Lazy Students » University of Cambridge

Is St Andrews elite or elitist?

Jessica Cook — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 16:30:14 +0000

Members of the Kate Kennedy Club (dressed like idiots)

’19 YEAR OLD GRADUATED ETONIAN SEEKS social, intellectual and aesthetic equal. Must be pashmina clad, preferably adorning worn ballet pumps, Jack Wills tracksuit bottoms and in possession of a public school education?’

Is The University of St Andrews elite or elitist? Having been labelled last year the 3^rd best university in the UK by The Guardian and the 4^th by The Times Good University guide does its reputation as academically elite extend to its admissions policy?

The university has previously been accused of being elitist due to its poor record for admitting state school students. The university was adamant that it selects its student on the basis of their academic excellence, irrelevant of their educational background.

We are then faced with the dilemma of whether a university should favor state school applicants with lower grades over private school students with superior marks. In 2004 the Government was commanded to “take its tanks off Oxford’s lawns” when it threatened to apply financial penalties if Oxford university if it did not increase state school admissions. Although St Andrews has never received this ultimatum, having been attended by Prince William only a few years ago, it faces harsh criticism over its large percentage of private school students.

The Kate Kennedy club, does nothing to defend this reputation of elitism, similar to the Cambridge University Pitt club this group is ‘penises only’ and is selective in its membership. The University withdrew its recognition of the club earlier this year in an attempt by the female principal to stamp out elitism. Despite their reputation the Kate Kennedy does many productive things for the town, it holds many of the university balls, and regularly gives money to charity.

In practice St Andrews has its fair share of social cliques, nights out are split between social circles and house parties are not unknown to have bouncers at their doors. More common than not, student irrelevant of their background will be clad in the ‘fabulously British’ brand Jack Wills and drunken insults are reduced to ‘Do you know who I am?!’

Although without the openness of the Leeds art student who searched for the perfect husband as part of her art project, St Andrews has previously been coined ‘the English girls finishing school’ and boats the highest intermarriage rates of any university in the UK, its student pairing off with the symmetry of Noah’s Ark and going on to marry in selective St Andrews venues such as St Salvador’s chapel.

What do you think? Is St Andrews just a place for Rahs to meet, marry and then breed? Or is such a viewpoint simply boring old class warfare?

Cambridge ignores UCAS personal statements

Duncan Robinson — Fri, 22 May 2009 08:33:01 +0000

These kids obviously spent no time on their personal statements.

The admissions tutor at Cambridge has admitted that he does not give a toss about personal statements in UCAS applications. Geoff Parks, el Presidente of Cambridge admissions, stated that: “We certainly don’t assign any marks to personal statements. I have been told by students after they have been admitted that their schools write the personal statements. Reading a very good personal statement doesn’t tell you anything about the student because you cannot be sure that it’s the work of the person concerned.”

Rather than meeting this (admittedly still refreshing) statement of the bleeding obvious with praise The Times cried woefully: “All those hours that applicants have spent trying to distinguish themselves by doing Duke of Edinburgh awards, ploughing through Ulysses or helping out in the local care home might just as well have been spent watching South Park.”

Except they’re not. If you go to your interview and reveal that you spent the majority of your A-levels doing nothing constructive, I doubt you’ll get far.

The only reason that Cambridge can give personal statements the short shrift they deserve is because Cambridge, along with Oxford, are the only two institutions in the UK that interview practically all applicants (you have to be pretty spazzy not to get an interview in most subjects). This means that every other university is left taking punts on prospective students based largely on the 500 words of often plagiarised, unoriginal bollocks that makes up a personal statements.

Oh, and the personal references too. But, wait just one second: “Personal references from teachers are also treated with a huge pinch of salt. Now that students can ask to see their references, teachers have stopped saying anything interesting or controversial, Mr Parks suggests.”

Which bright spark thought that this was a good idea? An acquaintance of mine got into LSE on the strength of some references he had edited heavily himself. Situations like this are easily avoided when the references are hidden from the student – as they should be.

So what do universities base their offers on? Let’s see:

Exam results that do not have the room to allow the brightest to shine and are (apparently) no harder than the The Sun crossword
A personal statement that is often not written by the personality in question at all
And teachers references that everyone should ignore because teachers can’t say what they actually think.

AQA, Edexcel and OCR, but especially UCAS, thank you all for making higher education that little bit worse.

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It’s time we gave up the lazy clichés and appreciated the Boat Race

Adam Clifton — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 13:01:47 +0000

This Sunday, Oxford and Cambridge will race from Putney to Mortlake – a little over 7km – in one of the most famous events on the British sporting calendar. The Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race is watched by millions around the world, with audiences far beyond the two universities and rowing community. Yet the focus in the press during the build-up to Sunday’s race has once again centred upon the number of foreign oarsmen and a long running debate about the “elitism” of Oxbridge.

Firstly, we need to get one thing straight. This is a university boat race which means the selection criteria is simply a matter of those who are presently taking a degree in the relevant institution. The issue of nationality should play no part. True, many students in Oxbridge are foreign nationals, but then many Brutish students take up the opportunity to study abroad. If anything, the number of foreign students in our Universities should demonstrate the high standards of further education Britain has to offer.

Secondly, the term “elitism” is often brandished without being properly defined. Any university should be elitist to the extent that it seeks only the academic elite of those who apply. In this respect, Oxbridge is proud to be elitist. However, the meaning usually given (or confused with the above) is a sense of snobbery. People thus focus on the number of public school entrants and the lack of state school oarsmen. (Something that is hardly surprising given that rowing is rarely taught in state schools and indeed often shunned as “posh” by those who attend.)

The real problem with Oxbridge admissions is the unwillingness of state school students to chance their arm for fear of being rejected for the first time

Anybody wishing to be eligible for selection to a boat must first pass the academic rigour of the admissions process. Whatever the press may think, this is blind to both nationality and rowing ability. Once this hurdle is passed, the demands of perhaps the most intense degrees in the world must be balanced with over 10 training sessions a week and a diet of more than 4,500 calories a day. Whilst such a training regime is as tough as any in professional sport, it is made all the more difficult as it must be fitted in around lectures and supervisions – this means early starts and late finishes.

There are obvious examples of those who fall short of these demands. Some drop out or fail their exams, the most famous recent example being Thorsten Engelmann who stroked the Cambridge boat in 2007. These failures are seized upon, as we British love nothing more than seeing those who seem like they have it all fail.

But perhaps we should take a second to consider what we could take from the Boat Race. These are young(ish) people who have proven what can be achieved by reaching out. If this example was followed by more of the state school pupils (accustomed to being a big fish in a small pond) who tell themselves “Oxbridge is not for them” out of fear of failing, then Oxbridge would become less “elitist” and the population of foreign and public school students would fall.

I, for one, advocate that only the brightest and best be admitted to Oxbridge regardless of their background (an opinion I have held only since I arrived at Cambridge), and see the real problem in admissions being the unwillingness of state school students to chance their arm for fear of being rejected for the first time. The coverage of the boat race highlights these problems. Instead of holding up those who take part as examples of what can be done, we focus on those who fail and in the process debase the achievements of those who succeed.

Whilst it is not a traditionally British thing to do, maybe we should focus on those who succeed as an example of what can be done with determination and skill instead of finding ways to reduce their achievements in order to mitigate our own shortcomings.

A*? It won’t get you far.

Duncan Robinson — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 09:43:07 +0000

There’s a big hoo-hah over the new A* grade at A-level – and it’s all over nothing. The new grade is meant to distinguish between very clever teenagers and fantastically clever teenagers. Basically, if you get over 90% in your A2 year, you get an A* and a big sticker saying NERD.

On the face of it, this doesn’t seem ridiculous – and it’s not – but it is pointless. Universities already have access to your individual module results at AS level. They can already see who is getting around 90% and is thus likely to do so again at A2. The new grade serves no real purpose.

All this new grade will result in is clever students wasting more time wringing the last few marks out of papers – which is not education, but jumping through hoops. This is not the answer to improving standards at A-levels. To use a bicycling metaphor, all the government is doing is making kids pedal faster, rather than moving up the gears by making tests more difficult. You still get from A to B (or, in this case A to A* – *chuckles*), but it’s not the right way of doing it. Britain’s education system needs bold reform, not gimmicks.

Is Hermione Granger off to Yale?

Duncan Robinson — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 10:26:34 +0000

Facts are intensely annoying. They always seem to get in the way of a good story. For instance, take the ‘news’ that Hermione Granger herself (well, Emma Watson), has got into Yale University in the USA.

This
is an interesting story. Firstly, if Ms Watson heads over the Atlantic
and chooses Yale over Cambridge (her other option) it could trigger a
sea-change in the opinion of bright, British teenagers who may become
more willing to study abroad (something I can thoroughly recommend).

Applications at St Andrews spiked the year after Prince William enrolled.
I would not be at all surprised if there was a similar rise in
applications from Blighty based teenagers, to hang out with one of
Potter’s pals.

Secondly, there’s the element of ‘Yale vs.
Cambridge’. If she does go abroad, there will be a dozens of articles
screaming ‘What’s wrong with Cambridge/Why are British universities not
good enough any more’. Although she’s just one girl, the press will
jump on it.

It’s a great story, but that’s the problem: it’s just a story.

It’s fiction.

Unfortunately,
Emma Watson has not been accepted by Yale (or at least hasn’t said so
in public). The oh-so-reliable Twitter feed that claims to be Miss
Watson’s – from which the Yale claims came – is in fact that of a
fraudster’s.

How did I find this out? Investigative journalism? Wire taps?

Nope. Just Google. There’s a rebuttal on the official Emma Watson website, outlining the falsity of these claims. Let’s hope The Times’ otherwise excellent School Gate blog posts a correctional update.

UPDATE: Well, I’m pleased to say that School Gate have now done so. Hurrahs all around.