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I've studied in Cambridge myself, and feel like some context needs to be added here for American readers not to misunderstand something here: Admission to Camb

by gyulai 5y ago

I've studied in Cambridge myself, and feel like some context needs to be added here for American readers not to misunderstand something here: Admission to Cambridge & Oxford isn't related to family wealth in the same way as admission to "elite" universities in the U.S. For example: Tuition fees are in line with government-set rates and are no different for these institutions than other British universities (at least it was that way, back when I was there in 2005-2009). While the U.K. was part of the E.U. these low rates even applied to students coming to study there from elsewhere in the E.U. It is only "overseas" students who are asked to pay significantly more. One thing that I found noteworthy when applying was also the fact that, for Cambridge, the admissions process had two phases: The first was academic acceptance. Those application forms made absolutely no mention of money. After a student has been academically accepted, there is a second phase in the application process that involves application to scholarships and ends with the applicant having to provide proof that they have the required funds to sustain themselves through the study period. This was very different from what I remember about applying to universities in the U.S. which asked you to disclose your family's financial situation on the same application form that was also used to decide academic acceptance. That form, incidentally, also asked about things like family members who have attended the same university, etc. ...so there is much less transparency there to guarantee that a U.S. school wouldn't just use your socioeconomic standing directly as a criterion to decide admission. There are, of course, impediments to social mobility into the class of Oxbridge-educated people, but it revolves more around academics than about money. For example, I found that the students disproportionately came from families where their parents were career academics. The relationship with those families having a lot of money was not something I particularly noticed. The "poshness" of it all, particularly where undergraduate circles are concerned, also comes to a large extent from free choices that students themselves make to try to socially set themselves apart from their peers at other unversities. For example many willfully adopt "received pronunciation" to replace their natural dialects.

varispeed 5y ago
Do you think universities still offer knowledge otherwise not accessible anywhere else? I mean, there are courses that require "hands on" experience and guidance, but for things like IT, how uni is any better than e.g. Udemy, free lectures from around the world and meetups?
- zhdc1 5y ago
  In person instruction and a large social community of intelligent and - hopefully - motivated people.
- gyulai 5y ago
  I think going to university is a luxury. It is a luxury I personally enjoyed having in my life. It is a luxury I want my children to be able to enjoy one day. It makes your life richer in the same way that, say, having horses makes your life richer, or sailing around the world in a yacht. Of course there are people who don't enjoy horses. Or yachts. And not enjoying university should be seen as being no different. If you look at them as an investment, I don't think they're a particularly good one. And I think that this cycle of runaway inflation with regard to academic credentials as a prerequisite for jobs that don't actually require them is something that should be stopped.
- thefz 5y ago
  I have been lucky enough to have some of my university courses taught by some luminaries in their field. Most of them have taught me a framework for thinking as well as their course, not to mention being able to transmit some of their passion and love for curiosity. There is so much more besides lessons at the university, I would not even compare any video course with it honestly.
- aardvark179 5y ago
  When I was doing CS we had a lecture course on Pi calculus with very extensive hand written notes, because it was a field still very much in development and there was no textbook. I think there is a lot to be said for taking a degree which lends an element of structure not chosen by you. Sometimes you need to learn the stuff that doesn’t interest you to have a foundation to really understand the stuff that does, and you might find there are other things you had never been interested enough in to even consider which will turn out to be really interesting. On top of that I think tuition in small groups is much better than I’ve seen any meetup group manage. I’ve organized it once at a previous employer to help get some our application developers to the point where they could work on the our core vm and database, and I think they found it helpful being able to ask questions and talk over where exercises had given them trouble.
nicoburns 5y ago
> There are, of course, impediments to social mobility into the class of Oxbridge-educated people, but it revolves more around academics than about money. For example, I found that the students disproportionately came from families where their parents were career academics. The relationship with those families having a lot of money was not something I particularly noticed. My observation studying in Oxford was that there was a big dispatity in opportunity, but it derived more from inequities in the quality of schooling available than unfairness in the admissions process. I met a lot of state educated students, but most of them came from well-regarded schools on upper-middle class areas that got hundreds of students into Oxbridge univeristies each year. Very few came from schools like mime that couldn't even work out which entrance exams I needn't to take for the course I was applying to.
iratic0 5y ago
"For example, I found that the students disproportionately came from families where their parents were career academics" I also found that students disproportionately cam from families who themselves had studied at Oxbridge. "The relationship with those families having a lot of money was not something I particularly noticed." When I was there, I noticed students disproportionately came from wealthy families, wealth in the millions rather than billions terms.
fallingknife 5y ago
I don't remember being asked about wealth on college apps. Are you thinking of the FAFSA, which is a government form, and not part of the application process?
- gyulai 5y ago
  I was thinking of the M.I.T. application form circa 2004. I seem to recall that it explicitly asked not just if I had enough money but to disclose how much money I had precisely, and it also explicitly asked if there were family members who had attended M.I.T.
  - caddemon 5y ago
    Maybe things were different in 2004, but those forms do not cross paths with admissions decisions whatsoever, for at least the last decade. The financial aid office won't communicate with admissions until offers have been decided. MIT is actually one of a few schools that is need blind for even international students, but almost every top school is need blind for domestic students these days. They want to have a financial aid package available to offer at the same time as admissions, which makes sense, so submitting your financial info prior to acceptance would be necessary for that.
    - gyulai 5y ago
      Yeah, I'm not suggesting that they would have done anything nefarious with that information. I'm just saying I liked the transparency of the Cambridge system. You'd hold an admission letter in your hand before anyone had asked any questions about money, making it very transparent that money had nothing to do with that decision. The possibility that you could end up in a situation of having an offer but no money would still exists, but then at least you'd know that that's what happened. If you put all the info on one form you have to basically just trust them to handle the information appropriately.
      - caddemon 5y ago
        Yeah I guess also the sticker price of Oxbridge being lower may make this the better choice. Even though the majority of students don't pay the list price at top US schools it is a really daunting number, and so for low income students not familiar with the process I can imagine getting an offer without any info about aid would be more stressful.
pm90 5y ago
I think you may have a misunderstanding of how the US education system works. There are lots of scholarships and financial aid opportunities accessible for students that need them. Most “Elite State Schools” also have some kind of programs that give preference to bright students from their own state. E.g. University of Texas gives an automatic admission to the top 7% of Texas high school graduates. In state tuition is almost always ridiculously cheaper.
- caddemon 5y ago
  Yes, also the private schools in the US that are comparable to Oxbridge all do need-blind admissions, and have very generous aid. Average cost paid at those schools is much lower than at mid-tier private schools or out of state schools. There are definitely a lot of indirect selection effects that lead to a smaller number of low income students at these schools, including legacy admissions at most of them as he points out. But acting like Harvard sorts by income in its admissions decisions is definitely not an accurate reflection of how things work in the US.
  - pnutjam 5y ago
    There are many of parts of the US education system that weed out poor people and disadvantaged people before the University has to deny their application. The poor people who get into elite universities in the US are very much an exception. Having parents that went to an Ivy League or going to one of their expensive "feeder" schools is the best indicator of whether you can get into an Elite US university.
    - caddemon 5y ago
      I never said that wasn't the case, just as it is obviously the case at Oxbridge. Making misleading comments about US schools using parental income directly in admissions decisions doesn't help fix any of that.
      - pnutjam 5y ago
        https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/commentary/sat-act-standardized-tests-equity-socioeconomic-status-wealth-20191029.html https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/commentary/sat-act-standard...
dogma1138 5y ago
Cambridge And Oxford and a few other “elite” unis don’t allow students to work during the school year afaik, this alone filters many students but “ironically” not the poorest ones which may be eligible for a full tuition cover + stipend. Low income families above the low income limit set by the government who cannot afford tuition + covering living expenses tend to be those who can’t really afford to attend those schools and this includes a lot of what would normally be considered middle class. Yes you can take a loan but Cambridge and Oxford as notoriously expensive to live around, student accommodation aren’t cheap and the overall cost of living is quite high. So you tend to skew towards either those who have money or families which planned for this from the get go, a few token poor people but quite a few of those that come from an “average” household.
- ratorx 5y ago
  Cambridge at the very least provides reasonably affordable accommodation for all years of your undergraduate degree. And some colleges provide accommodation for Masters and PhD students as well. The UK student loan is not perfect, but it does include a living stipend (which is family income based). Obviously it sucks to have to take a loan, but working is not a necessity (until after graduation). I’m not sure how reasonable the living stipend amounts are, but Cambridge is definitely reasonably affordable if you go out of the way for groceries etc. It’s a bit more expensive from a nightlife perspective, but again, college bars tend to have fairly cheap drinks.
  - dogma1138 5y ago
    The loans aren’t great if you are a student not living with their parents and studying outside of London if your parents have a household has a combined income of £45,000 you will be eligible for only £6000 p/a grant. If we take a £80,000 combined household income which won’t go that far in London especially if the family has more than one child and still paying for a mortgage or what is becoming more and more common these days rent. And while 80K is more than double the median household income this literally can be the salary of say two teachers or police officers with some seniority then you are only eligible for £4000. For Cambridge last time I checked student accommodations cost £150-200 p/w at the minimum. That more or less your loan gone on housing alone. The university itself requires the students to have £10,000 (well £9880) per year for living expenses this means that a family making £40K needs to add about £4K or 10% of their pre-tax income to their child’s education even with the stipend. It’s possible sure but many families simply can’t afford that. And more importantly because students are required to show proof of funds the parents would have to prove that they have that money ready and quite possibly for the entire duration of the degree if their income is too low for the uni to consider them to be able to afford support.
Ichthypresbyter 5y ago
>One thing that I found noteworthy when applying was also the fact that, for Cambridge, the admissions process had two phases: The first was academic acceptance. Those application forms made absolutely no mention of money. After a student has been academically accepted, there is a second phase in the application process that involves application to scholarships and ends with the applicant having to provide proof that they have the required funds to sustain themselves through the study period. As far as I can tell this only applies to graduate students, and possibly those from overseas (and other weird edge cases like people studying for a second undergraduate degree). If you apply as an 18-year-old from a British high school, you automatically get a loan from the government for tuition fees, can choose to borrow more to cover some of your living expenses, and will be given money by the university or your college if you come from a low-income family. You never have to show proof of funds, because the university will make sure you can afford to go.

by gyulai 5y ago

varispeed 5y ago

Do you think universities still offer knowledge otherwise not accessible anywhere else? I mean, there are courses that require "hands on" experience and guidance, but for things like IT, how uni is any better than e.g. Udemy, free lectures from around the world and meetups?

zhdc1 5y ago
In person instruction and a large social community of intelligent and - hopefully - motivated people.
gyulai 5y ago
I think going to university is a luxury. It is a luxury I personally enjoyed having in my life. It is a luxury I want my children to be able to enjoy one day. It makes your life richer in the same way that, say, having horses makes your life richer, or sailing around the world in a yacht. Of course there are people who don't enjoy horses. Or yachts. And not enjoying university should be seen as being no different. If you look at them as an investment, I don't think they're a particularly good one. And I think that this cycle of runaway inflation with regard to academic credentials as a prerequisite for jobs that don't actually require them is something that should be stopped.
thefz 5y ago
I have been lucky enough to have some of my university courses taught by some luminaries in their field. Most of them have taught me a framework for thinking as well as their course, not to mention being able to transmit some of their passion and love for curiosity. There is so much more besides lessons at the university, I would not even compare any video course with it honestly.
aardvark179 5y ago
When I was doing CS we had a lecture course on Pi calculus with very extensive hand written notes, because it was a field still very much in development and there was no textbook. I think there is a lot to be said for taking a degree which lends an element of structure not chosen by you. Sometimes you need to learn the stuff that doesn’t interest you to have a foundation to really understand the stuff that does, and you might find there are other things you had never been interested enough in to even consider which will turn out to be really interesting. On top of that I think tuition in small groups is much better than I’ve seen any meetup group manage. I’ve organized it once at a previous employer to help get some our application developers to the point where they could work on the our core vm and database, and I think they found it helpful being able to ask questions and talk over where exercises had given them trouble.

nicoburns 5y ago

> There are, of course, impediments to social mobility into the class of Oxbridge-educated people, but it revolves more around academics than about money. For example, I found that the students disproportionately came from families where their parents were career academics. The relationship with those families having a lot of money was not something I particularly noticed. My observation studying in Oxford was that there was a big dispatity in opportunity, but it derived more from inequities in the quality of schooling available than unfairness in the admissions process. I met a lot of state educated students, but most of them came from well-regarded schools on upper-middle class areas that got hundreds of students into Oxbridge univeristies each year. Very few came from schools like mime that couldn't even work out which entrance exams I needn't to take for the course I was applying to.

iratic0 5y ago

"For example, I found that the students disproportionately came from families where their parents were career academics" I also found that students disproportionately cam from families who themselves had studied at Oxbridge. "The relationship with those families having a lot of money was not something I particularly noticed." When I was there, I noticed students disproportionately came from wealthy families, wealth in the millions rather than billions terms.

fallingknife 5y ago

I don't remember being asked about wealth on college apps. Are you thinking of the FAFSA, which is a government form, and not part of the application process?

gyulai 5y ago
I was thinking of the M.I.T. application form circa 2004. I seem to recall that it explicitly asked not just if I had enough money but to disclose how much money I had precisely, and it also explicitly asked if there were family members who had attended M.I.T.
- caddemon 5y ago
  Maybe things were different in 2004, but those forms do not cross paths with admissions decisions whatsoever, for at least the last decade. The financial aid office won't communicate with admissions until offers have been decided. MIT is actually one of a few schools that is need blind for even international students, but almost every top school is need blind for domestic students these days. They want to have a financial aid package available to offer at the same time as admissions, which makes sense, so submitting your financial info prior to acceptance would be necessary for that.
  - gyulai 5y ago
    Yeah, I'm not suggesting that they would have done anything nefarious with that information. I'm just saying I liked the transparency of the Cambridge system. You'd hold an admission letter in your hand before anyone had asked any questions about money, making it very transparent that money had nothing to do with that decision. The possibility that you could end up in a situation of having an offer but no money would still exists, but then at least you'd know that that's what happened. If you put all the info on one form you have to basically just trust them to handle the information appropriately.
    - caddemon 5y ago
      Yeah I guess also the sticker price of Oxbridge being lower may make this the better choice. Even though the majority of students don't pay the list price at top US schools it is a really daunting number, and so for low income students not familiar with the process I can imagine getting an offer without any info about aid would be more stressful.

pm90 5y ago

I think you may have a misunderstanding of how the US education system works. There are lots of scholarships and financial aid opportunities accessible for students that need them. Most “Elite State Schools” also have some kind of programs that give preference to bright students from their own state. E.g. University of Texas gives an automatic admission to the top 7% of Texas high school graduates. In state tuition is almost always ridiculously cheaper.

caddemon 5y ago
Yes, also the private schools in the US that are comparable to Oxbridge all do need-blind admissions, and have very generous aid. Average cost paid at those schools is much lower than at mid-tier private schools or out of state schools. There are definitely a lot of indirect selection effects that lead to a smaller number of low income students at these schools, including legacy admissions at most of them as he points out. But acting like Harvard sorts by income in its admissions decisions is definitely not an accurate reflection of how things work in the US.
- pnutjam 5y ago
  There are many of parts of the US education system that weed out poor people and disadvantaged people before the University has to deny their application. The poor people who get into elite universities in the US are very much an exception. Having parents that went to an Ivy League or going to one of their expensive "feeder" schools is the best indicator of whether you can get into an Elite US university.
  - caddemon 5y ago
    I never said that wasn't the case, just as it is obviously the case at Oxbridge. Making misleading comments about US schools using parental income directly in admissions decisions doesn't help fix any of that.
    - pnutjam 5y ago
      https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/commentary/sat-act-standardized-tests-equity-socioeconomic-status-wealth-20191029.html https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/commentary/sat-act-standard...

dogma1138 5y ago

Cambridge And Oxford and a few other “elite” unis don’t allow students to work during the school year afaik, this alone filters many students but “ironically” not the poorest ones which may be eligible for a full tuition cover + stipend. Low income families above the low income limit set by the government who cannot afford tuition + covering living expenses tend to be those who can’t really afford to attend those schools and this includes a lot of what would normally be considered middle class. Yes you can take a loan but Cambridge and Oxford as notoriously expensive to live around, student accommodation aren’t cheap and the overall cost of living is quite high. So you tend to skew towards either those who have money or families which planned for this from the get go, a few token poor people but quite a few of those that come from an “average” household.

ratorx 5y ago
Cambridge at the very least provides reasonably affordable accommodation for all years of your undergraduate degree. And some colleges provide accommodation for Masters and PhD students as well. The UK student loan is not perfect, but it does include a living stipend (which is family income based). Obviously it sucks to have to take a loan, but working is not a necessity (until after graduation). I’m not sure how reasonable the living stipend amounts are, but Cambridge is definitely reasonably affordable if you go out of the way for groceries etc. It’s a bit more expensive from a nightlife perspective, but again, college bars tend to have fairly cheap drinks.
- dogma1138 5y ago
  The loans aren’t great if you are a student not living with their parents and studying outside of London if your parents have a household has a combined income of £45,000 you will be eligible for only £6000 p/a grant. If we take a £80,000 combined household income which won’t go that far in London especially if the family has more than one child and still paying for a mortgage or what is becoming more and more common these days rent. And while 80K is more than double the median household income this literally can be the salary of say two teachers or police officers with some seniority then you are only eligible for £4000. For Cambridge last time I checked student accommodations cost £150-200 p/w at the minimum. That more or less your loan gone on housing alone. The university itself requires the students to have £10,000 (well £9880) per year for living expenses this means that a family making £40K needs to add about £4K or 10% of their pre-tax income to their child’s education even with the stipend. It’s possible sure but many families simply can’t afford that. And more importantly because students are required to show proof of funds the parents would have to prove that they have that money ready and quite possibly for the entire duration of the degree if their income is too low for the uni to consider them to be able to afford support.

Ichthypresbyter 5y ago

>One thing that I found noteworthy when applying was also the fact that, for Cambridge, the admissions process had two phases: The first was academic acceptance. Those application forms made absolutely no mention of money. After a student has been academically accepted, there is a second phase in the application process that involves application to scholarships and ends with the applicant having to provide proof that they have the required funds to sustain themselves through the study period. As far as I can tell this only applies to graduate students, and possibly those from overseas (and other weird edge cases like people studying for a second undergraduate degree). If you apply as an 18-year-old from a British high school, you automatically get a loan from the government for tuition fees, can choose to borrow more to cover some of your living expenses, and will be given money by the university or your college if you come from a low-income family. You never have to show proof of funds, because the university will make sure you can afford to go.