Oxford Math's and Joint Schools Applicants for 2017.

Hi folks. In case anyone's interested, I just got feedback from St. John's for Maths and Computer Science (unfortunately I was rejected):

* There's the standard preamble about "competition for places is intense". For St. John's there were 141 applications for Maths and Joint Subjects. In total 20 candidates got an offer (9 to other colleges).
* I got a MAT score of 70 (slightly below the 73.5 average for Maths and CS), and it lists your ranking for that version of the test (for me it was 46/306).
* It shows your average interview score out of 9 (for me it was 6.61)
* It shows your overall score out of 9, based on your whole application (for me it was 7). It says that everyone with an 8/9 got offers (I'm not sure whether this means only people with 8/9 got offers, or whether some people with 7s got offers).


Overall I'm quite encouraged. It seems like it was closer than I thought. I performed a little worse in the MAT than I thought (by about 4-5 marks, maybe), but the interviews went better than expected (and that was with an interview that was quite bad). I've been considering reapplying next year, and I think this feedback makes that possibility more feasible.

Thanks for publishing the feedback you received from St John's College. My son applied to New College, for the same course as you were, and their three interviews did not go well for him. He had two more interviews from St Anne's College and he scored 8/9 (comment attributed to the Computer Science- quick mostly clever ) and he scored 7+ for the second interview and no comment attached to the second interview. His MAT scores were joint 81st across the University. His GCSE were 8A*s and 6As and predicted ALs are 3A*s. I would like to know your view, whether it is worth to make an appeal to rejection and review the decision.

Thanks for publishing the feedback you received from St John's College. My son applied to New College, for the same course as you were, and their three interviews did not go well for him. He had two more interviews from St Anne's College and he scored 8/9 (comment attributed to the Computer Science- quick mostly clever ) and he scored 7+ for the second interview and no comment attached to the second interview. His MAT scores were joint 81st across the University. His GCSE were 8A*s and 6As and predicted ALs are 3A*s. I would like to know your view, whether it is worth to make an appeal to rejection and review the decision.

I applied for Maths & Comp Sci at St Annes and hold an offer (so naturally I don't know my scores). I had 3 interviews at St Annes, and one at Keble. My Computer Science interview at St Annes didn't go very well, and the 3rd interview there was short notice, with the same interviewer. So a few questions.
1) When you say 81st, I'm assuming that's across all 1973 applicants for joint schools, not just maths/comp sci. Is this correct?
2) From the sound of things, only his final interviews were well scored. As I recall, when I asked about the process at the Comp Sci school, a score of 7 was roughly the threshold for an offer. Colleges all make their own decisions, but poor scores in previous interviews may have worked against him. What is the overall picture of interview scores?

No this ranking is for M&C students only - it has to be as they do different questions to every other group.

So that would be 81st out of 306 maths & compsci applicants last year where 42 offers were made.

I applied for Maths & Comp Sci at St Annes and hold an offer (so naturally I don't know my scores). I had 3 interviews at St Annes, and one at Keble. My Computer Science interview at St Annes didn't go very well, and the 3rd interview there was short notice, with the same interviewer. So a few questions.
1) When you say 81st, I'm assuming that's across all 1973 applicants for joint schools, not just maths/comp sci. Is this correct?
2) From the sound of things, only his final interviews were well scored. As I recall, when I asked about the process at the Comp Sci school, a score of 7 was roughly the threshold for an offer. Colleges all make their own decisions, but poor scores in previous interviews may have worked against him. What is the overall picture of interview scores?

For your questions I also can assume that his MAT score is 81/1973 their wordings are in the feedback letter says joint 81st across the country.

No this ranking is for M&C students only - it has to be as they do different questions to every other group.

I'm not so sure. Just because there's a different question, most of the questions remain the same.

I'm not so sure. Just because there's a different question, most of the questions remain the same.
https://www.maths.ox.ac.uk/system/files/attachments/Mathsgroup%20feedback%202016.pdf publishes all results together. 81st, you're by no means the only person made no offer, but most were.
However, on the interviews, 8/9 and 7+/9 seems awfully high to miss out on an offer. When I was there, I got the impression that the 7's are where they are undecided. A 7+ would logically be "unsure, but lean towards accept". And the fact that they have 7-,7=,7+ would suggest this is where the line is. If the MAT score was 81st of maths/comp sci then it would make more sense. 1973/306 * 81st = 522nd. That's still an area with plenty of offers made.

I work in the mathematics department at Oxford. I am 100% confident in this case that the ranking refers to the M&CS cohort alone.

OK, that's interesting. How much of a bearing would MAT score have on outcome with an 8/7+ in interviews?

Re your latest reply, so it sounds like a poor interview at another college.

I'm a Mathematics and Computer Science holder too and I am interested in the group chats.

I got an maths&cs offer!