Oxbridge anti-competitive?

Apologies if this one has been done before.

You cannot apply to Oxford and Cambridge in the same year. Isn't this anti-competitive? Although Oxford and Cambridge are recognised by most to be the best universities in the UK why should they get special treatment?

Oxford (and presumably Cambridge) both say that they have too many good candidates for the number of places they offer. So why institutionalise a two-tier system where everyone who does not get into Oxbridge is considered second-rate?

If they are so good why can't they work under the same rules as everyone else?

It would be very difficult without the rule, not only because of that but also they would have issues with the offers - whereas at the moment a sizeable majority of people who get offers firm oxbridge, presumably there would be a fair amount of overlap (since both oxford and cambridges admissions processes essentially try and do the same thing, it is likely that some people would get offers from both) which could potentially mean that some candidates who would previously have got offers now don't get that chance (as competing with double the number of people). And for the unis themselves, it would be very difficult to estimate how many offers to make as they don't know how many will firm them.

It's difficult for Durham, LSE etc, but they seem to manage. I'm not sure that ease of administration is sufficient reason to give Oxford and Cambridge special treatment.

That's not true though

You can't apply to both in the same year. This rule has been set by the powers that be. To me that makes it institutional. If Oxford and Cambridge get special treatment then you have an institutionalised two-tier system.

(a) they don't put the same resources into selection of candidates as Oxbridge does. The Oxbridge admissions system relies on an almost 1:1 offer:acceptance ratio..

(b) nobody 'gave' them 'special treatment'. They agreed it between themselves, and they could do so because they are entitled to do whatever they damn well please with regard to their admissions procedures.

My point is more that the current system means as many people who are good enough to have the opportunity to go to oxbridge - without the restriction this wouldn't be the case.

The other universities have to compete on a level playing field.

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Cartel? Can they take government funding and still do as they damn well please?

Government has never sought to involve itself (beyond the usual 'please take more of x special category' stuff) in admissions processes. No-one has much appetite for causing problems by meddling too directly in the procedures of the two greatest educational institutions we have (which, incidentally, most government types attended). It may interest you to know, also, that Cambridge was involved in talks recently about cutting its links with government. If government interfered too much, that is what would happen.

Yes, that is very interesting.

The government has Oxford in reserve. It should let Cambridge go. Would make a lot of business sense.

Oxford would take the exact same steps. To interfere as you appear to suggesting would destroy the admissions systems of Oxford and Cambridge, which would be treated by each as a very serious matter.

More realistically (because government would never really get involved directly, for the reasons I gave), if UCAS refused to allow the two universities to co-operate on applications as they do, they'd just set up their own systems instead, which, again, they're totally entitled to do.

There will always be exceptions though. Take Medicine. AFAIK you can't apply to 5 medicine courses. You can apply to a max of 4 per cycle.

Does that make med the best course in the UK? A tier above all others? No way lol

This is a good point to bring in here as well. I might be wrong but I think both restrictions might be also for the applicants' benefit to an extent? We were never given an actual concrete reason why you were only allowed to apply to 4 med schools at a time, but with a 10:1 applicant to place ratio (bigger than that for some med schools now I think) I can see why restricting it might be beneficial for both parties. The med applicants are then encouraged to pick another course which not only lessens the strain on med school admissions but also on the students/UCAS Extra/Clearing in the case of a clean sweep of rejections.
The same principle probably applies (to a lesser extent admittedly) to Oxbridge. It's possible that whoever decided the system should be put in place is working under the assumption that if an applicant would get rejected by one of the unis in a cycle, they'd also get rejected by the other (I'm not very well versed in their admissions policies, but I'm guessing they're pretty rigorous). Hence by restricting people's choices applicants have another slot free to pick another uni which is more likely to accept them, rather than wasting 2 choices if they're rejected by both Oxford and Cambridge.

This is just speculation on my part, anyway.

Nah good ideas. My impression was that the 4 limit was due to the competitiveness, reducing the number of applicants who have to reapply after a gap year if they're rejected from all 5.

Apologies if this one has been done before.

You cannot apply to Oxford and Cambridge in the same year. Isn't this anti-competitive? Although Oxford and Cambridge are recognised by most to be the best universities in the UK why should they get special treatment?

Oxford (and presumably Cambridge) both say that they have too many good candidates for the number of places they offer. So why institutionalise a two-tier system where everyone who does not get into Oxbridge is considered second-rate?

If they are so good why can't they work under the same rules as everyone else?

I agree that it does seem unfair, but I guess that it is up to Oxford and Cambridge. If they want that system, then I do think it would be difficult to enforce change on them. I think I remember threads about this before, where someone made the valid point that if UCAS tried to ban this, then Oxbridge could just withdraw from UCAS and people would have to make a separate application.

Take up the organ. Then you can apply to both.

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