SpawnofDescartes

Sixth Term Examination Paper Home | University Admissions Tests from Cambridge Assessment Used for admission into Cambridge, Warwick and Imperial. If she doesn't like the look of it, then Oxford would be best, however she will need to do the (MAT) Mathematics aptitude test.

ChocolateOrange

A predicted grade is the teachers best educated guess as to which grade the student will achive IF they continue working at their current level with the same amount of effort put in to work. So your daughter needs to ask her teachers in each individual AP subject, if she carries on producing the same level of work as she is now, what grade to they believe she will achieve. The prediction does not take account of exam nerves or anything like that. It is made on the current work, and previous work and exam results in that subject.

I think it's more difficult in the US as well because you don't have such a clear path of doing one set of exams followed by another set, like in the UK. So for instance I took a History GCSE, and got an A*. Because of that, I was given a predicted grade of A of the History AS Level. Predicted grades can then be adjusted later if it turns out the first one was not realistic. If your daughter has ever previously sat a History exam the teachers can take that into account. But the standard of her current work needs to be the biggest factor in her Predicted Grade

The predicted grades are used by the university to decide whether she should be given a place or not, AND to decide what grade offer to make her. Sometimes (quite a lot actually) intl students can be given unconditional offers (that means she is in, whatever she gets in her exams) but in your daughters case that is unlikely given the universities she is applying to and the fact that she will only have taken 3 AP's by October.

When (hopefully) she is made a conditional offer, she will be told what grades she has to achieve. The grades she has already achieved are taken into account. For instance, if she gets 544 in the first 3 AP's, the university may require her to achieve a further 5544 for instance in the next batch of AP's. They may also demand a certain grade in a specific subject (e.g. a 5 in Calc AB). Her offer letter will specify whether the grades are general over all the exams, or whether a certain subject requires a certain grade

If she is predicted a 5 and gets a 4, what happens depends on her offer. Lets say she was predicted 55554 by her teachers, and the university gave an offer of 5554 (no specfic subject grades) she has to achieve to win the place. If she walks out of the exams having got a 55543, she will get in, regardless of the fact she did not achieve her predicted grades. She achieved the offer. HOWEVER, if she achieved 55433 she missed the offer because she didn't get three 5's. It will be up to the university whether or not to admit her, but oversubscribed courses can afford to let go of anyone who misses their offer. OR if she was told get a 5 in Calc AB, but she gets a 4, even if she gets 5 in absolutely everything else, they may say 'sorry no' because she missed the offer.

However, I must say, the offers I just used as examples would be very high ones if she had already achieved 3 AP's at a high level!! If she gets 3 5's by October, she will likely only be asked for up to three more good grades.

If before the exams something big and dire happens (e.g. death of a parent, or she has a temporary but severe illness) your daughter MUST tell the university because this might be classed as an 'extenuating circumstance' which the university might take into account if your daughter does not quite meet the conditions of her offer. In this case she may be accepted even if she does not quite get the grades normally required. You can ask the individual universities what they would do in that situation directly. Hpwever, you must tell them before the exams are taken in most circumstances. I don't know whether the AP exam board allow for 'special consideration' in the marking in similar circumstances but if they do obviously apply for that as well. However, exam nerves/minor illness are just a risk and hopefully that will not happen. Sometimes the exam is a nightmare, but noting can be done about that.

082349

Just a note: there may be other deadlines specific to your country for Cambridge.

9 September 2012
- Students who would like to be interviewed in India

20 September 2012
- Students who would like to be interviewed in China, Malaysia or Singapore

15 October 2012:
- Students who would like to be interviewed in Cambridge or Pakistan
- Students who are domiciled in/Nationals of Canada who would like to be interviewed in Canada
- Students who are domiciled in/permanent resident in Hong Kong who would like to be interviewed in Hong Kong

floridadad55

Take a look at St Andrews in Scotland

They take a lot of Americans.

And I know they have art history

ChocolateOrange

St Andrews is very popular with US students, (I think the fact that the Scottish eucation system is a bit more like the US model than England/Wales is has a lot to do with that) but they do reject some applicants and some subjects are still insanely competitive for intl students (I'm thinking Medicine in particular). Limited places, hugely popular course.....a LOT of very talented intl's are rejected every year. And St Andrews is a good university, so it's worth looking at if it has your particular subject. A lot of Americans who go there visited it and loved it, they didn't just apply to get in

DrGoogle

Tons of useful information here that I need to digest, not possible while I'm on travel. One question I like to ask is what is open college application ? How does it work?

SpawnofDescartes

If you're referring to Oxbridge, it's when you do not specify a college, and are randomly allocated to a college,(usually the least competitve colleges for that course). So instead of applying to Trinty, you'd do 'open'

cupcake

In addition to what Spawn said above (which is correct), I think most international students who apply to Oxbridge do apply open. It's hard to choose a college when you've never been there! So don't stress about it too much.

For anyone thinking of applying to the UK for medicine, this is a special case. There is a UK student quota, in order to fill all the vacancies in the UK national health service. So most unis can only offer a handful of places to international medical students. This is nothing special to St Andrews.

ChocolateOrange

Yes, I didn't mean to imply that only St Andrews is really competitive for Medicine. International student number has a government set cap (came in as part of Labours plan to boost the number of doctors from the UK, although EU students also count as home students not intls) so it's extremely competitive. I have just been through the whole process (as a UK student) and have an offer, and I know a good few intl applicants, so I can give advice specifically about Medicine if anyone on the forum is interested in applying


DrGoogle - If you go to 'the student room' (.co.uk, remove spaces), and look at the 'international lounge' forum there is a massive 200 page thread called 'Americans applying to university in the UK' which you will get great advice on, and you and your daughter can speak to other students applying next year. The students who have already got places and come to the UK can tell you exactly how the process worked for them. Not that this is a bad pace for advice (there's tons of good advice on this forum) but there aren't many people who apply to go abroad to the UK here

DrGoogle

Chocololate, I think(not 100% positive) I did read through that thread and still am very confused. I need to do some more googling. Thanks for helping.

ChocolateOrange

No problem, feel free to ask me any question, I'll do my best to answer (as will the others here I'm sure)

thesmiter

Hi, I'm a junior hoping to apply to Oxford next year, what do I need to know? I've done a bit of research, but the whole UCAS application system is very daunting to me - there's a significant number of acronyms I have to leave blank on my application. I am hoping to enter a course in History/Politics for undergrad, then travel back to the States to enter law school. In addition to (obviously) Oxford, where else should I look into? Please offer guidance, thanks.

SpawnofDescartes

Make sure your high grades are good enough to warrant an application. You'll need to sit the HAT for Oxford (History Admission Test) You'll need to get your application in for the 15th October 2012. The UCAS process can be completed within a few days, so don't worry too much from that. If you're eager to study in England, aside from Oxford, consider LSE (International Relations and Politics) Warwick (History & Politics) You may want to apply for straight History at UCL, St Andrews, King's, Durham, largely because not many top UK university offers joint honours in History & Politics aside from Oxford, LSE and Warwick.

082349

Take a look at History & Politics at York: BA(Hons) History and Politics - Politics, The University of York

thesmiter

Okay, thanks for the additional information. I'll definitely look into the courses you both mentioned. Of the programs and courses listed, which 5 would be best?