Carmody - Getting into Oxford and Cambridge 2023 Entry

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Getting into Oxford & Cambridge: 2023 Entry

This 25th edition published in 2022 by Trotman Education, an imprint of Trotman Indigo Publishing Ltd, 21d Charles Street, Bath BA1 1HX

Trotman Indigo Publishing Ltd 2022

Author: Matthew Carmody

21st24th edns: Matthew Carmody

20th edn: Lucy Bates

17th19th edns: Sen P. Buckley

15th16th edns: Jenny Blaiklock

13th14th edns: Katy Blatt

7th10th & 12th edns: Sarah Alakija

11th edn: Natalie Lancer

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN: 978 1 912943 65 4

All rights reserved. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publishers prior written consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic and mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without prior permission of Trotman Indigo Publishing.

Printed and bound in Gloucester, UK by Severn.

Matthew Carmody read Philosophy at Queens College, Cambridge. He continued his studies at Kings College London, obtaining an MPhil and then a PhD in Philosophy. He has taught in a number of schools and universities and is currently a Head of Faculty and tutor at MPW London, where he oversees the Oxbridge programme.

I am very grateful to the Oxbridge students who kindly agreed to share their personal statements and to take the time to write the case studies. I am also grateful to the many members of staff at MPW London who suggested interview questions and recommended reading. I would also like to thank the following Oxbridge coordinators and advisers for their views on the application and preparation processes: Harriet Brook, Zoe Makepeace-Welsh, Richard Pember, Michelle Russell and Lesley Sharples. Final thanks are due to my wife Jessica for proofreading, helpful suggestions and cups of tea.

I suspect that the first thought that occurred to me on arriving in Cambridge for my interview has occurred to many others for whom disembarking from the train in mid-December is their first experience of the place. That thought would be: why is it so perishingly cold? I fished the paper map Queens College had sent me out of my coat (this was some years before smartphones with maps existed) and started to walk to the centre, something that prompted a second thought (which, again, must have been thought by many before me making a similar trip), namely, why was it that the railway station was such a distance from the centre? It was some time before the shops gave way to colleges, the market square and Kings Parade. After a few wrong turns map-reading was not a skill I possessed I arrived at the Porters Lodge to be given a key to my room and a second map to get me there that I also failed to read correctly. Thankful that none of this was part of an initial assessment, I eventually found it and spent the next hour pressed up against a small radiator.

I had been invited to attend an interview for Computer Science and I had very little idea what to expect. I can remember sitting on a wooden bench outside the interview room in a very nervous state of mind. Of what happened when I went in, I remember very little. We talked about some software Id written and then it was all over. I know I felt that it had gone too quickly and that this was not a good sign. I returned home to Bristol and tried to forget all about it. A couple of weeks later, around Christmas, a letter arrived with an offer. Eight months later, I had the results that I needed and a year or so after that, with my gap year over, I arrived back in Cambridge with a car full of material possessions, almost all of which I instantly regretted bringing when I realised that my room was at the end of a long corridor on the third floor of a building without any lifts.

I had applied to read Computer Science but, during my gap year, I decided to change to read Philosophy. Requests to change ones course were quite understandably frowned upon and I was very lucky to be accommodated. (I should take this opportunity to say that in these days of even greater competition, I would expect such requests to be firmly rejected. If you change your mind about what you want to study, be prepared to re-apply.) I would like to say that I proved my doubting Director of Studies wrong with an exemplary first term, but it was quite the opposite. I was not as prepared as I should have been for the intense academic environment that I had been accepted into. I was given long reading lists and short deadlines. Whereas at school I had had relatively little trouble absorbing what was thrown at me, I now had to read dense academic material on a wide range of topics of which I had little prior understanding. It was a difficult first year and I did not perform well in the exams at the end of the year. Oxbridge students are used to getting high grades in school and my very-far-from-high grades came as quite a shock.

It was not until the second year, after a busy summer among the books, that I felt I was able to keep up and deserving of the opportunity Id been given. I was now able to read and digest information at a rate I could not have envisaged a year earlier. I was able to benefit properly from the supervisions and lectures I attended. The subject finally came fully alive for me. A further year and I was filling out forms to apply for post-graduate study.

My academic experience at Cambridge was therefore not the simple one of continuing school-level success for a further three years. I know I was not alone. Very many students who are used to doing well, and indeed doing well with relative ease, have the shock of finding that they are no longer top of the class and not able to carry on as they were before. This may well apply to you, in which case I would say to you that it is not cause for despair. If you have got in, you have been judged capable of handling the academic pressures characteristic of Oxbridge. It may just take a while for you to realise your potential.

One feature of my time that did start well and continued to grow was the friends that I made. You will meet a very wide variety of people and it is impossible not to be able to find people with shared interests. I had the good fortune to make friends with people who stretched me intellectually, supported me in difficult times, and generated very happy memories. They continue to do these things a full 30 years after we all first met.

Oxford and Cambridge present you with brilliant minds and beautiful places to create a very special environment in which to live and study. Whether it be in the form of lectures, clubs, orchestras, sporting events or second-hand bookshops, there is more there to keep you occupied than you could want. You will learn a lot about your subject but also about yourself and others. You will do things that will surprise you and make you smile many years later. But dont delay! The terms are short and three years really will fly by. If you find yourself on the threshold of freshers week in 2023, make sure you allow yourself to enjoy it and take it all in.