Oxford Graduate Application 2012/13

taking a year out right now, and I'll get my result in a couple of weeks, so I should have a full transcript for the deadline.

taking a year out right now, and I'll get my result in a couple of weeks, so I should have a full transcript for the deadline.




thank you Oh, that's good to know - I had the impression from the website that absolutely no-one gets in without a first and a distinction. But presumably, funding is an issue, and I can't do it without funding..

Ah, OK. Well, for what it's worth: I applied before the results of my MA came out, so my offer was essentially conditional on an email from the graduate secretary saying 'yes, she has done enough that we feel confident to predict she will pass'. That was a bit weird, because I only got the actual result of my MA after the first term of my DPhil. In the end I narrowly missed out on a distinction (bleh), but fortunately it didn't matter.

Ah, OK. Well, for what it's worth: I applied before the results of my MA came out, so my offer was essentially conditional on an email from the graduate secretary saying 'yes, she has done enough that we feel confident to predict she will pass'. That was a bit weird, because I only got the actual result of my MA after the first term of my DPhil. In the end I narrowly missed out on a distinction (bleh), but fortunately it didn't matter.

A friend of mine got a conditional offer from Oxford for her DPhil for a 67. Cambridge on the other hand wanted a 70. She got a 69 in the end, so she came to Oxford.

do you know what happens in case they offer funding? Do they specify in the offer a specific condition for getting the funding?

ah... they requested an average out of all her marks? My essay marks are high enough that I'm fairly confident I'll average over 70, even if I don't get a proper distinction... :/

I have no idea, sorry. Though I imagine they'd have to make the decision about funding before you're admitted, and withdrawing funding from a student after one term (and most likely forcing them to drop out as a result) wouldn't really be in anyone's interest. So my guess would be that they can only specify conditions if the results will be known before the beginning of term.

Thanks for the info, this is helpful. Also good to know that they are not completely sticklers about distinctions, which is the impression I had from the website. My MA demands a distinction in the dissertation to get one overall (which I gather is pretty common - and not unreasonable), so I can't really predict what is going to happen. Next month is going to be very tense ... MA result, GRE result ... scary times.

The admissions statistics for the DPhil in English look alarmingly unfavourable.. I had no idea it was that competitive!

I was under the impression that we ll get the results from our MSt during summer

ah well...I should better focus on my essay than worrying about that

Well, I don't think a distinction is really mandatory in itself, but they claim to be looking for people with 'proven and potential academic excellence', and those people will tend to have (or at least be predicted) distinctions. Also, securing funding without a distinction is pretty hard for English, so for that reason alone the vast majority of students probably will have distinctions.

167 applications, 110 offers and 51 students admitted last year. I don't think that's too bad compared to some other courses?

Number of Applicants

Research degrees: 1194
Taught degrees: 486

Number of Places Available

Research degrees: 40
Taught degrees: 88

Oh! No that's not bad at all! Where are these statistics? This is what I saw:

(from http://www.ox.ac.uk/admissions/postgraduate_courses/course_guide/english_language_.html)

Am I woefully misinterpreting the statistics? 1194 applicants for 40 places looks pretty bad!

Bleh, sorry, I forgot that you've just started the MSt, so I didn't realise you were talking about next year. Yes, the MSt results will be out quite early, so I'm afraid you're likely to be set offer conditions.

http://www.ox.ac.uk/about_the_university/facts_and_figures/graduate_admissions_statistics/index.html


No, that's obviously a mistake. 1,194 is more than the total number of graduate applicants for English. You should probably email the department about this. My guess would be that when the statistics in the online prospectus were updated somebody made a typo or entered something into a wrong column.

Does anyone know whether oxford gives away places continually rather than deciding once all applications have been received by the deadline. I am applying for the Mphil in International Relations and wondering whether it is worth applying early rather than by the 15th of January? I know that LSE's MSc in International Relations is usually full long before the deadline in January, that is why I am asking.

Hope someone can help.

Thanks in advance.

Just to say, I bloody love the topolino comics if your username is after them.

I'm fairly certain that for the IR MPhil, the department don't start making decisions until after the January deadline, so an early application won't make a difference.