By
Brian Taylor
, Oxford University
Applying to Oxford
Applying to Oxford for an undergraduate course can be a complicated process.
For a start, you have to apply to a particular college, and there are 29 of them
for undergraduates. (Remember also that even prior to this, you have to choose
Oxford over Cambridge - you’re not allowed to apply to both.) Some people do
take the random approach, but most put some thought into the matter. They say
you’ll be happy wherever you go, and indeed, most people would recommend their
colleges, but there are factors to consider. Size, facilities, wealth (and hence
living costs and grants available), location, age, number of tutors (the Oxford
term for professors) in your subject, accommodation policy - all these differ
from college to college, as do the character and atmosphere, which range from
grand and palatial, to cosy and intimate.
They all offer open days when you can look around and meet tutors and
undergraduates. But who can get a true impression of a place when all the warts
and scars are carefully concealed? Only nice undergraduates are picked as
helpers, and the tutors who are on hand to give you course information are
invariably the wrong ones - you want to apply to do French and German, but you’re
met by the Portuguese tutor, and have no idea whether his dark unfriendliness or
sunny cheerfulness is representative of the teaching body as a whole.
After studying the college prospectuses and trying to concentrate on the
facts, rather than private opinions, my choices were narrowed down to Christ
Church and Queen’s. I went for an open day at Christ Church, the most famous
Oxford college (grand old place, but chilly atmosphere and bad food) and looked
through the entrance of Queen’s (nice front quad, with bright flowers around
the lawns). What swung the balance for me, though, was the tutors. I was
applying for French and German and wrote to the French tutor in each college,
explaining my unusual educational background (didn’t go to school, you see).
The man at Christ Church (who I’ve since heard wears leather trousers and
dangly earrings - not important perhaps, but I’m still glad I didn’t go
there) wrote back, but the tutor at Queen’s actually went to the trouble of
finding my phone number through directory enquiries, and then calling me. So I
decided to apply there.
