Monday, June 12, 2017

Gazing upon Oxford's "dreaming spires"


And that sweet City with her dreaming spires,
She needs not June for beauty’s heightening,

--Matthew Arnold


A life without regrets is a life not worth living.  No matter how "successful" the world may judge you, deep in your heart you know that you have failed to climb to what computer gamers would call "the next level."

For me, I suppose, that next level -- perhaps several levels above -- would have been a degree from Oxford.  I'm not sure when my infatuation with Oxford began, but it was certainly reinforced by reading Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited, and watching the TV series based on that novel.  But Waugh's Oxford was an atavistic experience of social connections, friendships, and traditions.  That picture, especially when accompanied by the series' theme music, was immensely attractive.

But I wanted to be an Oxford scholar.  I saw myself -- realistically -- as the young man who sat preparing for the next day's tutorial while others were out getting drunk.

Thus the appeal that's led me back to visit Oxford on several occasions -- always frustrated by the knowledge that I am seeing only a glimpse of the surface, while the reality of Oxford life is shared by only the elect few.  Nevertheless, last Thursday, my last full day in England, I took an early morning train to Oxford for one more brief visit. 

I wandered the hallowed streets -- somewhat less dreamy now, than when Matthew Arnold rhapsodized upon them -- and paid a few pounds for admission to two of the larger and more architecturally striking colleges -- Christ Church and Magdalen.  Christ Church has created a path marked by arrows for visitors to follow, and before you know it you're back out on the street.  Magdalen, however, is more generous.  Once past the turnstile, you're pretty much on your own.  You can go everywhere you want, except the rooms of students and dons, and the dining halls. 

Magdalen's a beautiful school, and I could see myself happily ensconced within -- the same emotion of being where I belonged that I acknowledged feeling, a few posts ago, while studying in the old law school facilities at the University of Washington. I gazed with envy at kids walking down the street, wearing the vest-like mini-gowns that told the world they were Oxford undergraduates.

But would I really have enjoyed it?  Back in Seattle, I perused message boards on the topic of admission to Oxford and the Oxford student experience.  Those writers posting were all current or past Oxford students.  Nearly all agreed that, regardless of whatever misgivings they may have originally felt about how they would fit in at Oxford, it had been a life-changing experience and one they wouldn't have missed.

The fact that they had all been brilliant enough to have been admitted, however, certainly skewed the results.  Admission of British students requires extremely high A-level exam scores following the sixth form -- what we would call the last two years of high school -- with an early concentration on one or two fields that the student intends to pursue at the university level.  Selection for interviews is based entirely on the A-levels, and the interviews themselves are an intensive investigation into the applicant's academic and personal suitability for Oxford studies.

For applicants from foreign countries, Oxford tries to accommodate the different preparatory programs those countries use.  Thus, with American high school students, the university looks to AP and IB scores (but not SATs) as the closest analogue to British A-levels.  But it's difficult, because the two testing systems aren't strictly equivalent.  As a result, although Oxford has a fairly large number of American graduate students, the proportion of American undergraduates is small.

That would have been disheartening to me -- especially having gone to high school in the Paleozoic era, before Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate programs had been invented.  And considering the lack of specialization in American high schools, in the absence of AP or IB classes, I would have been totally unprepared academically for consideration by Oxford.

Also, several former students observed that Oxford is a good choice for a certain type of personality -- students who enjoy thinking out loud and arguing their conclusions with some conviction.  Most teaching is done in tutorials -- individual or very small group settings with "tutors."  If a student hasn't kept up with his studies, it becomes all too apparent at the weekly tutorials.  Students who are equally intelligent but who excel more obviously in writing, some said, would do better at more conventional universities. 

I try to remember myself as an 18-year-old.  I was outspoken in high school classes, but that was no great accomplishment where I went to school.  I was shy socially, but not so shy academically.  At my university, all freshmen took a course called "History of Western Civilization."  All students attended a weekly lecture, and then, three times a week, attended small class groups of about twenty, each led by a professor who guided discussions based on extensive reading.  Grades were heavily dependent on participation in class discussions.

I enjoyed taking part in the discussions.  Maybe, then, I would have enjoyed Oxford's tutorial system.  On the other hand, I have no doubt that I've always performed better in writing than in speaking.  Even as a trial attorney, my oral presentations required careful preparation -- I didn't speak well  off the cuff, unless absorbed in a heated argument.

So, I don't know.  Reading the student comments did make the Oxford experience -- both the admissions process and the day to day academic life -- seem intimidating.  On the other hand, our minds and personalities are flexible when we're 18.  And stepping outside our comfort zone is an excellent path to growth.  Or, if too far out of our comfort zone, disaster!

But, as we say, it's all academic.  An Oxford education exists only in my fantasies -- and probably would have been nothing but fantasy under the best of circumstances.  And at my present age, even post-graduate education is out of the question.  All universities -- not just Oxford and Cambridge -- insist on investing their limited resources in students who possess a few more years life expectancy than I can offer.

Ah well.  I can still walk the streets of Oxford's "dreaming spires," and dream my own silent dreams.

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