Get help with your university decisions here! TSR Decisions Drop In 2025

Collections Nightmare

Apologies but I'm about to rant:

Ok so I spent what basically amounted to 5 weeks solid in bed with tonsilitus, pharyngitus, sinusitus and just about every other possible bug that I could catch at short notice. I was told I have some kind of immunosuppressing virus, possibly glandular fever although I never got the blood tests so God knows but at any rate I was signed off by the doctor until today. Therefore I missed my collections, which is a good thing because all that time in and out of the doctor's didn't exactly leave me an awful lot of time for revision! I came back to Oxford on Sunday night because I didn't want to miss lectures and since then have been in 9-5s as normal apart from today when I only had lectures and a tutorial. In my tutorial I got slated (by someone who's not technically my tutor but she;s the one who set the collection) for the fact that I haven't done it - well pardon me but college knew I wasn't going to be back and my tutor knew I wasn't going to be back and I couldn't exactly take the damn thing before I'd spoken to him to find out what the hell was going on and he was in Japan til Monday!! And now i've just got an email from the tutorial office telling me I have to take it tomorrow at some time between 9 and 4. That's great. I have morning lectures and afternoon labs. So technically I can't even have the full 3 hours for the damn thing. I can't complain about not having revised cos I could have got some done in the week over Christmas and I could have done some today but I honestly just feel like crying right now :frown:

Reply 1

georgecrabbe

Just think about what you are going to drink when it is over.

Reply 2

Cirsium

I'm not allowed to drink for a month due to the sheer amount of crap they put me on

Reply 3

Kalypso

Is the message from the tutorial office also from your tutor? If they're a college admin body they might not realise that it will clash with your teaching time - if it's not come via your tutor as well, it might be worth forwarding the message to him and pointing out the clash, asking if it would be possible to reschedule it? It would be unusual for them to be quite so inflexible about collections, which are relatively informal.

Reply 4

trina

1) Email back your tutorial office and explain that you are very happy to sit your collection tomorrow but is there any way they could be moved to another day (suggest one) as you have lectures, labs etc tomorrow.
2) Email your tutors (both your actual tutor and the one who set the exam) to say that you are very happy to sit collections tomorrow, but have done no revision as you were ill all holiday (offer to provide a doctor's note if necessary) and so you don't expect to do very well. Also explain that you have lectures and labs which you will have to miss.
3) Do as much revision as you can tonight, but (and this is VERY important) DO NOT PANIC. Loads of people don't do very well in their first collections, even when they haven't been at death's door all holiday (I believe the lowest mark ever achieved at Teddy Hall was 9%) and the tutors do not do anything bad except look a little disappointed. Your tutor will not be expecting you to do well as he knows you haven't revised.
Collections always seem like the end of the world when they are coming up, but once you are finnished you realise how no one really minds that much how you do as long as you do as well or better nect time. In one of mine this time round, i answered 1/4 of the paper on something we hadn't been taught (dont know what possessed me) and they haven't done anything to me (yet...).
And please don't cry- oxford can be sh*t at times, but it will get better, i promise you. :hugs:

Reply 5

Cirsium

Just got an email back from Angus (my real tutor) saying I have to do it tomorrow and would I kindly hand it in by 4pm. GREAT. I'm quite tempted not to bother revising. I have a rehearsal 7-10 and bearing in mind how totally shattered I still am from being ill staying up all night is unlikely to help so I might just be better getting the sleep and not panicking... hmm... I've started comfort eating from the stress :confused:

There go my jaffa cakes...

Reply 6

trina

Don't worry about the comfort eating- that's normal!
The worst they can do if you fail the collection is make you do it again and give you a bit more notice this time, which would be a pain work wise, but realistically they aren't going to discipline you for messing up one collection as long as you've worked hard for the first term (i.e. actually turned up to lectures and tutorials and handed most of your work in on time). So go to the rehearsal, have a good night's sleep and see what happens in the morning!

Reply 7

NeverMindThat

Bekaboo

There go my jaffa cakes...

Show your contempt for them by cheating. Do your collection open book.

Reply 8

folksie

I'm not at Oxford, but heard a few times from a friend who was pulling his hair out over the way his college handled collections.

He mentioned stuff like failing to be told by anyone that an exam had been made a day earlier and missing it then getting angry e-mails about it etc. As well as that he's described very unsympathetic reactions when he's had to have time off sick.

I suppose some tutors are less understanding than others, from the examples I've heard the treatment of students seems quite bad.

On the plus side, though, collections rarely seem to be used as grounds to take serious action against students. And they also seem to be forgotten pretty quickly (especially when you get onto the real exams). So I wouldn't get upset about it harming your Oxford career etc. as that just won't happen. That doesn't stop them making life uncomfortable though. : /

My advice would be to get them out of the way as quick as is feasible and if you don't perform as well as you had hoped you have a perfectly understandable reason why.

Reply 9

ThePants999

NeverMindThat

Show your contempt for them by cheating. Do your collection open book.

Seconded. In fact, in my opinion, it's good to show contempt for collections as early as possible - if you don't bother right from the start, they don't get disappointed when you stop bothering later...!

Reply 10

RxB

You need to start CCing all of your emails to your college's senior tutor; they really ought to be doing something about it, particularly your tutor (of sorts) having a go at you for not having done it is unacceptable, whether it's her fault or the college's for not telling her your situation.

Reply 11

tritogeneia1

I really don't understand why they're even making such a big deal over you doing it. I always thought the point of a collection was to test how much you know under 'reasonable' circumstances ie after a bit of revision and under exam conditions, so like an exam but just a progress report.
Therefore, if you haven't been able to revise and won't have time to do the full 3 hours because of other work commitments, it's fairly pointless because it won't be an accurate reflection of what you're really capable of at this point and how much you've learnt. It's especially stupid to make you miss the work you're doing now for it.
It might be a good idea to take it up with your senior tutor...unless he/she is the one who's making you do it. Is it possible that they've forgotten why you haven't taken it, have just noticed that they haven't had one in from you and done what they;d normally do ie ask you to take it asap, forgetting the circumstances? If that's possible, then e-mail your tutor and explain the situation again; if they still say you have to do it and it's not just that they've forgotten your situation then perhaps take it further as other people have said.

Good luck anyway; as other people have said, collections really aren't that important and I have no idea why your tutors are taking them so seriously (perhaps because it's your first one?) especially since it won't actually tell them anything useful about how you're getting on anyway in this case. Though maybe I'm judging by classics collections, which aren't always a great indicator of how you're doing - I've done terribly on things I've had +ve comments about all term!

Feel free to have another rant, and hope it all works out! And eat chocolate; calories don't count when you're ill/stressed/have imminent collections. :smile:

Reply 12

Showsni

Good luck! You'll probably do better than me, anyway - my tutor kept me behind after the tutorial this moring to express his dissappointment. And I don't even have the excuse that I was ill...

Reply 13

HannahZ

Bekaboo

... I have to take it tomorrow at some time between 9 and 4. ..(

That's terrible! :eek:

surely they must know that you have been too ill to revise. :frown:

Do you have a letter from a doctor? So many students pretend that theyv'e been ill that the tutors become cynical and don't believe anyone so somehow you have to convince them that you're really telling the truth.

But don't panic, I don't believe that collections are that important and if you do badly you can remind them how ill youv'e been and by rights you shouldn't really be back yet. tell them that you're still on medication as you are still not completely well

I think they are totally unreasonable. :mad:

Reply 14

Nutter

Do students have to wear their gowns for collections too?

Is it even done at a coordinated venue/time in the first place, or would it vary from college to college?

Lastly, are you allowed to do it independently (unsupervised) with them investing the trust of you not cheating in it?

Reply 15

Showsni

It varies from college to college.
For me, (University college) we had to go to the exam schools at a specific time and wear our gowns (no sub fusc, though), and we were invigilated throughout.

Reply 16

Cirsium

HannahZ

Do you have a letter from a doctor?

Yep - proper doctor's note signing me off until yesterday :frown:

And they know because I told them I have it

Lastly, are you allowed to do it independently (unsupervised) with them investing the trust of you not cheating in it?

Well this is the stupid thing I'm not being invigilated or anything I just have to pick it up, do it and bring it back. Which actually irritates the hell out of me cos it means it won't feel like an exam and I know that'll affect my performance too!! :frown: