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Choosing an Oxford College

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Wikipedia.
Original post by coolkid17
Hey there! I'm considering applying to Oxford for medicine, and I know I do not need to choose a college, but I'd like to know if there are colleges that would be a better fit for me. I'm interested in the overall culture and feel of the student life in each college- is it very different for each college? Also I like playing tennis, so I was wondering if any of these colleges were particularly prominent in Women's Tennis. Thanks for your help!


Teddy hall?
Original post by chanmartin82
I'd prefer something like 40 or 50 people. Are there any colleges that have that amount?

Is there a place where I can find a list or something?


Wikipedia.

That is about the size of the ones suggested above, which are the smallest. Above that you're looking at colleges with 75-80 per year. The biggest have ~160.
Original post by chanmartin82
I'd prefer something like 40 or 50 people. Are there any colleges that have that amount?

Is there a place where I can find a list or something?


The smallest college offering a wide range of courses is Corpus - the year groups are about 75 in size. Regents is closest to your range but it may not offer your course (we think the cohorts are 35-40 in size).
Hi, I'm applying for Biochemistry and I am torn between Brasenose and Christ Church. Could anyone offer me some help in making the decision? Thanks.
Original post by Katie.R.S.
Hi, I'm applying for Biochemistry and I am torn between Brasenose and Christ Church. Could anyone offer me some help in making the decision? Thanks.


(1) 50% of "successful" Brasenose applicants are placed in a different college. Not sure what the percentage is for ChCh.

(2) Distance to lectures/labs?

(3) Look at the Biochem tutors on the college websites. Go and see them in September?
Original post by Pars12
(1) 50% of "successful" Brasenose applicants are placed in a different college. Not sure what the percentage is for ChCh.

(2) Distance to lectures/labs?

(3) Look at the Biochem tutors on the college websites. Go and see them in September?


BNC and ChCh are chalk and cheese - Brasenose is a very compact community whereas Christ Church has rolling parkland (with deer!). You could come and visit both at the Sept 18th Open Days to see the differences if you haven't already.

Both colleges have two Tutors for Biochem. BNC offers 4 places a year (so 16 students in total across the 4 years) and ChCh has a quota of 3. Our Tutor for Graduates, Elspeth Garman, is also a Biochemist.

St Edmund's (Teddy) Hall's schools outreach officer Claire Hogben read Biochem. If you drop her a line, she may be able to tell you more about the course - maybe even suggest you consider Teddy Hall too! https://twitter.com/clairehogben
(edited 8 years ago)
Original post by BrasenoseAdm
BNC and ChCh are chalk and cheese - Brasenose is a very compact community whereas Christ Church has rolling parkland (with deer!). You could come and visit both at the Sept 18th Open Days to see the differences if you haven't already.


Does ChCh have deer? I know they have cattle but...
Original post by BJack
Does ChCh have deer? I know they have cattle but...


The deer are in evidence at the moment if you take a stroll around Christ Church meadows. Meanwhile, a fox has come into residence at Brasenose and is giving us the run around. He jumped the wall into Lincoln and promptly jumped back again - so we think he must agree that Brasenose is the friendliest college!
Original post by BrasenoseAdm
... a fox has come into residence at Brasenose and is giving us the run around. He jumped the wall into Lincoln and promptly jumped back again - so we think he must agree that Brasenose is the friendliest college!


...or the best Hall scraps :yum:
So i wish to read english lit but am having a lot of difficulty on deciding on a college, i want one which has a good night life
Original post by firegirl555
So i wish to read english lit but am having a lot of difficulty on deciding on a college, i want one which has a good night life


Do you have any other criteria on which to choose a college from, so we can help you narrow it down?

That said, Woosta (Worcester) students know how to party :colone:
Original post by firegirl555
So i wish to read english lit but am having a lot of difficulty on deciding on a college, i want one which has a good night life


LMH has a very good rep for ENglish, and nice tutors.
Also known as college for v. good bops x
Is there any college in particular which is known to be more diverse, in that it holds more international students?
Original post by elen90
Is there any college in particular which is known to be more diverse, in that it holds more international students?


Here you can see how many UK vs non-UK people were admitted to the various colleges over the last few years. It's not particularly easy to get through because numbers aren't given as proportions but skimming through it, it seems that St. Edmund's, St. Anne's and St. Hugh's have the higher proportion of non-UK admissions (St. John's, Univ and St. Hilda's also have high numbers) but there doesn't seem to be a huge amount of variation between the colleges.
I'm looking for a college with a relatively large number of students and fellows in Engineering and has a table tennis table. Any suggestion?


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Do the oversubscribed colleges get to choose from all the interviewees that have applied directly to them or are some allocated away before this stage?
Original post by Pars12
Do the oversubscribed colleges get to choose from all the interviewees that have applied directly to them or are some allocated away before this stage?


There are differences between subjects - for example, Medicine (one of the most over-subscribed subjects) runs everything centrally. Most subjects that are over-subscribed and which experience variation in applicants across colleges use a system of ring-fencing. Colleges can retain so many students per quota place out of direct applicants and the rest are released but may be returned as part of a balanced interview pool (balanced = a pool that consists of candidates that are high, medium, or lower ranked according the the initial assessment, based on the UCAS form and admissions tests). If a college has a very large number of applicants it may be able to construct a balanced interview pool out of the direct applicants and will release the rest to be reallocated to interview pools at other colleges.

The main point is that, come interviews, all the admitting colleges will interview roughly the same number of applicants per place and they should all see a mix of high, medium, and lower ranked candidates based on the pre-interview assessment.
Original post by yang323
I'm looking for a college with a relatively large number of students and fellows in Engineering and has a table tennis table. Any suggestion?


Posted from TSR Mobile


We would meet your criteria - but we think that nearly every other college offering Engineering would too.

Our advice is to look at the Fellows' profiles on the College web pages and see if the types of research they do interest you and also try looking at their TSE wiki pages and alternative prospectuses - or visiting them at Open Days (next one is Sept 18th TOMORROW!).
Original post by elen90
Is there any college in particular which is known to be more diverse, in that it holds more international students?


There are no specialist international student colleges. Most colleges in a typical year will have around 10-15% overseas UGs. For information, here is our 2015 Fresher breakdown:

Chinese 1 Danish 1 Finnish 1 French 1 German 1 Hong Kong 1 Italian 1 Polish 1 Singaporean 4 South Korean 1 Spanish 1 UK national 90United States citizen 2

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