Is Oxford or Cambridge better for an American student?

Should I receive the chance to study at Cambridge, I would love to study English or the new Human, Social, and Political Sciences. Oxford, comparatively, would be solely English.

Party scenes are not something I'm keen on - definitely not anything like Animal House! - but I would appreciate a warm, fun, and generally welcoming social environment.

I have friends in London, so easy access there would be tremendous.

All that said, does Oxford or Cambridge sound more appropriate for me? Is one more welcoming to American students than the other?

Thank you so much! Really appreciate your time and any assistance you can offer. :smile:

Hope you're having a great night.

Reply 1

SR255

I think places like UCL are more suited to an American. Similar semester and course credit set up, hell it even look a lot like an American university. Oxford and Cambridge are very unique and very English. Even I as a British person find their course structures and customs a bit strange. But if you're looking for a totally different experience then go for it!

To answer your question about easy access to London it just so happens that Oxford and Cambridge are the two closest cities to London after St Albans. Both are only 50 miles away from London with direct motorway connections and frequent train services.

Reply 2

opaltiger

For my money Cambridge has better connections to London, simply because King's Cross is a more conveniently located station. Plus it's slightly quicker - the express train is 45 minutes, I'm pretty sure the shortest to Oxford is about an hour.

Other than that... I go to Cambridge and have visited Oxford quite often, and I'm not sure there's anything that really sets them apart in terms of what you're looking for. They're both welcoming, they're both quite small and full of students. Cambridge has slightly more of a clear division between the bits inhabited by students and the bits inhabited by everyone else, but they're both still fairly insular. Cambridge is ever so slightly less tradition-bound. I think you're best off choosing based on their courses rather than anything else.