3 in STEP I worth mentioning on UCAS?

LSE do maths?

Hi, I got a 3 in STEP I at the end of year 12. I am applying for maths at oxford, imperial, warwick, ucl, lse.

Would you reckon it is worth mentioning my STEP grade on UCAS, since it is not very impresive, and may in fact work as a negative as a 3 in step I would probably mean a student wouldnt perform that well at oxford?

If I had to guess, Oxford would probably not even notice it, Imperial will strongly dislike it, Warwick couldn't care less, UCL and LSE I dunno.

Personally, if I had the choice, I wouldn't. It's not doing you any favours what so ever.

do you mean if you had the choice, you wouldn't declare your step grade?

I'm pretty sure that's what he meant, yes.

I seem to recall Imperial saying to some posters "a good grade in STEP would help us overlook {blah}", so I don't think they're particularly anti-STEP on principle. But a grade 3 in STEP isn't particularly impressive; I wouldn't say it's a *bad* grade, but Imperial seem to react badly to anything that indicates you might not be 'perfect'.

My own tendency would be to declare it: for better-or-worse, you sat it, and that's the grade you got. And it's not a bad grade, and an admissions office with a clue should know you'll probably do better this year.

Easy for me to say that, though.

Oh okay thank you

Can I be rude and ask why you think you ended up with a grade 3? How much preparation did you put in?

do you mean if you had the choice, you wouldn't declare your step grade?

Would imperial dislike step in general, or because I got a 3 in it?

Yeah, that's what I meant.

Imperial likes STEP, but they pretty much look for any excuse to reject you in my experience. To borderline applicants, they've sometimes asked for a 1 in STEP I, which means that's that level they expect their applicants to be at.

I was speaking to an admissions tutor once (admittedly for maths and computing, not straight maths) who said that he'd prefer students sitting exams like AEA/STEP in Year 13/upper sixth and getting the grade they truly deserve rather than a year early and getting a grade not as high as they could have (I think he was referring to getting a merit in the AEA in Year 12 rather than distinction in Year 13). It appears that you fall exactly under this category of underperforming by taking it a year early.

I was rejected by Imperial in my 2008 application even though all my friends got in (who had similarish grades to me) and I'd bet that it's because I declared that I got a U in the AEA for maths.

Oh thats strange, you're one of the strongest mathmos on TSR.