American's views on Oxford! Cambridge...

Applying to College
81

<p>Fallinwater0328, I'm afraid I can't buy your argument. It sounds like excuse-mongering.</p>

<p>Let me explain. I've heard Berkeley administrators claim that the relative youth of the school is a reason for why they have difficulty competing against other, older schools. Oh really? If that's really the problem, then why does relative youth not seem to be a problem for certain other schools, most notably Stanford? Stanford is actually 23 years YOUNGER than Berkeley is, having been founded in 1891 vs. Berkeley in 1868. </p>

<p>And if you really want to get into the history of Stanford, you will notice that Stanford encountered severe financial problems in the first few decades of its existence and at that time was considered to be a backwater school of little prestige and little consequence. Only after WW2 did Stanford really start to hit its stride, first matching, and then ultimately surpassing the prestige of Berkeley. In fact, there are stories about how the early Stanford leadership despaired at how the Stanford would ever be able to successfully compete against Berkeley. That doesn't seem to be a problem anymore, you must agree.</p>

<p>Now let me be clear. I don't go to Stanford, I have never gone to Stanford, and I have no affiliation with Stanford. </p>

<p>What I do have is a great admiration for what Stanford has managed to do. I think we can all agree that Stanford is one of the world's elite schools. Stanford has managed to catapult itself into these ranks in an unbelievably short period of time. Stanford doesn't have several centuries of history that stretches back to colonial times that allows it to cultivate a sense of ancient prestige. Stanford doesn't have a vested menagerie consisting of the ranks of old money and quasi-nobility that it can draw upon. Stanford hasn't been able to grow a giant endowment warchest through centuries of compounded interest. Yet none of that matters - Stanford has been able to place itself in the ranks of the elite school despite having none of those advantages. If there is one school that will surpass Harvard anytime soon (which I don't think will happen, but if it does), it's not the venerable fogies of Yale, not Princeton, not Oxbridge. It's Stanford, a spring chicken.</p>

<p>Hence, I'm afraid I have to question your assertions of "...certainly an institution needs a very long time to build its reputation. This process takes hundreds years..." If that's true, well, somebody forgot to tell the boys in Palo Alto about that. </p>

<p>Now I know what some of you are thinking - that Stanford maybe isn't as famous/prestigious as HYP or Oxbridge. Fine, maybe not, but I think we can all agree that Stanford is more famous/prestigious than Berkeley. Berkeley is young, but Stanford is even younger, so if age was all there was to the equation, then Berkeley should be at least as prestigious as Stanford.</p>

<p>And this makes the analysis of the other public schools even more problematic. UNC was founded in 1789, and is actually the 11th oldest institution of higher education in the history of the country. The University of Virginia was founded in 1819. Yet neither UNC nor Virginia are as prestigious as their backyard neighbor, Duke, which is a significantly younger school, having been founded in either 1838 or 1853 depending on how you define the word 'founded' (but in any case, Duke is younger than UNC or Virginia no matter how you count it). And of course, neither UNC nor Virginia can touch Stanford in terms of prestige, and Stanford is about half the age of either.</p>

82

<p>
[quote]
Berkeley, UCLA, UVA, UCSD, and UNC...every student deserves to be there. The same cannot be said for their pseudo-illustrious counterparts.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Please elaborate on what exactly "deserves to be there" means. Are you saying that every student at those aforementioned schools is there because of their academic record? If so, you're forgetting that those school recruit athletes that couldn’t have gotten in if not for their athletic talents. Instate residence, minority status, and legacy status all give applicants to those schools an unfair advantage.</p>

<p>Not every student who goes to an Ivy deserves to be there but your largely mistaken if you think the majority of Ivy leaguers paid their way in while those public schools only contain intelligent and hard working individuals. Look at admissions selectivity: it’s a lot more difficult to get into Harvard or Yale than it is to get into UNC or Cal instate. Average SAT scores are higher at Harvard and Yale than the public schools you mentioned.</p>

83

<p>First of all, in-state residency and minority status are admissions factors because not all students have the resources to just pick-up and move whenever the Ivy league comes calling. Not to mention the $30,000+ a year in tuition expenses. Additionally, many kids who attend top public schools did not have the supposed benefit of coming from prep or boarding schools. As a result, they are automatically at a disadvantage. Furthermore, your data concerning "admissions selectivity and "average SAT score" is skewed. Public schools tend to be much larger than the Ivy leagues, and therefore can accomodate larger numbers. As far as SAT's are concerned; students who score exceptionally well have often bought in to the allure and mystique of the Ivy leagues because they're under the impression these private schools are the best. Now as far as athletic scholarships are concerned, Berkeley, UNC, and UCLA are among the most selective in the country, and UCSD doesn't even extend them. So your understanding of that truly seems to be flawed.</p>

<p>The best tell-tale statistic would appear to be in 'what tax bracket the majority of Ivy league students fall under'. It's interesting that no one seems to have those numbers readily available. You see, schools who have the most money often end up at the top of the lists in America; however, in Europe, many (if not all) of the schools I mentioned are among the top 20 in the WORLD. Berkeley is #2. </p>

<p>Oh yeah, there is no legacy program at any of the UC's, and though I am unsure about UVA and UNC, I am willing to bet their program is pretty limited.</p>

84

<p>Look, Berkeley is #2 in the Times rating chiefly because of its graduate programs, which are indisputably great. Berkeley's undergraduate program is pretty good, but I would hesitate to call it great overall, and certainly it isn't the #2 overall undergraduate program in the world Yet I take it from the rest of your post that you are mixing your comparisons here - you are talking chiefly about undergraduate programs, yet you pull out the Times ranking which is chiefly about graduate programs. </p>

<p>Let me illustrate. You say that public schools are quite large, and for undergraduate programs, that is true. However, Berkeley's graduate programs are not particularly large - in fact, many of them are actually extremely small. You also talk about the tax brackets of the majority of Ivy league students. Well, to be fair, if you are then going to use the Times ranking to bolster your argument about Berkeley, you should be looking at the tax bracket not of Berkeley undergraduate students, but of Berkeley graduate students, because, again, the Times ranking is chiefly related to the quality of the graduate programs. Having known many Berkeley graduate students, I can say that their tax bracket would tend to be extremely high, which fits the fact that the majority of Berkeley graduate students, especially in the more prominent Berkeley graduate programs, tend to have done their undergrad at the 'usual suspects' - Harvard, Yale, MIT, Stanford, Princeton, etc. etc. </p>

<p>The point is, you can't switch back and forth between the Berkeley undergraduate program and the entire university as a whole whenever it is convenient. Berkeley undergrads as a whole may less less wealthy than the undergrads at the Ivy League, but the difference in family income levels of graduate students at Berkeley and the Ivy League is minimal, if, for no other reason, than the fact that many Berkeley graduate students came from the Ivy League. </p>

<p>Now, let me deal with your questions of prestige. You say that people go to the Ivy League because they are attracted by the allure and the mystique. I don't see anything wrong with that. I would further point out that Berkeley does the same thing. Let's face it. A lot of California residents just apply to all the UC's, and then go to the highest ranked one they get into. Let's face it. A lot of Berkeley students are at Berkeley and not at, say, UCDavis, for no other reason than because of the relative allure and mystique of Berkeley. So Berkeley is doing the same thing as the Ivies. How can Berkeley criticize the Ivy League for attracting prestige-mongers when Berkeley itself attracts plenty of prestige-mongers? The criticism then seems to be that they all do the same thing, it's just that the Ivy League does it better than Berkeley does, and that doesn't seem like a serious criticism to me. </p>

<p>I would also point out that it's not just a matter of prestige and allure alone. The fact is, the elite private schools do some things better than Berkeley does in terms of undergraduate education. The better private schools offer more resources per capita. Let's face it. If Harvard and Berkeley were both stripped of their brand-names and their prestige, Harvard would still probably be a better overall place to get an undergraduate education than Berkeley wold be. That's not to say that Harvard is perfect, or that Berkeley is bad, it's just the realization that Harvard brings more resources-per-capita to the table.</p>

85

<p>Well, there does not seem to be a credible (conducted by a university, or viable news source) European university ranking system for undergraduate schools. Which is why I was forced to use the London Times. However, it does not explicitly state whether or not the rankings are exclusively for graduate programs. Hmmm. And wouldn't they break it down by individual graduate programs? I mean, do they just lump all the respective programs into one list? I doubt it, and if they did then they are stupid, and not credible anyway.
Here are the World University UNDERGRADUATE rankings according to Asia, compiled by The Institute of Higher Education, Shanghai Jiao Tong University: </p>

<p>World Rank Institution Country Total Score Score on Alumni Score on Award Score on HiCi Score on N&S Score on SCI Score on Size
1 Harvard Univ USA 100.0 98.6 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 60.6
2 Stanford Univ USA 77.2 41.2 72.2 96.1 75.2 72.3 68.1
3 Univ Cambridge UK 76.2 100.0 93.4 56.6 58.5 70.2 73.2
4 Univ California - Berkeley USA 74.2 70.0 76.0 74.1 75.6 72.7 45.1
5 Massachusetts Inst Tech (MIT) USA 72.4 74.1 78.9 73.6 69.1 64.6 47.5
6 California Inst Tech USA 69.0 59.3 66.5 64.8 66.7 53.2 100.0
7 Princeton Univ USA 63.6 61.0 76.8 65.4 52.1 46.8 67.3
8 Univ Oxford UK 61.4 64.4 59.1 53.1 55.3 65.2 59.0
9 Columbia Univ USA 61.2 77.8 58.8 57.3 51.6 68.3 37.0
10 Univ Chicago USA 60.5 72.2 81.9 55.3 46.6 54.1 32.7
11 Yale Univ USA 58.6 52.2 44.5 63.6 58.1 63.6 50.4
12 Cornell Univ USA 55.5 46.6 52.4 60.5 47.2 66.2 33.6
13 Univ California - San Diego USA 53.8 17.8 34.7 63.6 59.4 67.2 47.9
14 Tokyo Univ Japan 51.9 36.1 14.4 44.5 55.0 91.9 49.8
15 Univ Pennsylvania USA 51.8 35.6 35.1 61.2 44.6 72.6 34.0
16 Univ California - Los Angeles USA 51.6 27.4 32.8 60.5 48.1 79.9 24.8
17 Univ California - San Francisco USA 50.8 0.0 37.6 59.3 59.5 62.9 48.8
18 Univ Wisconsin - Madison USA 50.0 43.1 36.3 55.3 48.0 69.2 19.0
19 Univ Michigan - Ann Arbor USA 49.3 39.8 19.3 64.8 45.7 76.7 20.1
20 Univ Washington - Seattle USA 49.1 22.7 30.2 57.3 49.6 78.8 16.2</p>

<p>As you can see, the best public schools still occupy top 20 positions. Berkeley is #4.</p>

<p>Did I fail to mention that Harvard has an endowment in the tens of billions. This may explain why their resouces are so plentiful. Conversely, a school like Berkeley, which has a considerably less "prestigious" endowment, still manages to keep pace.</p>

<p>It is true that students in California strive to attend the more preeminent UC's, though I wouldn't call it "prestige mongering" or whatever. Rather, there is a growing consensus among california students who feel their schools are the best. Additionally, top students who are California residents sometimes only apply to the UC's because it's all they can afford. Not necessarily because they're chasing prestige.</p>

<p>In analyzing this data, it would seem as though the top public universities in the world are quite competitive with their private counterparts without the benefit of extremely deep pocket books. If a school like Berkeley or UCLA had even half the monetary resources Harvard has, who knows how far their "prestige" would extend. Look, we could argue our positions for an eternity, but the bottom line is Berkeley, UCLA, UVA, UW-Madison etc., have accomplished just as much with a lot less.</p>

86

<p>Guys, you have to remember that this Chinese table is seriously flawed, by the direct admission of its compiler, who acknowledges, right on his website, that he's found no proper way of ranking specialist arts and social science universities. </p>

<p>His methodology is messed up in other respects too (for instance his citation indexes): only the London Times international table has any credibility out of the two of them, especially as it polls a very large number of international academics for their views: it is therefore based on a lot more than just simple, and in the case of the Chinese table, inefficient, number crunching..</p>

87

<p>i like Cambridge more than Oxford.. personally...</p>

88

<p>Cambridge itself admits that it gives around 30% first class degrees, way way above what it gave 20 years ago: are people so much brighter than they were then? Unlikely, given the evidence about dumbing down in the education system - in fact it's the other way around - students who are less well qualified when they enter university are getting higher and higher grades when they leave - in the eighties the average student graduated with a 2:2 degree, now that's become an average 2:1 (the British degree grade system calibrates as 1st class, 2:1, 2:2, 3rd class etc). </p>

<p>The British university system has become the Weimar Republic of grade inflation, with Oxbridge leading the way.</p>

<p>As for the 'two essays a week': the point stands -these are papers, they are not finished essays in the conventional sense -this does not mean they are useless, far from it, but that nobody should get the idea that they are the same as writing two normal academic essays which are then rigorously judged by red pen wielding academics in the way that they carefully scrutinise conventional essays. I know plenty of people who've been through Oxford and stories abound of tutors nodding off while the student stumbles through the reading of his paper - the text itself is often hastily scribbled down the night before, indeed it's perfectly possible to make some of it up as you read, using key words and quotations pasted into your text (you paraphrase the quote/extract as you read it aloud).</p>

<p>Somebody told me of a whole term in which the tutor listened to the whole thing each time and at the end he would utter a cryptic two sentence comment...Some feedback... Obviously there is more to Oxford academic work than this, and it's a great university, but the idea that students write two full proper essays a week every week for 24 weeks is off the mark...</p>

<p>Students in other leading British universities produce fewer documents, but in their 30 week teaching year the emphasis when producing written work will be on quality rather than quantity- you will not get away with reading something aloud to your tutor....the extra time that they have compared to Oxbridge people is put to good use...</p>

<p>As for the Oxbridge admissions tutor bribery, yep, it's been known about for years, the cases referred to were reported in the Sunday Times I think in 2003 (google for it if you need) - as with most fraud and corruption there is no reason to believe that the people caught were the only ones doing it -and there's anecdotal evidence going back a long way -after all UK university dons tend to be badly paid compared to those in comparable professions; it doesn't just stop with classic brown envelope stuff either - many major donors to universities expect that their progeny will be favoured when it comes to entry, and not just at Oxbridge - a couple of years ago a very famous Indian billionaire withdrew a donation to LSE because they refused admission to his daughter.</p>

<p>Oxbridge is great, but let's get with the real world..</p>

89

<p>What's first class degree, is it similar to Summa Cum Laude in US
and second class degree similar to Magna Cum Laude in US.</p>

90

<p>There will always be one or two slackers in however a great university. Perhaps your oxford friends were the few of them. Small wonder the tutors "dozed" off anyway. It's a real pity for them, because with Oxbridge, it is what you make of the experience, not what the university make of you. Many freshers when they start in the first year did not understand this, but usually after 2 terms or so, the majority comes to understand what it really means. If your friends had bothered and asked for a more complete feedback, and generally be proactive in their academic pursuit, they would get it. The point is - there are many opportunities to take advantage of. If you can't be bothered to write 'proper' draft essays, why should you expect the tutors to accept that it is not? But if you had bothered to spend time on them, and asked for a more detailed feedback, they would be more than happy to do so.</p>

<p>And just because there are more 1st class in Oxbridge is not evidence that there is grade inflation. These people deserved all the A grades they get. It just means the 'quality' of students has gone up over the years. Oxbridge, for some strange reason, is always the 'favourite target' of British media, and if a don ever admits to inflating a grade, you can be sure it is in the headlines the next day. You can try googling for one, ie. if you can find one such article. Grade inflation in Ivies is a more serious problem. I do not yet know, or heard of, any measures taking place to tackle this problem.</p>

<p>As to bribery and such, you might have missed my earlier point. No university can 'gaurantee' that their academic staff is 'clean of corruption' - not oxbridge, not HYPSM either. If academic staff got away with it and not be found out, no one can tell - not even the university - unless it caught the media somewhere. The whole point is - no respectable university will ever, EVER condone corruption of any sort by their academic staff, as this invariably tarnish the university's reputation. Hence, to put it simply: corruption can happen in ANY respectable university, but ANY respectable university will NEVER condone such an action. </p>

<p>I <em>may</em> not be rigiht on this - but I <em>think</em> a gpa of 3.8 is taken to be equivalent to a 1st class, and 3.6 ~ 3.7 a 2:1 class. I could be wrong on this.</p>

91

<p>There's an Oxford, Connecticut.</p>

<p>It's pretty small though.</p>

92

<p>Nobody in the UK seriously believes that the massive increase in A grades, across the system, from high school level to university, is evidence of a massive increase in student ability. </p>

<p>All the indicators point in the opposite direction: last week for instance there was more publicity about the fact that it's now possible to get a 'C' grade in GCSE maths while scoring about 20% in the assessment (I can't remember the exact percentage, but it's near that-google for it if you want to check) and sadly Oxbridge leads the way in this -it has been steadily ratcheting up its grades. </p>

<p>The evidence is there in so mmany places: three or four years ago Cambridge reported that it ran first year remedial classes in English (this is for one of Cambridge's best subject areas, English Literature: students who need straight As just to get in). When the BBC revived the venerable TV college quiz show 'University Challenge', in which student teams compete, it had to admit that the questions were notably dumbed down: the students of the present generation simply cannot match the erudition of their predecessors 20 years ago (incidentally Oxbridge is the keenest participant in the show, entering dozens of teams each year, one for each tiny constitutent college, whereas all the other unis only enter one team each, however large they are).</p>

<p>Oxbridge is not the only villain, of course: last year there was an understandable fuss when somebody computed that Warwick University had doubled the number of first class degrees it gave over the previous decade, so that it's now awarding more firsts than universities which have always had much higher entry grades. Have Warwick students become that much more clever in ten years? There's no evidence of that: Warwick entry grades are notably behind those of the big four universities, and there's still a telling silence whenever anybody asks about famous Warwick graduates...</p>

93

<p>Edubble23, have you realized what you just put up there? Your quote was :"Here are the World University UNDERGRADUATE rankings according to Asia, compiled by The Institute of Higher Education, Shanghai Jiao Tong University"</p>

<p>Yet, I see that in those rankings, what have we here at #17. Why, it's UCSF. Well, isn't that interesting. So interesting. So very interesting. Why? BECAUSE UCSF DOESN'T HAVE AN UNDERGRADUATE PROGRAM! Yet you say that this is a ranking of undergraduate programs? </p>

<p>I hate to have to point this out to you, but I think you ought to do a bit better fact checking. The reality is that the ranking you have published is NOT an undergraduate ranking. Rather, it is once again, a research-oriented ranking. As you can see from the methodology, the ranking is compiled by calculating Nobel Prize and Fields Prize winners, published articles, and so forth. It has nothing to do with undergraduate education whatsoever.</p>

<p><a href="http://ed.sjtu.edu.cn/rank/2004/top500(1-100).htm%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://ed.sjtu.edu.cn/rank/2004/top500(1-100).htm&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p><a href="http://ed.sjtu.edu.cn/rank/2004/Methodology.htm%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://ed.sjtu.edu.cn/rank/2004/Methodology.htm&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>I would also contest some of your other points. You say that Harvard has billiions of dollars of endowment and that's why Harvard is on top. But then you have to ask yourself why is it that Harvard has such a large endowment in the first place. Don't use 'age' as an excuse. Age only goes so far. Stanford is younger than Berkeley, and yet Stanford has managed to build up a substantially larger endowment than Berkeley has. </p>

<p>Furthermore, when I was talking about students applying only to the UC's, what I was referring to is what we both know to be true - that a lot of them are just going to reflexively choose to go to the most prestigious UC that will admit them. For example, I know plenty of people whose method of choosing the school to go to is simple. If he gets into Berkeley, he will go. If not, but he gets into UCLA, he will go there. If he doesn't get into Berkeley or UCLA, but gets into UCSD, then he will go there. And so on down the line. No visit to the school, no investigation of which UC is better for him, just a mechanical process for choosing schools. In other words, it's a simple matter of ranking the UC's prestige and then going to the most prestigious one he can get into. You know and I know that lot of people do that. </p>

<p>Hence, my point is, if people are choosing which UC to attend simply by prestige, then what's so wrong about people choosing to go to Harvard, Yale or Stanford just for the prestige? It's the same thing. </p>

<p>And finally, I see that you keep coming back to the money argument. And again I would point to the example of Stanford, which started life as a highly impoverished institution. The administrators of Stanford during the early days compared what they had to the relatively lavish resources that Berkeley had at that time (at least, lavish compared to them) and they trembled at how they would ever be able to match Berkeley's resources. It's not like Stanford was just handed the huge endowment they have now. They worked to create that endowment.</p>

94

<p>The increase in A grades at A levels was discussed some years ago. The root of the problem was felt to be that students are getting smarter while the standard required at A levels has not changed over the years. And this is not just in UK. In other countries, such as Singapore or Hong Kong for example, where there are also A levels, there has been a steady increase in the number of students gaining A grades. </p>

<p>What needs to be reformed is the standard that is asked of a student to get an A grade - ie. push up the barriers. This is not the same as 'inflation'. Just recently, their education ministry (or some authority - I can't remember the actual name) proposed a whole reform of the A levels system, and replace it with a Diploma. Some suggested awarding A* grades, simply because they can no longer distinguish the very brightest with the increase in numbers gaining A grades. So in short, the standards of the A level system has not changed over the years, and is in danger of becoming irrelevant to UK's economic needs, and is hence under critical review by students, parents, academics alike. You may google for these reports if you wish.</p>

<p>If anything, this also applies to Universities that have been keeping/maintaining what they asked of an A grade, ie. to set the bar higher. Again, this has nothing to do with 'dumbing down'. Media loves to use these sort phrases to catch people's attention. It's up to you to believe which side of the coin you want to see.</p>

<p>Compare this with Ivies' policy of awarding grades on percentile. eg. out of 100 students on a course, 50% will get A grades, 25% A- and etc. Note that this is regardless of whether a student actually deserves an A grade. The measure is against your cohort, not against the standard set down by the professor. So, even ifi you get a B grade in the class of 2005 (for example), you may very well get an A grade in the class of 2006 with the same paper that you submit. If this is not grade inflation, then I don't know what you call it.</p>

95

<p>Here's a marvellous snippet from today's BBC website:</p>

<p>''Exam boost for pupils if pet dies. </p>

<p>Critics say the system sends out the wrong message
A system giving students extra marks if they have suffered personal trauma is being defended by an exams authority.
GCSE and A-level pupils in England are given 5% more if a parent dies close to exam day or 4% for a distant relative. </p>

<p>They get 2% more if a pet dies or 1% if they get a headache. Critics say the system panders to an "excuse for everything" attitude. </p>

<p>But the Assessment and Qualifications Alliance (AQA) says taking such events into consideration is "nothing new". </p>

<p>The guidelines are set out by the Joint Council for Qualifications (JCQ), which represents England's three main exam authorities, including the AQA. ''</p>

<p>You get extra marks if your pet dies: I rest my case.</p>

96

<p>Living in the UK, I am very familiar with the standard of British universities and with Oxford and Cambridge. I can honestly tell you that although Oxford and Cambridge may be considered prestigious in the US, they are not considered to be excellent schools here or in most other places of the world such as Asia and Middle East, especially when compared to US universities. The resources of these universities cannot compete with those of US universities such as Harvard, Stanford, Yale or MIT which have massive endowments going into billions of dollars. Oxbridge was once the pinnacle of higher education but has not been able to keep up with the US, post-WWII and as a result have lagged behind significantly. </p>

<p>I am incredibly surprised to find people on this board posting comments such as "Oxford is the best university in the world" because it is, in fact, far, far from that.</p>

97

<p>Don't believe everything you read in the Press! It might be true, but i doubt the process is as simple and clean cut as presented. In my A-level days a few years back those rules still existed, but in order to have those circumstances mitigated one had to undergo a doctor's examination to actually proove you were genuinely ill! As for the relatives dying thing, that only counts if they actually die DURING exam period, which is understandable, since some A-level subjects require 6 final exams over the space of a 1-2 weeks. As for A-level standards, i do believe they've fallen somewhat in comparison to a few years back when they were academically rigorous tests, but only insofar as the method they are assessed - these days there are more exams spread out rather than packed in a few days, with only a single final synoptic. In days gone it used to be three 3hr synoptic papers at the end of two years. The course content and depth and breadth of knowledge achieved i think remains as it was. As for dumbing down, that's just media spinning that they like to do every August when exam results are released and other news is thin on the ground. Only 3% of all students achieved AAA at A Level last year, while the individual A-grades were high, it's obviously easier to get a single A in one subject if that's all you study for!</p>

98

<p>I have to agree with rage666 here. Oxford and Cambridge are no longer the institutions they used to be. There was a time when the two were considered far above any other university in the world, attracting the best faculty and students alike. However, those times are long gone with American education becoming unbelievably competitive and American universities improving at an unbelievable pace.</p>

<p>In the US, people still associate Oxford and Cambridge with excellence because of the weight these names once carried. I think if Americans were to visit these colleges and learn of the resources available that opinion would change very quickly, especially if compared with the likes of HYPSM. </p>

<p>Although it is commendable for someone to be accepted to Oxford or Cambridge, it is significantly more worthy to be accepted to any elite American college as these are much more competitive and their student bodies vastly superior.</p>

99

<p>That is bs. Oxbridge are far superior for undergrad, best teaching - tutorials/ supervisions- and much higher level reached in individual subjects. Grad- us a bit better. Oxbridge still gets best students in Europe and Commonwealth if not worldwide. And as for the supposed lack of resources - although they "only" have a few billion endowment each, remember that they are public universities and everything is paid for by the state. Imagine Berkeley 50 years ago, with one to one tuition by professors for undergraduates, and throw on a few billion dollars endowment and hundreds of years of history and you get oxbridge. And as I said in another post - almost no americans could get in from high school, only 3 out of 3000 cambridge offers went to people going to high school (as opposed to A-level/ib). vastly superior, yeah right.</p>

100

<p>Sargon, don't confuse the number of Americans accepted with the intellecual ability of Americans to be accepted. How many Americans without IB/A levels applied? </p>

<p>Americans do the IB program (in fact the IB program is growing the fastest in the US with over 3000 new candidates this year alone). </p>

<p>High schools do have IB programs (mine does). Almost no Americans get in from high school because Oxbridge heavily weight IB and A levels in the admissions process and not many Americans even apply. They would rather have a liberal arts education. Top America students definitely have the brain power to get into Oxbridge. They simply lack (a) the desire to attend a school where they have to focus on only one subject and don't have the option of changing their major and/or (b) the placement exams that Oxbridge puts so much emphasis on.</p>