Cambridge Tripos System

Can anyone please explain what the difference is between the Tripos system for undergraduate students at Cambridge and the systems operated at other Universities?

Reply 1

Y__

It's mostly just a fancy name. There are some minor details, i.e. if your grades are good enough and/or your college thinks it would be good for you, you can change tripos, usually if you have completed one part of one tripos, etc. And you will most likely have all your exams at the end of the year instead of the end of each term - and you'll think this is really cool until easter term starts and you realize you are meant to revise a whole year's worth of material for 5 papers that take place during consecutive days :p:

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edit: I suppose you already know about the supervision system? You meet with a member of faculty or a research student to discuss problem sets/essays/etc, and it's usually groups of just two students.

Reply 2

SunderX

Calling it a Tripos 'System' is a bit far. It's more like a Tripos 'held together with bits of glue, papier mache supervision work and sticky bits from the river'.

The Tripos is a fancy name for the 3 (or more) year course we have. For us, we have 1 Part for each year, Part IA, Part IB and Part II. You take an exam for each Part and get graded for it. Having different Parts also means it's somewhat possible to switch courses between parts.

Reply 3

Craghyrax

Another aspect is that Tripos always starts broad and then narrows down. Most degrees involve covering three very broad subjects or relevant areas at least, to start with, and then narrowing down to a specialised interest at a later point. So in my Part I we covered Politics, Sociology, Psychology and Social Anthropology but this year in Part IIa I specialised in Sociology, which I will continue to focus on for Part IIb.

Reply 4

FadedJade

There's also a lot of subjects that the above isn't true for.

Reply 5

annie91

thanks your answers have been extremely helpful! Is Cambridge the only place that offers the tripos system?

Reply 6

Craghyrax

annie91

Is Cambridge the only place that offers the tripos system?

Yep

Reply 7

generalebriety

annie91

thanks your answers have been extremely helpful! Is Cambridge the only place that offers the tripos system?

Yes, principally because Cambridge invented the Tripos system and every other university just contented themselves with offering, you know, courses. :p: