Many moons ago, when I was a student, there was a real sense of expectation around students who achieved those elusive top grades at A-Level. If you didn't think it was for you, you were still pushed to place an application to Oxford or Cambridge, especially if, like me, you were more a minority ethnic background.

The excitement starts when applying to university, choosing a course and actually thinking about what you want to do. It is a life changing experience that will shape your future. Being accepted and receiving offers at your chosen university is one of the greatest feelings you can have.

The tables have turned on universities who, as of this year, will be the ones competing for brightest students as the cap on numbers is relaxed furthe...

Young people today have a far greater range of educational choices than ever before and, thanks to the technological revolution, numerous ways of accessing them. What these latest statistics show, when studied in context, is that these options are no longer going unnoticed.

University applications have finally seen their first rise since tuition fees were hiked, which is great news. We are to be encouraged, too, by the one per cent rise this year in applications from 18-year-olds living in the poorest areas of the country. But it is not enough.

There's something to be said for a single application process for all school leavers: UCAS has been gesturing in this direction for a while, with UCAS Progress, which was intended to incorporate all the options from 14 to 19, although so far hasn't included work-based options.

Before even suggesting they should apply to university, it's about time people re-thought how to treat the working class as a category, not dividing them by races.

Updated: 7 January 2012 - statement from Aberystwyth University Universities in Wales are at the centre of a "dumbing down" row as it was revealed...

The number of UK students applying to university has slumped for the second year in a row, official figures show. New UCAS statistics show that 265...

Tens of thousands fewer students started university courses this autumn following the move to triple tuition fees, it was suggested on Thursday. Co...

This week's round-up of student confessions sees post grads in porn careers, revenge on exes and stealing a pet fish after a one-night stand. We're...

Up to 30,000 fewer students may have started university courses this year following the tuition fee hike, the government's fair access tsar has sugges...

The number of students in England applying to university has slumped by almost 10%, official figures show. The latest Ucas statistics reveal that a...

Why doesn't this ambitious, motivated straight-As sixth-form student from one of London's inner suburbs know how to get into town, a distance of around five miles?

UCAS is a brilliant middle-man to apply to university by. However, deadlines are not clear and the innate details you have to include are so in depth, you half expect you have to put your great great grandmother's cat's name on the 'additional information' section!

One of the reasons many students - myself included - chose to go to university in the UK rather than elsewhere, was that most degrees here are only three years long. Back in the day, when we were filling out our UCAS applications, it seemed like such an advantage.

Plans to reform A-levels could lead to a two-tier system with students discriminated against because of the subjects they choose, the Government has b...

Students appear to want more for their money as recent figures show applications for medicine and Oxbridge courses have increased since 2009 despite t...

The UCAS deadline for Oxbridge applications is looming but if your mind still isn't made up, we've got some tips and advice on hand to help you on you...

What seems obvious to people who went to a school where the closest thing to a tuck shop was the Chicken Spot over the road, is not what they believe over at Britain's top schools. Ask most Wickamists, Etonians or Salopians* and they'll tell you that getting into Oxbridge from a state school is easier than looting trainers in a riot.

The problem of falling student numbers, which could cost universities £1.3bn, was highlighted by Ucas a year ago but the government ignored warnings,...

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover." Mark Twain.

Welcome to the second in my triptych of blogs about getting into Oxbridge. Sorry if you have a tweed fetish and actually came here for sex tips.

Remember, you'll be up against thousands of others who are also pitching their case to the universities, so whatever you write needs to be good.

Here's some advice about getting into the big two that's a little less 'be yourself' and a little more 'prepare like so'. I graduated from Oxford a couple of years ago and while I was there I worked at University open days and for my college as an interviews chaperone. I know the system, and in my next three posts I'll reveal what you need to do to get in.