Chances at Oxford, Cambridge and other British schools?

<p>Hello, </p>

<p>Thank you for taking the time to read this. I will be a senior next year and am considering going to school in England. Since British schools don't care about EC's, I won't bother posting them, but here are my academic stats:</p>

<p>ACT: 35
SAT II's: Math IIC 800 Chem 770
Class Rank: 2 out of about 600
GPA UW: 4.0
GPA W: 5.0</p>

<p>Freshman Year:
Enriched Geometry (Honors, highest freshman level math course)
Honors English 9
Honors French 2
Honors Biology
Health/PE
Computer Concepts and skills/ Global studies</p>

<p>Sophomore Year:
Enriched Advanced Algebra and Trigonometry (Honors, highest sophomore level math course)
Honors English 10
Honors French 3
Honors Chemistry
Spanish 1
CAD Engineering</p>

<p>Junior Year:
Honors Spanish 2
Enriched Precalculus (Honors, highest .....)
Honors English 11
Honors US History Seminar
AP Statistics (probably a 5 on the AP test)
AP Chemistry (5 again most likely)
Honors French 4</p>

<p>Senior Year:
AP Biology
AP Calculus BC
AP English
AP US Government
AP Physics B
AP French
Honors Spanish 3</p>

<p>I may be forgetting some classes. Hmm I'm not sure what else to say. </p>

<p>Ahh yes, I lived in Europe for 13 years and have lived in the US for 5 years. </p>

<p>So here are the schools: </p>

<p>Cambridge
Oxford
London School of Economics
Imperial College London</p>

<p>Sorry the post is so long. Thanks for the help.</p>

<p>Wait. How are you #2 in your class with a 5.0?</p>

<p>well, there is a .03 gap between me and the valedictorian but there is a much larger gap (maybe .2) between me and the person ranked 3. The students are very competitive. </p>

<p>Just to clarify one thing that I forgot the mention in my initial post, I live in the US now.</p>

<p>Well if determining my chances at British schools is difficult could you tell me my chances at the following solely based on what I have posted already (my EC's are not the best, but they are decent and I should get amazing recommendations)</p>

<p>Harvard
MIT (Sloan)
U Penn (Wharton)
Stanford
University of Chicago
Northwestern</p>

<p>Thank you very much :)</p>

<p>Academics are good.</p>

<p>No extracurriculars listed...you will be rejected at all except University of Chicago and Northwestern.</p>

<p>Tell us what specific Extracurriculars you have and I may be able to help you.</p>

<p>British schools don't care about your GPA or non-academic related ECs. What are your AP scores? Also, you may want to take the SATs. I don't really know how British schools make their decision. You may want to PM someone who's from America who went to a British school and how they did so. All I know is that the process is very numbers driven and you wouldn't need to ask chances. You would know whether or not you are in.</p>

<p>I already chanced you for American schools I believe.</p>

<p>OK, so here are some of my EC's:</p>

<p>Hospital Volunteer - about 150 hours
Chess Team (co-captain)
National Honor Society
Mathematics Honor Society
French Honor Society (treasurer)
National Merit Commended
Scholastic Bowl
Math Team
Math Tutor</p>

<p>I've worked as a caddie and have had other jobs </p>

<p>Hmm, i can't remeber anything else for now.</p>

<p>^ you wouldn't get into any of those american schools listed with those ECs... About british schools, have no clue</p>

<p>Certainly his ECs aren't the strongest part of his app (but they are acceptable) yet considering his academic promise there's a reasonable chance he'll slide into one or more of his reaches.</p>

<p>British schools care solely about your SAT and APs . (and SAT IIs, fair enough)</p>

<p>For LSE, OxBridge, you need 2200+ (preferably 2300+) and 4 5's. and 1 4.+
For ICL and other classy British schools (University College London, St. Andrews, York) you need 2000+ and 5 aps at 4 or 5.</p>

<p>If you don't have 5 APs or 5 good APs, you can list your senior year APs and say you're taking them in may. They'll give you what is called a conditional acceptance, which basically says, you're in, but you need to get a 4 or 5 in these courses.</p>

<p>Also mind that LSE is going to be very difficult numbers wise to get in, more than Oxbridge, but Oxbridge requires very difficult interviews and tests with the interview. At least for Oxford the interview is offered in NY and across the pond with very little flexibility. </p>

<p>Also, for British schools, you apply to 6 "courses." A course is a major at a university. Mind that you can only apply to one course at OxBridge every year. Your UCAS app might look like this.</p>

<p>190 Oxford Politics, Philosophy and Economics
123 LSE Economics
134 LSE Economic History
152 LSE Mathematics and Economics
290 UYork Economics
1083 St. Andrews Economics</p>

<p>For every school besides OxBridge you can apply to as many courses as you want at that school that fit under your 6 allotted courses. There is no other way to apply to British schools that is not UCAS.</p>

<p>UCAS stands for Universities and Colleges Admission Service. There is a 15L fee for all 6 applications. All 6 applications are identical: They have your test scores, a "personal statement," a open reference, and that is all they go off. You only have to put it in once. </p>

<p>They used to have a "Tarriff" for American and Worldwide students where there was a point system for all accomplishments and you added up your points and saw where you should get in. However, the American section seems to be gone now. It's like 120 points for a Hard AP 5 (Eng, Calc, Language, History) and 50 for a soft AP 5 (Envi Sci, Stat, etc) and something like 50 points for a 750+ on an SAT section. Most courses at Oxford needed 600+ points. See if you can find the tarriff. </p>

<p>Also mind that British schools might be cheaper, but the level of instruction is far less. There is far more reading and far less teaching than at an American institution. They call it "reading" for a degree. Also British degrees are 3 years courses with little room for electives.</p>

<p>My mates who were accepted to British schools:</p>

<p>2280, six 5s including AB calc, BC calc, Chem was accepted to Oxford unconditionally for a course in Mathematics and is enrolled..</p>

<p>2400, five 5s was accepted unconditionally to Oxford, but not at the residential college he wanted to go to and was given three conditional offers from LSE, (most of them were one 5 in BC Calc but one was like he had to get three 5s his senior year) and he is currently enrolled in Econ and Management at LSE. He had to get a 5 his senior year BC to attend though. </p>

<p>I had a 2300+ and two 5's when I applied, and both LSE and Oxford gave me strict conditionals. I had to get four 5's my senior year to go to Oxford (Eng Lang, BC and Statistics and a choice) and I had to get a 5 in BC and a 5 in Lang to go to LSE. The tough numbers were in part because I screwed up my reference. I didn't have a open reference so I ended sending mine under separate cover. I ended up not getting the 5 in BC and only getting a 4, so Oxford was out. It ended up after a phone calls to LSE and Oxford that they didn't care (since all my other APs were 5s) and would let me enroll anyway, but for Oxford they ended up deferring me for a year (i..e I would start studies a year after my HS class but end at the same time), so the conditionals are not super strict but they still are there. However, based on the quality of teaching, I ended up opting for less prestige (than Oxfaahrd) at an American college. I'll probably go across the pond for graduate studies.</p>

<p>Soooo, sorry about the long reply. I've always though that going across the pond is an excellent offer for students who are brilliant and test scores reinforce that but maybe the grades are the weak part of the profile. The lack of information available about American apps to British schools has always ****ed me off. My brother's attending LSE right now, and wouldn't have gotten in unless I had already gone through the process and made the mistakes.</p>

<p>There are 3 caveats:</p>

<ol>
<li>You must be self-driven enough for the lack of teaching</li>
<li>You must know what your major is out of high school</li>
<li>You must have drop-dead excellent test scores</li>
</ol>

<p>That's not your case though. British schools don't take ACTs very seriously, you should take the SAT. But from a 35 and your other scores, I predict a conditional from Oxford, if you send 3 apps to LSE you'll get a rejection in the toughest course, a conditional in the large courses and an unconditional in something like Econ with Econ History, and you'll get into anything less selective.</p>

<p>What's your major anyway? I'm assuming it's Econ. Keep in mind that ICL doesn't offer econ. Imperial College London is mainly for the hard sciences. It looks like you got your colleges from a ranking, or a "table." LSE only offers courses in history (polisci), law and ECON. OxBridge offers most everything, but Cambridge is about the sciences and Oxford's about the social sciences. The 5th uni on most tables is University College London, and that's a great all around school (think a less artsy NYU.)</p>

<p>ALSO: (man I keep thinking of other things) The deadline for Oxford/Cambridge is really really early. Like September. The drop dead deadline was October 15th my year. I squeaked in on Oct 15 but it hurt me in the process. They prefer certain forms back in September. LSE and most other schools take them on Jan 15. It's very much sort of a rolling system for everyone except LSE. You'll learn of most schools 3 weeks after you apply, except for Oxford which lets you know right before Christmas (HAPPY CHRISTMAS :) and LSE which lets you know in February. It is pretty sweet to be done and into Oxford in December, esp if you're unconditional. </p>

<p>So my last points: </p>

<p>Go here: <a href="http://www.ucas.ac.uk/%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.ucas.ac.uk/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br>
Open an application and fill out what you can.
Look online for Tables (ranking according to course and points needed to enroll in the course) and the UCAS Tariff.</p>

<p>Good luck!</p>

<p>Amazing post, thank you so much.</p>

<p>What about the interview? I heard they usually have professors interview you.</p>

<p>^^^ Yes they do. It's an academic interview, not a general chat. They usually start off by asking you why you want to do a certain course, etc. Then they'll ask you specific questions about it, e.g. for my interview (for Chinese) I was given an article about members of the Chinese Communist Party and asked to analyse the economic and politics effects of having Party leaders who were engineers. </p>

<p>There's someone on another board who was applying for Maths (I think) who got asked "How much helium would a balloon have to contain to lift you off the ground?" By the way, you don't have to get the questions absolutely right, you just have to show that you know how to go about the process of answering them.</p>

<p>Btw - thecorsair, what course will you be applying for? Some are more competitive than others which will affect your chances. But whatever you do DON'T apply for a course that isn't competitive then hope to change when you get to Oxford. Chances are you will either a) get rejected at interview because they will pick up on your lack of enthusiasm for the course, or b) accept you then not let you change course.</p>

<p>Well I plan to major in economics or finance.</p>

<p>OK - you probably know that you can only apply to either Oxford or Cambridge, but not both. (This is to ensure that the maximum number of people get accepted and therefore have the chance of an Oxbridge education - it's not that they're being deliberately mean!!)</p>

<p>So because of that, you need to choose between them. Cambridge has a course in straight Econ, Oxford doesn't. The Oxford courses that include economics are: Philosophy, Politics and Economics (PPE); Modern History and Economics (MHE); Economics and Management (E&M); Engineering, Economics and Management (EEM); Materials Science, Economics and Management (MEM). </p>

<p>Cambridge also has a course in Land Economy, where you do bits of economics, management, law and geography. </p>

<p>I'm guessing either PPE or E&M would be of most interest to you. These are both really competitive courses (as is straight Econ at Cambridge), so you really need to show very intense and dedicated interest. This is where extra-curricular activities can come in - have you done anything specifically related to economics or finance? If you have, you should mention it in the personal statement on your application. If you haven't, you could mention some books you've read about the topic.</p>

<p>Thank you very much for the advice.
You're right. E&M would interest me the most but I don't have any EC's related to economics because I don't know of any. Any suggestions?</p>

<p>To my knowledge APs are the most important factor for American students hoping to attend a British University. Are you sure that you dont want to wait till graduate school?</p>

<p>I recommend you rent History Boys, its about boys trying to get into Oxbridge</p>

<p>No problem, glad I can help! :) </p>

<p>As for economics/finance ECs... I think pretty much anything will do - have you been Treasurer for an organisation or attended business conferences or something? Or had a part-time job and had to organise people? Anything related to business skills would be applicable. Basically what they're looking for is a very intense interest in economics, evidence that you know what economics actually is, and evidence that you're willing to go beyond what your high school offers to experience it. </p>

<p>I wouldn't worry too much about ECs though because the main focus of your personal statement will still be on why you want to do economics. Having economics-related ECs will just give you a bit of a push, but I doubt it will be very significant.</p>

<p>Thanks again for the advice.
I have been treasurer but it's not really significant. I've done some fundraisers though so maybe that would help.
I'll make sure to become more knowledgeable about the field of economics.</p>