Most competitive degree in the UK?
Discuss current events and changes in the education system and ways you'd like to see it improved, from secondary school through to postgraduate study.
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Re: Most competitive degree in the UK?a toss up between economics and medicine, both attract very high calibre applicants, there are not very many other courses where most applicants have 8a*'s+ and crazy A-level combos with 5+ subjects.
Last edited by JohnKennedy; 06-01-2009 at 17:18. -
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Re: Most competitive degree in the UK?I would say, with regards to Econ, it depends where you apply... Not all Econ courses are as competitive as E&M and PPE at Oxford, Econ at LSE, Warwick, UCL, etc...(Original post by JohnKennedy)
a toss up between economics and medicine, both attract very high calibre applicants? -
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Re: Most competitive degree in the UK?Well 1. Sole languages tend to have a lower entry requirement (no one wants to do them) and UCL must have really, really wanted them.(Original post by adilmorrison)
German...
UCL have arguably the best German department after Oxbridge. -
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Re: Most competitive degree in the UK?The ones where you get paid the most, dentistry, medicine economics etc. I think the main reason for the economics 'boom' is due to the massive amounts of money you could potentially make from a career in investment banking.
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Re: Most competitive degree in the UK?Erm actually read carefully and you'll see I'm not looking at entry requirements, Im looking at offers. It seems to me that they're a pretty good indicator of how competitive a course is, as a University wouldn't make a relatively low offer to a mediocre candidate if there was a lot of high level competition for places. That would be craaazy.(Original post by adhesive)
Why are you looking at entry requirements to see how competitive it is. Also, just because you don't know anyone applying for dentistry doesn't mean it's not competitive.
Manchester: Approx 900 applications for 75 places
Sheffield: Approx 1000 applications (300-350 interviewed, 200-220 offers) for 65 places
Leeds: Approx 1000 applications for 96 places
Bristol:Approx 750 applications (220 interviewed, 180 given offer) for 75 places
Kings: Approx 1000 applications (230 offers) for 150 places
Birmingham: Approx 1100 applications for 75 places
Queen Mary: Approx 1000 applications for 55 places
etc
I guess I was just suprised about dentistry as, like I said, I don't know anyone at all doing it, but if your stats are accurate then fair point.
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Re: Most competitive degree in the UK?Nah, UCL give BBB offers out for the more 'obscure' languages.(Original post by Greatleysteg)
No.
And when you first applied to university, Oxbridge still gave out AAB offers...
Examples being:
Dutch
Scandanavian Studies (Swedish, Danish, Norwegian or old Norsk)
Eastern European languages (Russian in particular) -
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Re: Most competitive degree in the UK?(Original post by tomster)
Nah, UCL give BBB offers out for the more 'obscure' languages.
Examples being:
Dutch
Scandanavian Studies (Swedish, Danish, Norwegian or old Norsk)
Eastern European languages (Russian in particular)
Understandably so, but then languages is such an umbrella term.
Major (European) languages, then, are highly competitive. -
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Re: Most competitive degree in the UK?I don't know why you keep on insisting this is the case. Yes, languages are competitive at the "top" universities, but then pretty much all courses are.(Original post by Greatleysteg)
Understandably so, but then languages is such an umbrella term.
Major (European) languages, then, are highly competitive.
Comparatively speaking though, languages are not really that competitive when compared with the likes of economics, English, medicine, law and dentistry. -
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Re: Most competitive degree in the UK?In that case, Economics isn't that competitive, either, then. It's easy to get onto "an" Economics course, if we're not thinking of top 20 or so unis.(Original post by Grapevine)
I don't know why you keep on insisting this is the case. Yes, languages are competitive at the "top" universities, but then pretty much all courses are.
Comparatively speaking though, languages are not really that competitive when compared with the likes of economics, English, medicine, law and dentistry. -
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Re: Most competitive degree in the UK?My stats are taken from the unversity websites, I'm sure if you do a search you will see that thay are correct.(Original post by _Fleur_)
Erm actually read carefully and you'll see I'm not looking at entry requirements, Im looking at offers. It seems to me that they're a pretty good indicator of how competitive a course is, as a University wouldn't make a relatively low offer to a mediocre candidate if there was a lot of high level competition for places. That would be craaazy.
I guess I was just suprised about dentistry as, like I said, I don't know anyone at all doing it, but if your stats are accurate then fair point.
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Re: Most competitive degree in the UK?The ratio of applications to places is practically irrelevant when trying to determine the competitiveness of a degree. A much more useful statistic (often unavailable, unfortunately) is applications/offers. Oxbridge might not have as impressive applicants/place ratios, but they give hardly any more offers than they have places.
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Re: Most competitive degree in the UK?Yeah but economics is still way more competitive than languages at the top unis.(Original post by Greatleysteg)
In that case, Economics isn't that competitive, either, then. It's easy to get onto "an" Economics course, if we're not thinking of top 20 or so unis.
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