<p>The interviews shown in the video involve two faculty interviewers plus the student. Generally, it looks as though one of the interviewers is a man and one is a woman.</p>
<p>Is there anywhere that is really free of gender bias? The interviewing behind a black curtain idea would not work unless you also gave all of the applicants voice pitch shifters that made them sound like Darth Vader.</p>
<p>I believe that the interviewers do actually want the students to do well, and they want to test their intellectual and knowledge limits. This might be more comfortable for men than for women (but maybe that is just a gender-biased view). It sounds to me as though PCHope’s daughter did fine! </p>
<p>One historical note of irony regarding the nobility part. The nobility, especially the high nobility in the UK only started to embrace higher education after Prince Albert brought his respect and love of intellectual learning from his Germanic university educational influences to the British Royal court when he married Queen Victoria. </p>
<p>Even then, it took a while before a critical mass of the nobility…especially the high nobility stopped preferring the “Grand Tour” and/or purchasing/using family influence to get their sons an Army commission…preferably in a socially exclusive regiment* as the culmination of their children’s educational preparation over sending them to university. </p>
<p>There was also a strong anti-intellectual streak within the British aristocratic establishment when Prince Albert arrived which continued for a long while afterwards. </p>
<p>Many among that establishment were disdainful of universities as “something for the commoners” or worse wary about them because some among them viewed universities as “dens in iniquity”. This attitude really only started to change around the turn of the 20th century. </p>
<ul>
<li>To a large extent, such socially exclusive Army regiments served as social clubs for the second and later sons of the British aristocratic/gentry elite.<br></li>
</ul>
<p>I’m not saying gender bias, necessarily. I’m talking about confidence, projection, warmth, wit, appearance, etc. bias. Some people are easy to talk to and radiate “winner.” Such a student will be graded differently versus a nervous, inarticulate, cold, and poorly attired student, even if they answer the same math problems in the same amount of time. Unless Oxbridge tutors are exceptions to what are otherwise universally observed truths about human behavior.</p>
<p>There’s such an unhealthy level of overthinking going on lately with regard to the “mystical” methods of elite college admissions. In my experience, every 99 percentile, super out going and terminally busy student that was passionate about getting into an elite college, got into at an elite college. Once you have the accomplishments, you have to brand yourself in the application. It’s not rocket science. Perhaps there’s some luck involved, but a strong Harvard applicant isn’t falling to their local regional school. At the worst they’re going to Duke or perhaps Wash U or Cal.</p>
<p>There are no secrets. It’s just that you can’t force your child to share the passions you have for them. They need to be passionate and dedicated to an Ivy, in addition to being out going, charismatic and a grinder. Most students are going to lack in one of those capacities and the shortcoming is snuffed out by admissions teams.</p>
<p>Right. But some people on here are obsessed with certain brand names, specifically Harvard and MIT.</p>
<p>They’re worse than the students who are obsessed with HYP because they are tickets to Goldmsn Sachs and hence the One True Life. They’re worse than the immigrants who obsess over these schools /- they at least have the excuse that they’re new around here and don’t know any better. Why Harvard or MIT <strong>has</strong> to be the only worthwhile destination or else the World Has Failed is beyond me. </p>
<p>There’s no virtue in being book smart but commonsense dumb. </p>
<p>“There are no secrets. It’s just that you can’t force your child to share the passions you have for them. They need to be passionate and dedicated to an Ivy, in addition to being out going, charismatic and a grinder. Most students are going to lack in one of those capacities and the shortcoming is snuffed out by admissions teams.”</p>
<p>Or, they don’t lack in any of these capacities but there simply aren’t enough seats to take them all. So some get turned away, and it’s not a reflection of “shortcomings” at all. This is what I mean by common sense. </p>
<p>I think you are viewing the Cambridge interview through an American lens, Hanna, in post #102. In my experience, Oxbridge mathematicians are acutely sensitive to mathematical power and reasoning. Confidence has no effect on them, except secondarily, if it helps the applicant to answer the scholarly questions better. The Cambridge interview web site addresses specifically what applicants should wear:</p>
<p>"What should I wear?</p>
<p>You’re not being assessed on your clothes or appearance so there’s no need to dress formally, and it’s not necessary to wear a suit. On the other hand, you might not want to look as though you’re going to the gym or for a night out!</p>
<p>The best rule to follow is to wear whatever you feel comfortable in and don’t be put off by what other people choose to wear to their interview."</p>
<p>They are very sincere in this. </p>
<p>Wit might get an applicant somewhere, as a feature on top of excellent answers, but wit in the absence of substance will do nothing for a Cambridge interviewee.</p>
<p>It is really quite different from the American system, and much closer to what Pinker is advocating. The students in Cambridge are no less interesting, for it. </p>
<p>I don’t think its hard to understand why immigrant families have high aspirations. When you are in the bottom quartiles of income and status, with the tools to move yourself up, there is a natural, IMO, tendency to shoot for the very top. Its a natural outcome of ambition, which is not evenly distributed in the population. </p>
<p>Books have been written on this topic. Karabel’s “The Chosen”(Chapter 9?) tells the story of the battle between faculty members who want an Ecole Normale Superieure vs. Dean of Admissions Wilbur Bender who was more concerned about Harvard’s more narrow institutional needs. </p>
<p>Frankly, Harvard would not become the giant hedge fund (with a school on the side) that it is if the faculty members have won. You don’t become that by catering to the brightest; you do that by becoming what Lani Guinier calls “a handmaiden to power”.</p>
<p>Nothing wrong with high aspirations. A lot wrong with decreeing that only 3/5/8/20 universities in the land are where high aspirations can be fulfilled. A lot wrong with assuming your new country’s college system is just like your old country’s one, when the whole point of moving to the US was because we have more opportunities. </p>
<p>I’ve only met two people in my life that I “would categorize as super geniuses. One was at Harvard and he now directs opera and theater. I had lunch with him and thought this is the smartest person I have ever met. Very charismatic too.”</p>
<p>The 2 smartest people I know went to USC and Notre Dame. I know a good number of people from Ivies and other top schools, and -well - they’re pretty much all smart, some more so than others. That’s about it. </p>
Pizzagirl beat me to it, but I have to add my own “baloney” to the idea that students ditch their passions when they set foot on campus. It’s simply not true. (Indeed, doesn’t Pinker essentially complain that they are following their passions rather than coming to his award-winning class?) It is true, though, that when it comes time to decide on the next step, there are people there waving big stacks of money, as against a really rotten market for academics. Those people waving the money are inviting you to come work in New York City, while in the academic market, if you are really lucky, you might get an assistant professor gig at the University of Southern North Dakota at Hoople (and that’s after, like, five or more additional years of education, during which you won’t be making any real money). Given that situation, I don’t think the problem is with the students–it’s with the market.</p>
<p>One additional note: I strongly suspect that you can’t both attract more low-income students to elite colleges and at the same time increase the number of graduates going to graduate school and other lower income careers.</p>
<p>I don’t know. If you are talking about the 5 to 10% who have a decent shot at an academic career and are lured away by the big bucks, I don’t think you have to change anything. If we believe in the 5/10% idea, and want to keep those students, making room for more low income students comes at the expense of those with high stats combined with some other passion/quality that adds to the composition of the well rounded class.</p>
<p>I agree there is a market problem and maybe it is in the process of self-correction. It seems to me we will go back to the dollar a year sort of scholars. </p>
<p>adding: I like the idea of low income students taking the big bucks jobs and their children or grandchildren having the economic security to choose an academic career if they want. : ) I like the idea even more of the low income graduates choosing academics, but that is going to be a really difficult sale. imho</p>
<p>Yes, some object to privileging the 5/10% (if they even believe it exists) because they aren’t special snowflakes who deserve a place at university. I know I’m pretty much convinced at this point there may a greater good to society in admitting the blank slate utterly brilliant low income students.</p>
<p>I have no doubt that the math faculty at Cambridge assesses applicants purely on the basis of their math ability and potential. What I wonder is whether the PPE faculty might take things like leadership and ambition into account, along with academic distinction and intellectual capacity.</p>
<p>Does Cambridge or Oxford admit more math students, proportionally, than Harvard does?</p>
<p>One thing that isn’t mentioned too often is the extent to which any of these colleges may choose to reject people who come off as jerks, no matter how talented they may appear to be on paper.</p>
<p>We should still delete the concept of “passions” as it relates to the hs kid. There’s so much misunderstanding what sorts of drives and follow-through have meaning for adcoms. </p>
<p>Soccermum, it’s not rocket science, I agree. But most kids, no matter their goods, have trouble branding themselves vis-a-vis a top college. Their thinking is more in relation to the hs scene they are so used to. And the top colleges aren’t looking for candidates for 13th grade. If kids spent more time digging into the colleges, they would learn what’s valued, the ways they might match, beyond stats, etc- assuming they have the savvy to then process that. </p>
<p>From my DD’s experience, once the applicants were invited for on-campus interviews, the admission decisions at Cambridge were “completely” made by faculty of a specific subject in a specific college. What were the admission factors are anyone’s guess, although she felt that it was mostly raw intellect (TSA test for example), subject knowledge, and “teachability”. </p>
<p>Well, maybe if Oxford and Cambridge focused more on recruiting movers and shakers, Great Britain would still rule the world. Besides, who cares what they do?</p>
<p>I don’t believe Oxford and Cambridge have anything do with “holistic” admissions process because their academic standards for admission before someone gets to interview are almost set in stone.</p>
<p>If one wants to go to Oxford from US, they need to start with a 2100 SAT or 32 ACT.</p>
<p>They refuse to accept one’s high school grades and have zero weight for them. They expect students to be taking either AP/IB exams or subject tests and have very specific scores. My kid had the application blown up because they had a specially administered test pop up at the last minute for the chosen subject and she missed all the deadlines to be able to take the test.</p>
<p>On top of that, most admissions are conditional and require someone to meet a specific score or grade in selective subjects in standardized testing.</p>
<p>I think that Great Britain in general is much more comfortable with the idea of class than here in the good USA. That is to say that they believe class exists, are comfortable with this idea, and don’t go to great lengths to change it. In America, we hate the idea of class and try to fight stratification. The college admission policies reflect this.</p>
<p>Someone I know did a semester abroad last year at Oxford, and the group from her American college was incredible dynamic and diverse, while the Oxford colleagues were almost uniformly white, posh, and kind of boring. </p>