This is an informal guide to studying Engineering Science at Oxford, along with some tips for your personal statement and interviews!
What's the course like?
Engineering Science at Oxford is a cool one because it’s a general course, which is great for indecisive people like me because you get to try all the different ‘flavours’ of Engineering before you have to choose which one is the one for you.
Each year - apart from 4th, when you’ll be working on a project of your choice- is split into 5 modules, which run parallel to each other. There is lots of information on the Oxford Engineering Science website, if you’re interested in the specifics.
Every week, you’ll have around 10 lectures, and 2 tutorials. Remember, the modules run parallel so not all lectures are on the same topics. Before each tutorial, you’re set a Problem Sheet, infamous for how fun they are (not really, but a challenge is always good for you). Using the information you’ve learnt from the lectures, as well as some recommended reading, you write out your solutions to the Problem Sheet to the best of your ability. You then go through it during the tutorial, with your tutorial partners (2 or 3 others from the same college) and tutor, who is unique to the module.
And then there’s labs. From computing to drawing, labs are your chance to learn some practical skills. They happen once a week for 5-7 hours; you are given tasks to complete within the lab session and you work through them with the occasional (or regular if you’re me) help from the incredible lab demonstrators, who are everyone’s saving grace.
It’s not all work, don’t worry
Whether it’s sports or societies or social events, there is so much to get involved in at Teddy. Even if you hate sport, don’t have many interests and don’t like going ‘out’, then you still have Teddy Hall dinner to look forward to every day, which is, not only delicious, but is such a good way to catch up with your fellow Teddy Hall-ers on a daily basis.
The Application Process:
Personal statement
Whatever subject you apply for at Oxford, the main thing to convey in your personal statement is your genuine interest in the subject. Your tutors want to know that you’re going to be engaged during tutorials and enthusiastic about what you’re learning about. So make sure that you’ve done things outside of just school work, that show that you really want to pursue engineering. It’s not a subject that is widely taught at A-levels, so make sure you know what it involves. How? Here are some examples:
Going to lectures by experts in the Engineering field
Watching relevant documentaries
Reading relevant books
Listening to relevant podcasts
Read relevant news stories and articles
Doing extra research on a specific topic you’re interested in (try watching TedTalks or listening to the TedTalk podcast/Radio Hour for inspiration).
If doing an Extended Project, make it Engineering-based
Getting some work experience/shadowing at an Engineering firm (not essential but great if you can)
Entrance Exam - PAT
Make sure you’ve revised your GCSE and A-level Mathematics and Physics. There are past papers online which will give you a good idea of what’s involved and you can find the syllabus on the Oxford website (https://www2.physics.ox.ac.uk/study-here/undergraduates/applications/physics-aptitude-test-pat/pat-syllabus)
Don’t fret if you look at a past paper and don’t understand 90% of it at the beginning- there is the chance that you haven’t covered all of the content in your A-levels at the time that you take the test- it is completely normal and most people will be in the same boat. You may need to read ahead on your A-level content if needed.
The paper structure changed in 2017, so try and save these papers for closer to when you take the test. This might seem obvious but remember to go through the solutions. Past papers are great to work through but the most important part isn’t doing the questions, it’s going through the answers and making sure you know where and where you went wrong.
And don’t get disheartened if you don’t get all the answers right, like you might be used to in your normal school exams. These questions are supposed to be challenging and the questions have marks for working-out (even the multiple choice questions), so try and give everything a go, even if it’s just writing the equations you think might be useful for the question.
The Interview
Huge congratulations if you’ve got yourself an interview! Make sure you realise how big of an achievement it to have gotten this far.
For Engineering, you will have two interviews: one interview will be at the college you applied to, where you’ll be staying overnight (if COVID decides to stop hanging around) and another interview, which will be allocated to you from a college at random.
The biggest thing you’ve got to remember is that the interview is not a ‘question and answer session’, where the tutors fire questions at you that you answer and move on. The best way to think of an interview is like how you would expect your subject tutorials to be (just without any other students.) Tutors want to see if you can interact and engage with them and whether you really are suited to the tutorial system. They might ask you a couple of questions on why you chose Engineering Science at Oxford, so do make you you know the answer to this, but it is likely just to make you feel more comfortable.
What they really want to know, is how you work through problems. Just like the PAT, the questions are not supposed to be easy. The tutors will pick questions that will be an advancement on basic concepts that you will hopefully have learnt about in the past and don’t be worried if you find it difficult. Honestly, they will probably be disappointed if you tell them the right answer immediately. They want to see how your brain works when you’re faced with something you don’t immediately understand.
The only way they’ll know this is if you talk through what you’re thinking. I cannot express this enough but don’t be afraid of making mistakes. It is much better to say something that might be wrong, but you think could be relevant, than to just say ‘I don’t know.’ Give it a go. You really have nothing to lose by trying. If you need a beat to think about it, that’s fine, but let them know that’s what you’re doing; they can’t read your mind and might think you’ve given up if you just go silent suddenly.
The tutors are there to guide you and it really is more of a conversation than a ‘grilling’. If you genuinely don’t know the
answer then try and use phrases like “I don’t think I’ve covered this yet, but I have seen something like this where…” You are allowed to ask for help if you’re really stuck; try and use what they tell you and build upon it using what you know from studying your A-levels.
Sketching graphs. Whether you love it or hate it, practise drawing graphs of functions because it is very common to be asked to do this in your interview. The functions are likely to be ones that you wouldn’t necessarily do in A-level Mathematics- things like reciprocals, square roots or more advanced trig- but there is a technique to it (eg. Looking at where they would cross the axis, the origin, any asymptotes that might exist, etc) and practise really is the key for these kinds of problems. The best part is that you don’t even need past questions for these. Think of a random function, try and sketch it and then check it using an online grapher like Desmos.
Finally, the interview process isn’t just the interviews. If you really want to come to Oxford, you might even enjoy the interview, though it sounds weird. And if you don’t, then, like I said, there is more to it. COVID-permitting, it’s free accommodation and food! And it’s a great way to meet new people and socialise. Enjoy the process and don’t jump to conclusions on how you think the interview went. It really is impossible to tell; whether you think it went great or it went awful, it’s pretty hard to tell as an interviewee, so don’t stress out about it.
I hope you found this helpful! Whatever happens, well done for applying and giving it a go in the first place. Applications are a pain but they don’t last forever. maybe even see you around the Teddy Hall corridors sometime! You’ve got this.
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