Choosing an Oxford College

(Also posted this in the postgrad thread.)

Hi, does anyone have any advice about colleges for postgraduates? I missed out on halls in my undergraduate course at the University of Bristol, and after three years of living in a variety of grotty flats with no one around, I'd really love to live in the particularly oldie-worldy college of Oxford. A chapel is also important for me.

However, having browsed their websites, a lot of the colleges put their postgrads in flats or other buildings far away from their main complex, or only have a low percentage of grads being offered accommodation.

Also concerned if I put a popular college down, it's more likely I'll be put somewhere else and end up in a block of flats after all.

Any ideas on what I should do? Any insight would be great.

I'm thinking of applying to Magdalen, however I know how popular it is and therefore will be more difficult to get in. I have only just found out that Magdalen is top of the norrington table... will that again push up the no. of applicants....

That is a difficult one. Colleges like Merton guarantee 2 years, likely 3, and i know St Johns is good too, but as you correctly point out, they do tend to be off-site. I can see how that might be disappointing. I don't know of a college that puts its grads in the most historic rooms, but do continue your research you might find something.

The only contribution i have are words of consolation. My third year room was built in 1310-1320, and it was very nice for sure. However, old rooms are pretty much universally poorly heated - it was freezing in the winter. The staircase to get up there was terrifically narrow, meaning transporting any kind of suitcase etc was pretty hazardous. You mentioned the word 'grotty' - that certainly would not apply, however, old rooms aren't always the most practical or well thought-out places to live. If you wanted somewhere 'nice' to live, i'd be teling people to go for modern rooms. And above all that, as sad as it sounds, after about 2 weeks of living on such a historic site you do tend to not notice it any more. Every now and then you think to yourself about those that may have walked this way 750 years ago, but they're fleeting thoughts. Which brings me onto the next point:

The fact that you aren't living on site doesn't mean you can't spend time on the site, and appreciate the history as much as you would do otherwise. Merton's MCR (common rooms for grads) is tone of the oldest buildings in college. Merton has an amazing college chapel, as do lots of other colleges, which you can wonder into at any time. And of course the gardens are always there - plenty of people just work out on the grass when its sunny.

I hope you do find somewhere historical to live, but if not, its honestly not so bad!

I'm thinking of applying to Magdalen, however I know how popular it is and therefore will be more difficult to get in. I have only just found out that Magdalen is top of the norrington table... will that again push up the no. of applicants....

Thank you for the insight! Have you seen any of the rooms in Holywell, by any chance?

I guess I don't want to be stuck in a place far away and without any facilities, but as you pointed out you can just spend time in the college site anyway. It was exceptionally hard work keeping friends and a social life living outside of halls, and I'd rather not go through that again...!

I will PM you the worst thing about Woosta, since it's quite serious but at the same time I don't wanna put anyone off

I will PM you the worst thing about Woosta, since it's quite serious but at the same time I don't wanna put anyone off

As a second year Woostarite, I'm intrigued - could you also PM me the worst thing about Worcester?

In general, is there significantly more academic pressure in colleges that are high up the Norrington table?

Queens', Cambridge and Pembroke, Oxford are 'sister colleges', as are Queen's, Oxford and Pembroke, Cambridge. Not that this necessarily means much, but it does imply some similarity within each pair, probably more in terms of size and age than anything else.

Nice architecture and central location tend to go together, as the older colleges are in the middle and tend to be seen as more architecturally pleasing (depends on your taste though!). There are a lot of medieval-looking colleges in the centre, and then the 19th/20th century ones further out - Queen's is a bit of an anomaly as it was rebuilt in the 17th/18th centuries, so it's in a neoclassical style on which people seem to have quite divided opinions. In terms of size, it's certainly moderate.

Queen's is pretty laid back academically (well, we were given a little speech in freshers' week last year about how we should work hard and make sure the college has a good reputation, but nothing like that has happened since). It certainly isn't known as one of the hard-working colleges - although just like any college, you can't just coast along - and Pembroke isn't either, as far as I know. I don't know much about Balliol except that it's known as the 'party college' ... Hertford possibly has the same kind of reputation, but I think it's quite big as well. It's probably hard to find a college famous for its social life without it being one of the larger ones; all the colleges have the social opportunities if you want them, but they're likely to generally increase with the size of the college.

There are maybe a few more northeners at Queen's than elsewhere, but we're mostly southerners (as at most colleges). Being from the south certainly won't disadvantage your application/mean you don't fit in.

And All Souls doesn't take students, so there's no need to worry about its creepy name

The college pros and cons article has one student saying that Magdalen is 'not the friendliest college'. Would someone like to comment on this?

all souls don't but they're a college ?

It is college which provides a home to researchers plus some people in public life with an academic background.

The name comes from the fact that it is a war memorial to the dead of the Hundred Years War; All Souls of the Faithfully Departed of Oxford.

After a long while, narrowed it down to two colleges. Brasenose and Univ. I quite like the features of both (Centre, 10 places for the subject that I want to take, high amounts of academic staff for the course I want to do, medium sized college.) so I am really unsure which one I should pick.

Could anyone tell me more about the two colleges?

someone told me that x college is undersubscribed so it would be a good shot applying there. Is that a good gamble ?