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Is Law THAT competitive?

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cookiedoughmonster

I think that's an unfair and gross generalisation. Firstly, Oxbridge does not like applicants to have studied law at A level, as it's considered a soft option for A level.

All the law applicants I met when I applied this year seemed to know a great deal about their subject and had done work experience over the summer.

Don't assume that everyone else applying will be any less qualified than you are. Everyone who applies to Oxbridge knows how hard it is to get in and will have worked very hard for their interview.

Bear in mind that Oxbridge has a very low dropout rate, so it's unlikely that there are many applicants who have 'no passion for the subject'.

I'm not too sure about Oxford, although I don believe it is the same, but, Law at A level is considered as neutral to Cambridge, and indeed most universities mentioend in this rumour. This is from Churchill's Website, one of the most stringent colleges in Cambridge where it comes to admissions for Law:

"Though we do not frown upon the taking of Law at A-level, we do not in any way require it or even recommend it."

The only place I am aware of that explicitly doesn't like Law at A level is the LSE

Pretty Much :smile:

t.w.

I heard that King's had 60+ applicants to read law this year for 3 places.

You can't possibly be serious?! What that's like 1 place/ per 20 people or something - unbelievable.

Reply 23

Zhen Lin

Isn't that about the ratio of applicants to places the LSE has?

Reply 24

The West Wing

You can find singularly skewed stats like this for any subject :rolleyes:

e.g. SPS at Clare in 2004 was 26 to 1 place.

This is evidence for Kings being competitive that year, not for law being competitive (although it is, I'm just annoyed by this terrible misrepresentation of statistics)

Reply 25

gobsmacker

The number of people applying to law have actually fallen annually in recent years though. It's surely not as bad as people make it out to be. Obviously if you're applying to a top school the competition's insane as everyone's brilliant. I've noticed on the Cambridge forum that more people are pooled for law (inc. myself) than any other subject this year.

gobsmacker

HCD

Oh great, now everyone's gonna think I'm a big-headed, arrogant jerk aren't they? :wink:

Really it's just a mild case of brain failure

Reply 28

Alexander

I think that the point that the OP is trying to make might be that the average law entrant to Cambridge isn't more intelligent and intellectually adept than (say) the average Theology entrant - i.e. that just because a subject has more applicants, it doesn't mean that it's necessarily more competitive as such.

Reply 29

Fillette

"Is Law THAT competitive?"

Well, duh :rolleyes:

Reply 30

yonanz

Yes it is. someone above said something about arts subject being competitive and its true. factually correct supported by real and actual data/statistics. One of the most popular is Economics. A sampling of TSR students revealed that economics is the most sought after course for 2008 TSR applicants. this of course is not representative but is indicative to an extent.

im not sure about ooxbridge, but schools like LSE or SOAS have ratios much more severe than the 5:1 you are talking about. for example, SOAS law department website reads "UG Applicant Place Ratio: 23:1".

then again u must take into account the fact that many students are aware of how competitive it is to enter oxbridge and many are aware of their own inabilities/limitations. Many people will be put off applying to oxbridge fully aware that they have little chance of success hence they would rather not apply. the number of people applying for law in leeds would be around 2000+ but the number of people applying to cambridge or oxford law is less than 1000 each i think. but numbers are not indicative of competitiveness completely, because the quality of the pool of oxbridge applicants is very very high, and the places available is comparatively lower too.

if you cut through all my bull****, its basically. work your ass off, cuz you gona compete against all the top students, and its fiercely competitive.

for pragmatic reason, law is popular because it yields better financial returns.

Reply 31

stkil

Alexander

YES! that's exactly the point i was trying to make :biggrin:

Reply 32

HCD

gobsmacker

Oh great, now everyone's gonna think I'm a big-headed, arrogant jerk aren't they? :wink:

Really it's just a mild case of brain failure

Nah, I was just kidding. :wink:

Reply 33

stkil

Solemn Wanderer

Well, a better way to put it might be that there is no such thing as general intelligence and intellectual adeptness untied to a particular task or subject.

Ok, with reference to their respective subjects then. I think that you're just being pedantic.

Anyway, i was looking at the application statistics at Cambridge for law. The graph shows a consistant decrease in the number of both applicants and offers in recent years.

Is this suggesting that the number of offers has decreased because their are fewer applications and thus fewer students of the standard they require??? I heard that Cambridge often doesn't give places that it has spare, if the tutors believe that none of the remaining applicants are of the right standard. Is this what is being seen for law? If so it would support my argument that although there are so many applicants, many are not up to the standard that Cambridge requries. I have no idea as to whether this is true (but i suspect not). This also leads me to ask: is the standard of applicant required, higher for law than any other subject at cambridge?

Alternatively it could mean that Cambridge is trying to reduce the number of law under graduates, though i have no idea why this would be true. Please could someone answer the questions i have raised, i'd be very grateful!! :redface:

Reply 34

HCD

Could be a number of reasons why they'd cut back on undergrad law admissions. Maybe the tutors struggle to cope with so many? Maybe they've recently lost a tutor? Maybe they're looking to expand in other departments?

Reply 35

t.w.

The West Wing

You can find singularly skewed stats like this for any subject :rolleyes:

This isn't really a misrepresentation at all though, is it? The fact that a subject like Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic would never attract so many applicants at a single college, and that Law and SPS do, tell us quite a lot about the relative competitiveness of the subjects. The fact is that 60+ for 3 places is crazily competitve, and would probably only ever occur for a handful of subjects. In this particular case (at King's), I don't think it's necessarily the applicant :tongue:

lace ratio, but the sheer volume of applicants, that indicates the extreme competitiveness.

Reply 36

allymcb2

You are right that law students probably aren't any better in quality than students for other arts subjects, just more of them. It is problematic because all the candidates will have high A-level grades and so getting in can be a bit more of a lottery. Science weeds out a lot more people earlier, at the A-level stage.

The upshot is probably that the interview is more important for law than for other subjects in differentiating applicants.

Reply 37

simple.

Conversion course? lets say, i applied to cam for specifically land economy or politics, i could still have a career in law by the use of this 'conversion course'?

Reply 38

The West Wing

'Better This Year'

Conversion course? lets say, i applied to cam for specifically land economy or politics, i could still have a career in law by the use of this 'conversion course'?