Should I do the ESAT exam on top of the required TMUA for CS at Imperial/Cambridge?

Hi, I'm planning to apply for Computer Science at Imperial and Cambridge next year (currently in year 12).

I am taking Maths, Further Maths, Computer Science and Physics and have a good few coding projects e.g a mobile app. I am wondering in order to make my application more competitive what other tests I can do e.g. whether I need to do the ESAT as well as the TMUA.

Reply 1

vnayak

Original post by Flippergail

Hi, I'm planning to apply for Computer Science at Imperial and Cambridge next year (currently in year 12).
I am taking Maths, Further Maths, Computer Science and Physics and have a good few coding projects e.g a mobile app. I am wondering in order to make my application more competitive what other tests I can do e.g. whether I need to do the ESAT as well as the TMUA.

Doing extra admissions tests does absolutely nothing, particularly tests they don't care about for CS like the ESAT. ESAT is for Engineering specifically so no point in doing it for the sake of doing it. Also, I'm pretty sure you have to pay for every admissions test you do (at least I'm having to right now. I've paid £78 and £93 for TMUA for Cambridge (rejection :/ )and STEP II (Imperial offer) respectively).

Impress on your personal statement and smash the TMUA. That's all you have to do. Easier said than done - granted - but do well in your admissions test and then well in your interview and you're in. While I can't speak for the Cambridge interview, my Imperial interview was really chill so you have nothing to worry about if you do get in.

Reply 2

Flippergail

Original post by vnayak

Doing extra admissions tests does absolutely nothing, particularly tests they don't care about for CS like the ESAT. ESAT is for Engineering specifically so no point in doing it for the sake of doing it. Also, I'm pretty sure you have to pay for every admissions test you do (at least I'm having to right now. I've paid £78 and £93 for TMUA for Cambridge (rejection :/ )and STEP II (Imperial offer) respectively).
Impress on your personal statement and smash the TMUA. That's all you have to do. Easier said than done - granted - but do well in your admissions test and then well in your interview and you're in. While I can't speak for the Cambridge interview, my Imperial interview was really chill so you have nothing to worry about if you do get in.

Thank you for your response on whether I need to do the ESAT. How would you suggest I best prepare for the TMUA in October?

Reply 3

vnayak

Original post by Flippergail

Thank you for your response on whether I need to do the ESAT. How would you suggest I best prepare for the TMUA in October?

Not sure I'm the best person to ask since a lot of my 'work' was last minute and through my own ability rather than spending a lot of time doing work for it (I started like 3 weeks before the exam unlike a few people I know who started months in advance).

But I was scoring 7.5 in practice so here's to trying:

Step 1: Familiarise yourself with the AS level Maths content they can ask you and the very early stages of the A level stuff.

Step 2: Do AS level exam questions to ensure that you are familiar completely

Step 3: Start to grind papers. Ideally do Paper 1 AND Paper 2 in one sitting because that's what it will be like in the actual thing (back to back, no breaks).

No calculator, no nothing so make sure your mental maths is up to scratch.