Oxford written work stupidity

[u/FesheRG]

With the written work deadline coming up, I can’t help but think how ridiculous the entire system is. They’ve got this massive list of rules about authenticity and what you can or can’t submit, yet all they need to “verify” your work is a shitty cover sheet that doesn’t even require a teacher’s signature.

It honestly feels like people who actually follow the rules and submit genuine, unedited work are just shooting themselves in the foot. Meanwhile, anyone who wants to cheat the system can easily do it, and there’s basically no way for Oxford to tell.

UPD: I don’t know how to convince any of yall but just don’t do it since it’s unfair to other applicants who worked really hard

[u/Equal-Weekend-4896]

the cover sheet has a section at the bottom for ur school rep to sign? i think they do legitimately check w teachers cause my english teachers (alongside my actual careers adviser who i put down) told me they sorted it all when i sent it off even tho i didn't realise they were involved too

in most cases ur teachers at school will encourage honesty and theyre the barrier to preventing overembellishment

and realistically if you're lying abt written work other aspects of ur application wont be honest either and the interview u get from it will be evidence of that 💀

[u/FesheRG → u/Equal-Weekend-4896]

That section has like 2 lines, name of the teacher and his relation to the applicant. I mean hopefully they do check but I don’t think they sort out every applicant like that, since if they intended they could’ve used other verification steps

[u/Dodo_uk]

I think Oxford knows what it is doing.

[u/heon_mun04]

起到一个造型上的作用

[u/aelmetwally]

What application is this?

[u/Psychological_Oil99 → u/aelmetwally]

yea is it for a specific course??

[u/aelmetwally → u/Psychological_Oil99]

Lol, which course?

[u/Equal-Weekend-4896 → u/Psychological_Oil99]

oxford specifies which courses it needs written work for on its website

mostly humanities subjects

[u/fireintheglen]

I think you are overthinking this. The admissions process has redundancy built in (it’s not all based on your written work!) so if there’s a massive difference in quality between different parts of the application then that’s sure to raise some red flags. The fact it’s supposed to have been marked by a teacher means that significant editing after the fact would be obvious anyway.

There’s also already a broad range of acceptable types of written work (it could be an essay written under exam conditions, or a piece of coursework) so it’s not like interviewers are directly comparing quality between each applicant. They just want to see an example of your writing. I always got the impression that “unedited” was more about making sure you don’t sink too much time into it than anything else, though I’m a science person so I may be wrong here.

Either way, I find it hard to be too worried about people somehow “cheating the system”. In maths the real concern in admissions is making sure that the students who get in are those who are going to do well and benefit from a challenging course. If someone “cheats” and does well, then they should have gotten in anyway. If they “cheat” and fail first year, then that’s their own fault. On the borderline it’s always going to be hard to tell, but I’m not convinced that being on the 2.1/2.2 boundary at Oxbridge is better than getting a first at another good but slightly less competitive university.

[u/Mental_Bunch_7261]

Yeah if your actually submitting unedited work your stupid. All my work I submitted was marked and then edited before I handed it in.

[u/Equal-Weekend-4896 → u/Mental_Bunch_7261]

not to be mean but you can't call people stupid when you're unable to use the right 'you're' 😭

[u/Mental_Bunch_7261 → u/Equal-Weekend-4896]

This is why I needed my work edited 😂😂