Sorry for so many posts in a row, I figured it would be worth mentioning that I plan on getting my Master’s after I complete my undergraduate, hopefully directly after. I’m shooting for Oxford for that. Obviously postgrad admissions is a whole other system but would there be a particular school that would look best for Oxford or is it just going to be based off your performance at the University. I imagine since the schools I’ve applied to are all pretty good, it would just be my individual performance that mattered.
@madyabby With postgrad applications to Oxbridge, any of the universities you’ve applied to will give you an excellent chance at acceptance. I know several very capable people who graduated from UCL, Bristol and Durham who were admitted to both Oxford and Cambridge for MAs (you can apply to both at that level).
At that level, a stellar academic record will obviously be a pre-requisite (a first will generally necessary- but actually, here’s where things get interesting. I’ve noticed a pattern amongst top British universities whereby they’ll sometimes VERY UNOFFICIALLY lower the degree threshold for applicants who either are at that university already or coming from a university they consider to be roughly their academic peer. Case in point: a friend with an offer to study the modern literature MA at UCL, which has a claim to be the best and most competitive in the country [Oxbridge excel far more at Medieval and Renaissance than mods] who missed the terms of his offer [needed a first] but was let onto the course because he’d been an undergrad at UCL and the department obviously knew him. Similarly, another UCL literature graduate missed a Cambridge offer and was permitted. A candidate at Bristol Uni, meanwhile, who had an offer for an equally competitive Oxbridge MA and very narrowly missed a first [by ONE percent] was unequivocally denied. Obviously this is all anecdotal and purely speculative but I do think there’s something to be made of here- departments have a good idea of the rigour of their ‘peer’ and inferior departments, therefore they are able to make allowances when people screw up in exams). What matters more is an excellent statement of purpose, which shows at once DIRECTION and FLEXIBILITY (hard to get the balance right!) and an excellent writing sample (your best work from your undergrad degree will suffice, and very often an individual subject tutor at your undergrad uni will help you polish it up).
@maddyabby - both my husband (Case/University of Edinburgh) and I “studied abroad” for our entire junior year of college. Although my experience was not as a “typical” American study abroad experience. I applied and was accepted as a “regular” student outside of any study abroad program on more of a “transfer” student level, in other words I could have finished my degree in the UK.
I did my junior year at UCL - SSEES. London is very big and, at least for the classes that I took, I travelled quite long distances between dormitory housing, classes and my “college” (some were at London School of Economics other not) things were literally all over the city for me. I repeat that London is a very big city and there are very big city issues that coincide with living in a city, ie. crime, cost of living etc. There is no hand holding in the British system, it is definitely sink or swim academically and dropping into the system as a junior (in my case) and not entering as a new student there was some serious academic culture shock. The classes were, what I would characterize as, at a US graduate school level and there was an expectation that students were already familiar with how the system worked and expected to perform from day one, which made the transition all that much harder. I do feel the Professors routinely questioned my academic credentials and pushed and expected more of me then the Brits. The British students studied hard (in spurts) and played hard (even the very “academic” drank A LOT and I don’t say that lightly, I was coming from Ohio University, a known US party school) and while generally friendly and welcoming I never really felt part of the “inner circle”. During the times that I felt that I was drowning or at least in over my head, because I was not on a “study abroad” program there really was no support system and after a while you begin to feel like a burden for continually asking for help on how to do even the simplest things ie. What the heck is paracetamol? Where do I go to get copies made?
It was an amazing opportunity but was also the most challenging/difficult thing I have ever done and I am not sure it is one that I would repeat. It is one thing to just be dealing with the homesickness (and believe me not matter how worldly and culturally aware you think you are, you will be homesick) when you add the differences in academic styles and cultural differences it can be overwhelming. (I had spent 3 months in Germany as a HS junior on a exchange program so I had thought I was in a pretty good place as far as adapting to a foreign culture).
So, I just wanted to say to not underestimate the differences in the whole system. Good Luck!
@labegg Thank you for all the info! I’m in a somewhat similar situation as you are. I did one year here in the USA, but I will be starting as a first year. I definitely won’t underestimate the culture shock, don’t worry! I’m fairly accustomed to being away from home from summer camp, a lot of travel, and two exchange programs to Germany very similar to the one you went on. I’ve found I only really get homesickness when I feel like I can’t leave the place I’m in, as it was at summer camp when I was younger or when I was under 18 on the high school exchanges. Of course, now that I work there and get off time, it is not a problem. But I’m sure I still may have the issue of homesickness, on the bright side I know how to cope now!
London is of course huge. My hometown, Austin, is a fairly big city but no where near the size of London. We don’t have much crime here but cost of living is definitely high. I don’t mind lowering my usual living standards though. Thankfully, I think my classes aren’t too spread out but you never know. I’ve applied for housing and obviously don’t know where I am staying yet but I put proximity to campus as my preference so that should hopefully solve the issue of distance, at least for the first year.
I am worried about the difference in schooling structure but I’m trying to read up on it. My high school prepared me well and hopefully my APs (similar to A levels somewhat) will help. I took 13 of them and the ones that directly relate to my major (I guess that would be Environmental Science and Human Geography) I got 5’s on, plus 5’s on Psychology and Calculus, and 4’s on Statistics, the English exams, German, and some others.
I DEFINITLEY won’t be used to the drinking or partying though, that’s for sure! I admit that though I like alcohol, I don’t drink much. In fact, I’ve never actually been drunk. That probably makes me sound lame of course, but I just have personal reasons like health, mental stuff, etc. In short, I’m very open to drinking and partying, I’m just not one to get blackout drunk.
Can I ask what you found most different between the two systems academically?
@filouxx This is very interesting. I think it is going to be between Durham and UCL then, if I get accepted to Durham. They both have great geography departments and offer more fieldwork opportunities than Saint Andrews. I’m not completely discounting Edinburgh yet but we’ll see. UCL also has the benefit of including the year of study abroad (of course I still have to apply to one of the unis they allow).
I do worry about student life/social life there. Obviously London is huge so there is tons to do but I’ve read so many posts lately that the uni offers no community. Now, don’t need a campus university or anything but I am certainly concerned about making friends as I’m an international student.
Also, is it going to be odd for me being a fresher at age 20? I figured most would enter at 18 or 19 if they took a gap year.19 doesn’t bug me as much but my brother is 18 so I just find it odd! I get along with most every age though so I imagine it won’t matter too much. Actually most my best friends are either a year older or a year younger than me. Will it be weirder at Scottish unis where there may be more Scottish students who sometimes enter at 17/18?
It really boiled down: in the UK actually having an active part of the learning process.
The expectation to have and be able to verbalize an opinion or write an analysis paper or research paper with very little time. I wrote lots and lots of papers! 10 - 15 page papers due from one meeting time to the next. To this day I distantly remember being assigned, on the very first day of class, a rather substantial book and told to have it read and a 10 page analysis paper written by the next class meeting in 3 days time, I walked out of the class and cried. I was used to being lectured to and expected to regurgitate information, as is the norm in most US undergraduate situations. I went from being in mostly classes of 50 kids to 5 - 10 people sitting around a conference table, there was no hiding if I didn’t do a reading. Or being asked to write an opinion paper and given no direction about source materials. I was truly lost in the economics/business class I took at the London School of Economics as well as intimidated by the prof. Several professors would call us in for individual meetings, just to chat about or expand on something we talked about in class.
I think my husband’s experience was rather different than mine he was studying Chem E and his experience was more similar to “lecture” type settings here in the US. I was studying Soviet and Eastern European history.
Yeahhh…about that: Austin is 84 /249 countries in the world and London is 4 / 249 for cost of living
You will have enough to do at any of the unis (even St As)- it’s just what you spend your time on, what you like doing and who you want to do it with. Many/most of the English students won’t have the money to go do a lot of stuff in London (and most of the international students will). Think about how you actually like to spend your free time and try to picture how you would do it- and who you would do it with- in each of the places.
Your start won’t be quite as much of a cold shower as @labegg’s- coming in first year will give you time to acclimatize, and you are likely to have lecture classes first year. But, she is right the UK does not hold even freshers hands (even with the extra bits new internationals get). All the info will be available but it is completely up to you to read it and do something about it. As an example, during freshers week the banks will be there to help students set up accounts, and buried somewhere in your packet will be a note of a time set aside for internationals. Academically there is much less continuing assessment (quizzes and tests particularly) and much more emphasis on exams.
I was faced with the same decision between Durham and UCL a few years ago for English lit, and I chose UCL. For me, the choice was obvious: the UCL course was smaller, offered one-to-one feedback on each of the many essays written per term and just seemed, on paper, more rigorous. Because there were clear divisions in the teaching standards at both universities, the choice seemed obvious. For your course (geog), the provision may be very similar- I’m in no real position to say whether or not Durham teaches geography better or UCL does. You’d probably be splitting at hairs at this level- I know that, in terms of the research both of these institutions are conducting, they’re both world leading (QS Rankings get a bit of flack for being UK-centric, but their subject specific rankings generally seem more accurate than their holistic ones: http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/university-subject-rankings/2015/geography#sorting=rank+region=+country=+faculty=+stars=false+search=).
In terms of social life- now herein lies the big issue, I’d say. Durham is obviously collegiate; you’ll be assigned an undergraduate college and will no doubt end up leaving with strong, tribal ties to a cloistered community of people. This has many benefits but also a few drawbacks. If you’re unhappy with your college (probably quite unlikely), you might find little chance to escape. There are definite imbalances in college ‘vibe’, aesthetic and wealth. Some are grand and wealthy, others built in modernist/brutalist style and more modest in terms of their finances.
I will definitely concede that UCL will offer less of a student feel- you’re in London, no ‘townies’ are going to be making allowances for you, as they would do in a provincial university town. That said, Bloomsbury is a very ‘UCL area’. UCL inhabits a (somewhat) tranquil bubble, spread over four of five ‘blocks’ and demarcated by Tottenham Court Road and Euston Road (both of which are pretty unpleasant streets). The streets that UCL occupies, however, are lovely. Lots of Regency era townhouses around, pristine white portland stone, no traffic, etc. I imagine it’s somewhat like Columbia’s relationship with the Upper West Side. Obviously there’s no college system so you’ll be dependent on your halls of residence for social activity. That said, most UCL halls offer a decent array of facilities- common rooms, music practice rooms and the like, so they go some way to foster a sense of community.
You mentioned something about drinking- Durham’s got a rep for being a little like your Dartmouth, as in, lots of libation, generally done by rugby boys in wood-paneled rooms. Not knocking it at all, but there’s a definite ‘posh hedonist’ vibe to the university. Lots of drinking gets done at UCL, too, but one advantage of having London at your fingertips means you can distract yourself with more leftfield or cultural social pursuits (rather than consuming beer after beer to stave off the Arctic chill). There’ll also be considerably more international students at UCL- not sure how relevant that is to you, as I’m sure you’re very keen to mingle with Brits.
I wouldn’t worry at all about being a fresher at 20- lots of British students take gap years, particularly those aiming for more elite universities. I was 19 beginning UCL and that seemed to be the average age in my halls. Another year will mean nothing!
@filouxx, just a small nitpick:
Columbia isn’t in the UWS (which is pretty tony) but Morningside Heights, which has gotten better but was a rather rough neighborhood a few decades back. I don’t know much about London neighborhoods so can’t compare.
@filouxx Wow, awesome response. I figured from some of the videos and reviews I’ve seen that Durham might have that Dartmouth feel to it, very party hard, study hard. I admit London, despite all its flaws, has that magical feel to it for me. I especially love theatre and museums so studying there may be the best option. You mentioned the international students, I am keen to mingle with British people, but I think it would be quite cool to meet people from all over as well. I enjoy having friends in other countries, as I have a few in Germany and one in Ukraine right now. I know London is much more of an international capital city, much like New York, Paris, Berlin, etc., but there will certainly still be a lot of British people at the university, right? I’m about 80% sure I’ll choose UCL right now, as I feel it will attract a large variety of people, where as something like St. Andrews or Durham is apt to attract a certain kind of person. I generally get along with everyone but I admit I can be quite picky as I like people who are smart but not completely obsessed with studying, social but not partying all the time, well traveled/cultured but not elitist, etc. People who happen to be smart and social and cultured but still normal.