<p>Hi I am currently an american high school junior taking 6 IB classes (HL’s - chem, english, and history; SL’s- anthropology, maths and spanish V. Nest year I will be taking TOk and environmental systems SL). I was wondering about my chances at Oxbridge.
I do really well in my classes straight a’s. Got a 5 on an ap exam last year. Do chem club, KEY club, MUN and I’ve been playing in an out of school youth orchestra for about 3 years. I also teacher younger kids music, tutor and volunteer for a several organizations.
With regards to IB exams: I will be taking 2 this year and I have been getting 6-7 on the practice exams
Please let me know of you have any info! It will be really helpful.</p>
<p>Also I have not taken a full SAT or ACT. But my PSAT score was 200 and mh PLAN score was 32.
Thanks so much!</p>
<p>In the UK in general, you usually apply for one specific subject or “course”, which is effectively your major. It’s very difficult to switch (ie you might have to drop out and reapply). The main criteria for admission are high grades in the subject you are applying for and related subjects. Therefore, from the information given above I have no idea if you would be a good candidate. If you want to apply for English for example, the only relevant things in your post are IB English, History and Spanish. Look at the school website and see what A-level subjects are required for UK students for the course you are interested in. You need to do IB/AP/SATIIs in those subjects for the best chance of admission.</p>
<p>IB is generally highly respected, probably more than APs, are you know you need really high grades. Probably at least 38if you are doing full IB.</p>
<p>ECs are irrelevant unless specific to the course you are applying for. Eg the chem club if you apply for Chemistry.</p>
<p>You can only apply for Oxford or Cambridge for undergrad, not both in the same year (unless you are an organ scholar).</p>
<p>The application deadline is usually around 15th October for admission 1st October the following year.</p>
<p>I suggest you research universities in the UK, and also advise you to visit <a href=“http://www”>www</a>. ************** .co.uk (remove spaces for link to work) which is a UK board similar to this one.</p>
<p>It’s great that you are thinking about this early. </p>
<p>You seem to be doing the IB a different way to how most UK schools would, we do all 6 subjects throughout the 2 years with all 6 exams at the end. This means we can apply with our predictions in each subject, for you it seems to be rather different. Either way you will need to apply through UCAS next year before the Oxbridge deadline, as a poster above said you should be looking at 38/39+ as a minimum to be considered for interview (although I have noticed UK unis being rather lenient to internationals of late). Good luck.</p>
<p>Before your predicted scores, Oxford requires at least 2100 in SAT (700 in each) and 3 fives in APs or 700s in subject tests to prequalify since they don’t consider your high school grades whatsoever.</p>
<p>In addition, you should research the subject you want to apply to and ensure any additional requirements needed, such as a test that needs to be completed within 2 weeks of the application dealine of 10/15.</p>
<p>One good aspect as a non-Brit, as you will not be sitting for A Levels your offer, if it comes, will most likely be definitive rather than conditional. That is nice. </p>
<p>One can’t over state the importance in understanding that Americans should see English uni applications more like American grad school applications–the admissions tutors couldn’t give a toss about this or that EC (well, let me roll that back, if you are a sure “blue” for the Eight, Eleven or Fifteen that is a different matter–) it is about candle power and preparation in one’s selected field. The essay is not to show how you have overcome some personal adversity (etc.) but to demonstrate your commitment and knowledge to your chosen field. If you have interviews (not sure if they hold them by phone, waive them or make Americans fly over) they will be substantive-- more via voce exams than a chance to “get to know you.”</p>
<p>Do your research-- some subjects are more difficult to be admitted to read than others and even within Oxbridge there is a great variation between the difficulty of entrance between colleges (Trinity, Cambridge is more selective than, say, St Hilda’s). Your experience will in large measure depend upon your college so it is a trade-off between the “better” colleges and the increased selectivity (if you are not selected at the college of your choice the admissions tutor can, if he wishes, place you in the “pool” from which another college may take you–you have no choice as to which at that point–but the chances of being taken from the pool in the larger, more popular subjects is rather remote…)</p>
<p>Not sure how the Oxbridge system works for Americans, but I guess I just want to emphasise the importance of the interview. From what I observed, Oxbridge admissions tended to be a little arbitrary–I knew some people who practically screamed “intelligent” from the moment they opened their mouths who didn’t get in, and some people who gave every impression of being idiots amongst their peers who did. I can only really put this down to the interview since grade-wise, they were probably fairly similar. If you’re required to have one, it’s definitely a good idea to practise interview skills and make sure you’re comfortable talking about your subject. I’d recommend not basing your hopes on Oxbridge just because the interview can go really well almost as easily as it can go disastrously wrong… plus it’s very difficult to ascertain exactly WHAT interviewers want. Some people come out convinced that they’ve done terribly when they got in, just as some get really cocky about the whole thing and get rejected.
The academics and personal statement are obviously really important as well, though. I was told by my school counselor that my personal statement was “just not good enough”, and that I should “be prepared for 5 rejections”… but even with that and subpar AS results (for my school), I still got pooled rather than outright rejected, so apparently my interview “must have gone really well”. I wasn’t taken out of the pool, probably because I wasn’t an amazing candidate on paper, but my point here is just to be aware that a good or outstanding interview probably won’t do much if your grades just aren’t good enough. I applied to Cambridge, where they grant interviews to almost everyone, whereas Oxford does screens its candidates a bit (I believe the percentage of candidates who get through to the interview stage is over 90% for Cambridge and somewhere under 50% for Oxford, though I’m probably wrong about this–go look it up, I’m sure the stats are floating around somewhere on the internet).
Btw, I personally can’t see the link cupcake posted, but I’m guessing it’s t h e s t u d e n t r o o m because that’s the UK equivalent of CC.</p>