold their school from their interviewers. A third party could then check that the academic reports have been written by a reliable institution. This would also pacify people who still think there's discrimination against state schools.

Yours,

Michael

Neil -

My AAB offer does not correspond to any specific subjects, since I am doing triple Maths + Physics + Chemistry. However, I suppose I can make that offer by the three Maths A-Levels.

Kerwin

Does triple maths consist of the normal two and Stats? I think that with-holding the school will be a good idea, as long as somebody doesn't look at the records, and find that they're naturally biased one way, and interpret this wrongly. You're right that Private schools may have better facilities, but it doesn't mean the pupils are better!

Neil M

Well absolutely. But sometimes applicants from independent schools will have been better taught and may well appear to be better at the interview because of this. So if two applicants come over equally well, but one's been to a private school and the other a state school, it would be interesting to know how they react.

For A-Levels, at least in the system I'm doing (London Examinations) there are 13 modules (4 pure, 4 mechanics, 4 statistics and 1 "decision maths") and for each A-Level you do 4. The popular consensus at my school is that the hardest are the stats, but I've avoided all of these modules so I wouldn't know.

Yours,

Michael

Perhaps the reason that pupils from independent schools have a better chance to get in Oxbridge is the fact that the staff in independent school offer better assistance in interview techniques, filling in UCAS Section 10, &c. However, it should come down to personality in the end, as any good interviewer would be able to distinguish people that are trained from the rest.

Michael - I agree that stats is the hardest of the three, at least as far as the Edexcel syllabus is concerned. The problem partially lies in doing the project and also the fact that one needs to write in stats. As you can see, I can't write very well.

Kerwin

Hello Neil, Andrew, Michael and Kerwin and others no doubt,

I've also got an offer to study Maths at Trinity this Autumn and have a very similar offer to Kerwin.
a "B" in Physics and 1+2 in STEP II and III
(having already got 2 "A"s in Maths)
Being from a grammar school I did find that many students I saw on the interview, (9th Dec as with the rest of you!) particularly from Public schools seemed very "self-aware" and "self-assured". But as you all say the interviewing procedure was very fair.

Hope to see you all there in Autumn.

Dan: ANOTHER ONE! to add to your list!

David

Good luck to all you Trinity applicants! You will have had your first maths A-level by now won't you? Also, good luck to all others doing A-levels as well. My exams are in a few days too, so I share your pain :)

I can give you a BIG evidence that there is absolutely no discrimination in Cambridge's maths department! You just have to be in love with maths to get in!

I agree that there is little or no discrimination, but not that you just have to be in love with maths to get in. The implication behind that is that if you get rejected you aren't in love with maths, and I don't think that's fair. The admissions procedure at Trinity favours people who respond well to time pressure. Thankfully, a good deal of the time this overlaps with people who have a real interest; but this doesn't detract from the fact that plenty of amazingly intelligent and enthusiastic mathematicians will crumble when put through that sort of assessment, and will ultimately get rejected. I firmly believe it is more important to be enthusiastic, and to have ideas of your own, than it is to be able to solve hard problems in a short period of time.

My interview was an absolute disaster. I am extremely interested in maths but I only scraped in because I had the clever idea of taking STEP Maths 1-2 a year early. At some of the other universities, it seemed they wanted more to know why I like maths, what my particular interests were, what I thought about a particular topic (for instance analysis, set theory) - something the interviewers at Trinity semed to show no interest in whatsoever. I guess it is hard to decide whom to accept in this way, so maybe the interviewers cannot be totally blamed. The good thing was they did try their best to minimise the effects of superior teaching, and thus were attempting to assess on potential rather than knowledge.

Yours,

Michael

I apologise for the aggressive tone of that last message (I'm in a bad mood, following the death of Match of the Day ). I'm really not trying to knock the Trinity (or Cambridge) admissions system. The interviewers face an almost impossible task, and I suppose they've done all they can to level the playing field. Being asked about maths in general would have been nice (instead of the rigid focus on the problems on their paper), but then you could argue that you could prepare answers to this so in terms of assessment this is useless.

Also I'm not trying to suggest for one minute that anyone who has an offer/place at Cambridge doesn't deserve it. This applies most especially to people on the NRICH board (both the student team and the members) who have clearly given up a lot of their time for mathematics outside their formal assessments, and therefore deserve all the success they get.

The only point I would insist on is it's not true to say "if you're good enough you'll get in" or "if you're enthusiastic you're guaranteed a place". The problem is that if this were true, there would be very few rejections. The system is not entirely fair, and I think it is important for the people rejected to remember that. Otherwise it is all too easy to completely lose any self-confidence, and not capitalise on an education in another of the countless excellent universities both in England and abroad.

Yours,

Michael

Surely the point that ought to be made is that it is grossly unfair to expect only two universities to be able to accommodate ALL the bright kids in the country who choose to apply. In that case, the universities are forced to choose between equally qualified candidates, and some will obviously fail to gain a place for an 'arbitrary' reason. Already, positive discrimination is operating in favour of deserving groups - for example those perceived as being disadvantaged by quality of education, social reasons (e.g. race) and societal history (e.g. no-one from the family/region/school has been to Oxbridge). The question is how far we want the balance to swing against those we perceive as privileged.

No-one so far has thought to praise the fact that Oxbridge takes the trouble to interview ALL applicants and so find out in person their strengths and weaknesses. If selection was without interview there would be an outcry - even though some other universities do this already, and some simply abrogate all resonsibility making ALL candidates very high offers, cynically counting on the fact that many cannot achieve them.

As for Michael's point that the interview was only on one topic, this must be in some measure to level the playing field. Maybe the system of restricting the interview to discussion of a test prevents schools coaching candidates to interview well, which might disadvantage State School applicants. Besides, it opens up the possibility of giving harder tests to those from 'good' schools, Independent or State, to see how they think when faced by an unfamiliar topic - a most uncomfortable situation for an interviewee to be in, but effective. Michael, if this is the case then you had a tough interview BECAUSE you did the STEP a year early.

The obvious solution is to make other universities as good as Oxbridge, which would be good for Oxbridge - nothing like competition to hone the mind, and good for all those who aspire to education in world class universities.

The impression I got is that they wanted you to think on your feet; they deliberately took you to breaking point.

Neil M

Whilst I agree with the previous conclusion that the obvious solution is to make other universities better, I think the argument that there a too many bright people is in some sense a red herring. This is because a quick survey of students at Cambridge reveals that many of them don't particularly deserve to be there, on academic grounds at least. I have to be careful here becuase I really don't want to offend anyone, but within Cambidge there is a very wide range of abilities. I think this undermines the "too many bright people" argument, for the time being at least.

I also agree with Michael's reservations about the process in general.

I don't think that one's ability to perform "at breaking point" is necessarily going to be linked in all cases to one's ability to perform under normal conditions - which is most of the time (although obviously there will be a correlation).

Sean

Just a small comment. I am thinking about applying to Cambridge next year. If there is going to be discrimination against people at public schools we are going to see people who have earned their place at a public school with a near 100 percent scholarship and otherwise would be at a comprehensive not get a place even though they are extremely bright. I also agree with the fact that univerties should not be told the school of the applicant and it should only be UCAS who knows so as to verify the statements.

Definitely apply, but you might want to avoid some of the colleges which are known to positively discriminate for state school students, for instance I was told that King's had such a policy, but I don't know. You might also want to mention your scholarship on your application, I think it would help. I don't think you'll encounter too much positive discrimination.

I really don't think you need worry... The main source of state/independent inequality is applications. I think most colleges in Cambridge do not show discrimination in their entry statistics. There is certainly no evidence whatsoever for positive discrimination, although in some case there is evidence of discrimination. There was also an interesting study last year showing that students from state schools did slightly better on average once in Cambridge, suggesting it was easier to get in from an independent school.

The only thing that would make entries from independent schools drop is if the number of applications from state schools increased, but seing as these applications are currently substantially underrepresentative, this could hardly be called a bad thing.

It has been stated above in this discussion that if you are good enough you will get in. I'm not sure I completely agree with this, but I'm fairly sure it would be 99\% true to say that if you are good enough, and you are from an independent school then you are very likely to get in.

Sean

To answer Dan's point which was posted at the same time as mine, it isn't actually true that King's has a positive discrimination, despite a general opinion that it does. What happens is that it has very large number of application from state (mostly grammar in fact) schools. It's addmissions is actually proportional to its applications.

Sean

Sorry for spreading rumour, I'd heard that they had a pro-state school bias, but I'm happy to be corrected.

[These sorts of rumour are pervasive. Someone told me (in the late 80s) that they'd heard that one particular college only had 2 state pupils. My immediate response was that if that was the case, I knew both of them. (And given that I only knew 3 students altogether at that college, I suspect there were a lot more.) - The Editor]

Sean said (a few messages back)

'I don't think that one's ability to perform "at breaking point" is necessarily going to be linked in all cases to one's ability to perform under normal conditions - which is most of the time (although obviously there will be a correlation).'

I see what you're saying, but given their own conditions, everyone can do well, and then its harder to pick the real top league of people they want.

James-

I agree with you. But they're not really going against public school students, just a little more so than they have in the past decades to even it up a bit. You'll still get in if you deserve it no matter where you're from. They can't change that.

You may be interested to know, I was at a colloquium this weekend (in the (really splendid) new Maths building) for teachers of sixth form students and was told that the proportion of Maths students accepted at Cambridge who come from public schools is about 30%, and the proportion of students obtaining firsts who came from public schools is also around 30% - which seems to indicate that they manage to assess people on potential pretty well.

Incidentally, (although those above will know by now whether they have a place) don't forget that, good as they are, Oxford and Cambridge are not the only Universities around! I failed to get an offer when I applied (to Queens, so I'm breaking the Trinity trend) and ended up going to Manchester. I liked it so much that I stayed a student there for nine years.