Cambridge Re-applicants 2016

Thanks! Yeah, I get that I couldn't apply elsewhere without withdrawing completely. I was asking if I can reapply to bristol after rejecting a deferred place from them though. Because if I do get my Bristol offer deferred and then get A*A*A ideally I'd turn down the Bristol offer reapply to Cam, Brist, Edin, Manc and Leeds, but I'm unsure of whether I'd be able to reapply to Bristol in particular if they had reserved a place for me in 2016 and then I turned it down.

Ok I understand, you want a Gap year whatever your results, but you don't know if you will reapply until you see how good your results are?
People frequently withdraw and reapply to the same university for a Gap year with good results. I'm pretty sure the universities understand that some of these will apply to Oxbridge as a first choice, the same as they do when people with good AS results apply the first time round. I don't think they take offence because they can guess they are not first choice. Most Oxbridge applicants don't get in and they form a good proportion of those at Bristol Durham Imperial LSE etc.
In general they just want the best people, post-qual candidates are a certainty as regards results and will make their mind up reasonably early. I'm not sure they have the time or energy to track who applied the previous year.
I think the bigger risk is that Bristol wouldn't repeat the offer just because decisions for English always seem a bit random.

You can of course delay adding the others to UCAS till after 15th October and then they don't know you have applied to Oxbridge. You will have to include good GAP year plans in your PS. Hope this helps.




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Sorry, this is all super useful but I appear to be ****e at explaining! Ok, in an ideal world I would ask Bristol to defer my place now, and they would accept. If I got better than expected grades I'd turn down this offer, and reapply next year to a number of Unis including Cam and Bristol; if I got my expected grades I would take the offer and go to Bristol in 2016. My question is, would UCAS allow me to reapply for 2016 entry to Bristol if I had already turned down a 2016 place so that I could reapply to Cam? In other words, does the first scenario make sense?

Thanks!

Sorry, this is all super useful but I appear to be ****e at explaining! Ok, in an ideal world I would ask Bristol to defer my place now, and they would accept. If I got better than expected grades I'd turn down this offer, and reapply next year to a number of Unis including Cam and Bristol; if I got my expected grades I would take the offer and go to Bristol in 2016. My question is, would UCAS allow me to reapply for 2016 entry to Bristol if I had already turned down a 2016 place so that I could reapply to Cam? In other words, does the first scenario make sense?

Thanks!

Not sure if this post will be comfort or irritation (haven't scrolled through other posts properly on the thread) but I'd really encourage people to think hard about re-applying. My school tried to force me to re-apply to Oxford but in my gut I knew it was a big emotional risk. A friend of mine got rejected by Oxford two years in a row, but luckily she ended up at Harvard in the end on a full scholarship and proved them wrong. Anyway, I decided to go to Warwick and had the most amazing three years of my life - the people and the teaching were amazing. I'm now at Cam for my Masters and whilst I don't regret it I would say it is not for everyone - I think I would have suffered there as an Undergrad. The environment is very competitive, it's expensive, and some of college life breeds bad feeling and people always want to show how they are the best. There are some great things about Cambridge but to be honest, the teaching is better at Warwick - not to mention the mental health support if you encounter family problems (which I did, at both Universities). Anyway, whatever you decide, just make sure you think about the amazing benefits of other Universities. You will have a great time wherever you end up. But, if you really want to re-apply and think you'll regret it otherwise - go for it, just don't expect it to be the best place on earth.
To anyone who has been rejected, do not take it personally as it is a very arbitrary system. My dad does admissions for Oxford and he is always astounded at how random it seems and how much petty politics goes on in the selection process behind closed doors. Oxbridge isn't everything

Not sure if this post will be comfort or irritation (haven't scrolled through other posts properly on the thread) but I'd really encourage people to think hard about re-applying. My school tried to force me to re-apply to Oxford but in my gut I knew it was a big emotional risk. A friend of mine got rejected by Oxford two years in a row, but luckily she ended up at Harvard in the end on a full scholarship and proved them wrong. Anyway, I decided to go to Warwick and had the most amazing three years of my life - the people and the teaching were amazing. I'm now at Cam for my Masters and whilst I don't regret it I would say it is not for everyone - I think I would have suffered there as an Undergrad. The environment is very competitive, it's expensive, and some of college life breeds bad feeling and people always want to show how they are the best. There are some great things about Cambridge but to be honest, the teaching is better at Warwick - not to mention the mental health support if you encounter family problems (which I did, at both Universities). Anyway, whatever you decide, just make sure you think about the amazing benefits of other Universities. You will have a great time wherever you end up. But, if you really want to re-apply and think you'll regret it otherwise - go for it, just don't expect it to be the best place on earth.
To anyone who has been rejected, do not take it personally as it is a very arbitrary system. My dad does admissions for Oxford and he is always astounded at how random it seems and how much petty politics goes on in the selection process behind closed doors. Oxbridge isn't everything

this is beautiful and lovely. After that... I think i'm going to take the plunge and go to Manchester. Like you probably were, my head of careers is pushing for me to reapply if I get A*A*A or more... which I think is likely but to be honest this has made me realise I don't need to do that.

<3

This has made my day, it's my birthday today and I have a thesis deadline and the most important people in my life seem to have forgotten what day it is. But, as I struggle at Cam a lot of the time it means a lot that this advice helped shed some light on your conundrum. Honestly, any University will make you happy and you will be looked after wherever you go, I just can't say the same for Cambridge. Best of luck!!

Depending on what A level subjects, if they are three traditional ones and you get A*A*A or better you will be a strong candidate. You would also be quite unlucky not to pick up the LSE offer a second time and other good places with those grades. So if you want to give Cambridge another go and you can do something useful with a GAP year then go for it!

To anyone who has been rejected, do not take it personally as it is a very arbitrary system. My dad does admissions for Oxford and he is always astounded at how random it seems and how much petty politics goes on in the selection process behind closed doors.

Really good you had such a great time at Warwick.
Some wonderful tutors there, I know for a fact.

On Oxbridge, I may be wrong, but it seems to me that the Cambridge system is more open and transparent than the Oxford one.With good grades I would say you can judge better whether you will get into Cambridge rather than Oxford.

Although there's never certainty, especially for subjects like Medicine.

I agree - the Cambridge system is a lot more diplomatic. That being said, I was recently in a library and overheard some very dodgy Cam admissions training sessions that made me rather angry. Oxford is definitely worse - I was rejected at Undergrad for Literature, I had one interview, and they asked me how to make a car bomb in the interview. I had to stay three days in the college for one interview, and was the last person to be seen. One of the interviewers, I kid you not, was lying on her front on a chaise longue, whilst the other one sat on the other side of the room corresponding with her by laptop. It was a good cop bad cop interrogation. My feedback was that the interview was good but I hadn't done French at A-Level, if that was the case, they shouldn't have called me to interview and made me feel humiliated for years to come. Looking back I laugh at how much I beat myself up over it - again, truly glad I got to go to Warwick instead. My professor at Cambridge asked what college had rejected me years ago, and she said that it was a blessing - and that the professors at the college were notoriously mean and that she knew of current students who were unhappy there. So yes, moral of the story is Oxbridge is just like any other Uni, just with more pomp and circumstance - and awful interview processes.

Which Oxford college was this? Because if it's the same that's rejected two friends of mine it will be rather satisfying

Pembroke

Ah, fair enough. I had two friends rejected from Hertford over GCSEs and so I am currently not much endeared to Oxford. It's awesome to hear that you had such a good time at Warwick, what did you study?

English Lit - honestly Warwick was amazing.
I have had a good time at Cam but this place is honestly not worth crying about if you don't get one of their arbitrarily assigned places. Now I'm here, I cry more than I ever did at any other point in my life and I'm not usually emotionally affected by things as much. If you don't work well under pressure, Oxbridge will only prevent you from being happy and that's all that's important really.

I've done a creative writing course at warwick, the place is lovely
I'm actually on the other side, I have an offer from Cambridge (was on the thread to see if there were any other Hertfordians here) and I'm really excited about it, but I do get that it's definitely not for everyone and it's not the be-all and end-all, the country's full of fantastic universities and people need to go where they'll be happy. For me, I hope that'll be Cambridge; for my friends, it's Aston or York or Liverpool. Nobody should go to Oxbridge just for the sake of it being Oxbridge if the environment is going to make them miserable.