Cranford Review 2019

UNIQ residential at
Oxford University:
Art History
30th June- 4th July 2019
UNIQ
is an access programme,
which prioritises students
with high grades from backgrounds that are underrepresented
at Oxford and other highly selective
universities. Simran Sidhu who is currently
studying Art at A Level took a leap of faith,
applied for a place on the programme and was
successful. It is clear that the whole process has
raised her confidence and also given her a good
insight into university life at Oxford. She has had
opportunities that have been very valuable and it
was a great experience that allowed her to sample
the variety of resources that the university had to
offer.
Here is her account of the residential at Oxford.
Pam Hunt (Creative Arts –Art)
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My experience at UNIQ was amazing and I
would definitely recommend it to anyone who plans on
applying to Oxford. I applied for the History of Art course
and I had to write a personal statement as to why I wanted
to study it. UNIQ is designed for students in their first year
of A-Levels to have an insight into what university life is
like for their chosen subject. I arrived on a Sunday where
we were divided into groups according to which college
we were staying at. I was given accommodation at Trinity
College which was in the centre of town and near all the
shops. On the Sunday we were given time to settle in and
get ready for the academic programme of that week. On
Monday we were told to be down for breakfast at 8:00am
and be finished by 9:00 to leave on time. I was taken to
the main building where they teach History of Art and was
introduced to our tutors. We began by carrying out a visual
analysis of a few paintings as a warm up. We were then given
an object or painting to give a presentation about at the
end of the week. The painting I had been assigned was the
‘The Hunt in the Forest’ by Paolo Uccello. Our days were
packed full of workshops related to personal statements,
interviews, the admissions process and finances. On Tuesday
we were taken to the Ashmolean museum and the Pitts River
museum, I really enjoyed this because they were both very
different. The Ashmolean was more traditional and the Pitts
River was more cultural. We also had a chance to see the
objects we had been assigned ‘in the flesh’ and we were able
to gather more information for our presentation. We were
given tours around some of the colleges; some were more
traditional like St John’s and some more modern like Lady
Catherine’s. During the afternoon we visited the library at
St John’s College where we were given the rare chance to
look at and touch books that were over 500 years old. One
of the oldest books we saw was from the 9th century. On
Wednesday we went to the Bodleian Library where scenes
of the Harry Potter films were filmed and then we went to
the UNIQ party. Thursday was our final day when we had
to present our findings. We then attended a final reflection
session and left Oxford University for home.
I really enjoyed my experience there because it was
completely different to how I thought it would be: Oxford was
not so intimidating. UNIQ helped me understand what kind
of applicants Oxford are looking for and whether or not their
style of teaching is something that I liked. I was grateful to
get a place on UNIQ because out of over 6300 applications
I was lucky enough to be one of the chosen 1350. It was an
excellent opportunity that helped me make decisions about
what I wanted to do next. To anyone thinking
of applying to Oxford in the future UNIQ is
something I highly recommend. It was fun to
meet people from all over the UK who share
the same interests as me.
Simran Sidhu (year 12)