The Student Room Group

Applying to a "safety" university

As an American applying to schools in the UK for English, I now have 4 schools I'm certain I want to apply to: Oxford, UCL, King's, and Edinburgh. Initially, I thought my fifth might be Queen Mary, because I figured I would get in and I hadn't really contemplated studying outside of London/Edinburgh. My logic was, worse comes to worst, I'd be studying at a totally reputable school in the capital.

My question is-is QMUL all that much easier to get into than a school like Bristol/Manchester/Nottingham/Durham? And in English, are those schools significantly better than Queen Mary?

If Queen Mary is really that much worse/equally difficult to get into as those schools, maybe I should open up to the idea of studying elsewhere. Does anyone have any recommendations for unis that are good academically, but are hip and have a lot going on culturally in terms of art, music, etc.? And do people think its necessary I have a school I know I'll get into considering I'm also applying to universities in the states?
Original post by eliyahul'orignal
As an American applying to schools in the UK for English, I now have 4 schools I'm certain I want to apply to: Oxford, UCL, King's, and Edinburgh. Initially, I thought my fifth might be Queen Mary, because I figured I would get in and I hadn't really contemplated studying outside of London/Edinburgh. My logic was, worse comes to worst, I'd be studying at a totally reputable school in the capital.

My question is-is QMUL all that much easier to get into than a school like Bristol/Manchester/Nottingham/Durham? And in English, are those schools significantly better than Queen Mary?

If Queen Mary is really that much worse/equally difficult to get into as those schools, maybe I should open up to the idea of studying elsewhere. Does anyone have any recommendations for unis that are good academically, but are hip and have a lot going on culturally in terms of art, music, etc.? And do people think its necessary I have a school I know I'll get into considering I'm also applying to universities in the states?


Assuming you meet the basic requirements then I think you're almost guaranteed to be accepted by Edinburgh - they have a bit of a reputation for accepting Americans, they like the money. That said, it is a good idea to have one safety just in case. I don't know much about QMUL but I think both Bristol and Durham are harder to get into.
Original post by Snufkin
Assuming you meet the basic requirements then I think you're almost guaranteed to be accepted by Edinburgh - they have a bit of a reputation for accepting Americans, they like the money. That said, it is a good idea to have one safety just in case. I don't know much about QMUL but I think both Bristol and Durham are harder to get into.


Yeah, I've seen people with rather good scores from my high school not get offers from KCL and UCL, but they may have applied to competitive courses/written craps PS's. However, the two people who applied to Edinburgh both got in, and it seems like a similar situation with St. A's.

In general, it's hard applying to British schools as an American because a) your most important factor in our applications is AP scores, something US colleges don't even look at typically, and b) rankings of UK unis are often the exact opposite in the UK league tables of their international counterparts. The only common ground is that Oxbridge, UCL, and Imperial top in both: St. A's, LSE, and Durham do great domestically, but internationally they do poorly, while Edinburgh, Manchester, and King's do very well. It's a bit mind boggling :tongue:

Quick Reply

Related discussions

Latest

Trending

Trending

Articles for you