does durham stall on oxbridge applicants?

Just wondering...cos thats what it seems like as so many ppl i know with grades like 4 As and above have not heard yet even tho they applied early whereas other people with lower grades have already been given offers!

But....how would durham know if ur applying for oxbridge? surely they're not allowed to know where else people have applied?

Also, why would they do this? what are they waiting for?

Any suggestions....??! cheers Ali xxx

I belive they know you've applied, and thus will probably wait to see the outcome of your interview. generally I think Durham prefers to be first choice.

One of my friends put Oxford down as an insurance offer. I found that rather amusing.

I was under the impression they were allowed to look at your ucas form. I may be wrong, it wasn't something I ever really gave a rats ass about.

I belive they know you've applied, and thus will probably wait to see the outcome of your interview. generally I think Durham prefers to be first choice.

One of my friends put Oxford down as an insurance offer. I found that rather amusing.

I belive they know you've applied, and thus will probably wait to see the outcome of your interview. generally I think Durham prefers to be first choice.

One of my friends put Oxford down as an insurance offer. I found that rather amusing.

cheers guys, but just wanted to know why they are trying to predict if u r applying to oxbridge? how would that make a difference to them making you an offer? and if it does, how will it make any difference by waiting??!!

They're likely to be able to guess you're Oxbridge if your form shows up on the 14th of October (I know mine did!) and you have straight A's or similar.

This might make them less inclined to make you an offer, because the assumption is that if Oxbridge accept you, then you won't be going to Durham. This may mess up their intake figures - they could end up with too few people if lots of offers are made to Oxbridge applicants who then get into Oxbridge and go. If they account for this by making lots of offers to Oxbridge applicants and overfilling their quota on the assumption that many of the people won't come anyway (but they want to get as many as they can), then it may turn out to be the case that hardly any of the Oxbridge applicants get in and they all go to Durham (likely to be their second choice) - Durham will then have more people than they can house / fit into lecture theatres but they will be legally obliged to take them.

Perhaps in the case you mention they're holding back offers until they see how many good applicants they get - "maybe lots of stunners will come in after the Oxbridge deadline and we won't need those rah tw*ts". Jokes.

Please note obvious use of words in bold - this is just how they might play it...do we have any evidence that they are slightly more hostile towards Oxbridge applicants? I know Bristol's hinted at it, but I was having a discussion with a teacher at my school t'other day about how Durham try their best to make sure they get a lot of the Oxbridge applicants - after all, even the Ox-rejects are bloody good grades-wise and it's kind of a lottery regarding who gets in there anywayz. So by bagging Ox applicants Durham can get some of the top students in the country. That was teach's take on it anway...he's very knowledgeable so I chose to believe.

ZarathustraX (Soon to be Oxbridge-reject en route to Durham )

I DIDN'T apply to Oxbridge, yet I have good enough predicted grades and my UCAS form was processed by UCAS on the 5th October and received by Durham on 11th October. If the reason they haven't given me an offer is because of this then that's just SAD SAD SAD. It may also be my GCSE grades (maybe they don't like to see Bs) or something I do not know about in my reference (but then I wouldn't have got other offers, would I?)

its simply not true. I have 5A's at AS and applied to cambridge yet i have had my durham offer for about a month

I think its more to do with when they get round to processing your form