Chemistry Applicants 2015

Nothing like DNPH! Actually pyridine is good stuff too. And ammonia if you have a cold.

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Ew organic
Talking of reacting stuff, I have to continue my coursework tomorrow, 3 hours of practicals on the most boring experiment ever :s and I have no idea what I'm doing, every lesson I just go in like "what do I feel like doing today?" and then manage to pour iodide and persulfate all over my hands and turn them orange why oh why did four unis decide that it would be a good idea to give me offers?!

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if you can smell pyridine in a lab and you're male, you want to worry about your balls Oh my word, I've done that with ammonia before. Had such a bad coughing fit, i was nearly sick.

I hate organic too. I only like my alkene module this year because the lecturer is fit. We get VERY little male eye candy in the department. I also had a couple of nightmare lab session in Y13. Titration with potassium permanganate, when the markings on the burette are blue... 2,4-dinitrophenylhydrazine turns your hands yellow as well. I'm missing the feeling of acetone over nitrile gloves

I'm not dead set on an academic career and I'm planning on going to Oxford

You don't need to go into academia to have a good time as a chemistry student at Oxford. And at any rate, it's too early to know what you'll be looking to do in four years time!

for the love of god, revise your A2 stuff, and go over AS as well. I made a complete div of myself with VSEPR in my interview. How i got an offer from them, I will never know. I assume she put my awful answers down to being sleep deprived (I'd been up since 4am, got the train at 6 to be in London by 9.30, then had to leg it to UCL) and really anxious.



^^ This. I'm in second year and most of my coursemates don't have a clue. Some of us have vague ideas what we might want to do afterwards.

This made me LOL. I was debating whether to go through VSEPR because I think we only need to learn certain shapes and bond angles for A2 but I guess not now. How did your interview process go?

At UCL, the second I met the lady who interviewed me, she hated me. UCL had faffed me around with my interview date - they pulled it forward by a week at the last minute. I'd pushed the original date back so i could get the cheap tickets down to london. I ended up having just over a weeks notice, and had to pay the best part of £100 for a second set of tickets for the new date, which UCL did reimburse me - not without me making it clear to Dewi that I really couldn't afford that sort of money.

York, my interviewer was lovely. She'd skim read my UCAS form, and then smiled. 'I think I know why they've put us together.' She's German and I was doing German at A level at the time. Most of my interview was on my trip to Berlin the previous summer, her reasearch on liquid crystals, and a tiiiiiiiiiny bit of chemistry - for which I was so nervous I couldn't pick up the pen :/

Sheffield interviewer is absolutely lovely. Interview had very little chemistry, mainly interested in again my trip to berlin and the forensics stuff I mentioned on my PS. I only remember doing the formation of a hydroxynitrile from a ketone.

Guys, just interested, what's everyone planning to do after their degrees?

I'm hoping to do a PhD straight after so I can go into a research oriented career. Not sure what field yet, though.

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Guys, just interested, what's everyone planning to do after their degrees?

I'm not sure, I was originally thinking about doing a PhD and then going into research or pharmacy, but now I'm thinking I might like to become a teacher.

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Yeh im planning to do the same thing!, What university you looking to go to?

York, hopefully! Just need to get three As :O

What about you?

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got an oxford offer
well done to all you others above me who also did
and to those of you with rejections - there are plenty of other fab unis for chem - oxford doesn't even have the best facilities unfortunately!!
best of luck to everybody with their applications x

got an oxford offer
well done to all you others above me who also did
and to those of you with rejections - there are plenty of other fab unis for chem - oxford doesn't even have the best facilities unfortunately!!
best of luck to everybody with their applications x

I see you got an open offer for chemistry (as did I). Where are you hoping to get sent?