Hi guys! Welcome back to my channel
Hi guys, it's Ayanfe. Welcome back to my
channel
And I'll be sharing with you how I got
into the University of Cambridge
To study medicine. This is a funny story
because not many people know it
And most people from my sixth form didn't even know I was applying.
Like most of them didn't know I had applied, until I'd gotten in
And I became the first person in almost 10 years to get into an Oxbridge university from my sixth form
Which is really cool
But I'm gonna share with you, my progress, how I did it
Some tips and my overall story
So I think my journey, I would say started in
year 12 when I went to an Oxford shadowing day
Organised by the Oxford
ACS at the time
Basically, I found out about the shadowing day two days before the deadline for like submission
of applications and I found it out on
Twitter because my brother saw it
randomly and then he sent it to me and I
then quickly I filled out the application
application and I had to go to Oxford and had to wake up at 3am, leave Leicester at 4am
take a coach.
But it was like an overall amazing day
Because that was the first time I really considered Oxbridge as an option
I don't know why it wasn't really in the back of my mind
I was more focused on doing medicine
at whatever uni but
then that was the first time really
considered that maybe I could actually
do this and I met loads of cool people
Renee, her and Courtney's video was like the main stimulus I guess
that made me really start thinking and
then Josh, Vee's friend which was YouTuber
I watched at the time and watch now as
well. But, yeah that's really interesting
But then, that was the first time really
considered it and then
Sorry, I'm looking down at my notes so I don't forget anything
And I guess that would be my turning point.
And I didn't really think much about it after because I went back
into school it wasn't really like a
big thing, like a school didn't really
send people to Oxbridge, so it wasn't like
pushed in the school
And then when it came to summer when I was like thinking more about university applications
I was like "I can't do this, I can't apply" 
And that was mainly because
1) I didn't think that I would fit into that type
of environment because...
And what else
2) Because I saw medicine as 
difficult enough to get into any uni so
I didn't want to add extra stress and
I do not enjoy stress so
And then there'd be extra stress of SAQ, extra stress of another admissions test and I was like
"I cannot do this, I can't do this" 
And then the third reason
because our school hadn't sent many people before, so I thought I wouldn't get as much support
as some other applicants.
Especially because some
some people is there like in life as
part of their life goals to go here and
I was like I'm not prepared
So then at that point, I'd written it all off
Then especially after I did my UKCAT/UCAT
which is one of the admissions test for medicine
I was like, "Definitely not!"
Because my UKCAT was
quite good, like above average so I could
have applied to most UKCAT/UCAT
Universities and gotten in hopefully
If my personal statement interview went okay
Yeah, so I wrote off the BMAT completely and I was like
I'm just gonna apply to UKCAT universities
But I remember my mom always tells me, both of my
parents told me, aim for the best 
So Oxford and Cambridge, my mom was like
"You're applying to one of them pick
one"
Well obviously, she didn't force me like
She was just like very encouraging
And I will still battling with it
Until it was like three weeks
until we had to send off our applications
which is at some point in September
because of early UCAS admissions and whatnot
Ultimately, I picked Cambridge because I was not prepared
The BMAT  that we had to do,
 I knew of course, that people were only applying to
BMAT universities, so some people would
have been revising since summer and I was
like "I cannot compete with that",
especially because Oxford looks at your
grades and your BMAT score quite
heavily and Cambridge is more like
everything because they invite so many
people for interviews. So they get to know
you a little bit more but Oxford invite less people
So I could not predict
what I would have gotten in that BMAT, so
I was like "I'll be safer with Cambridge"
So I chose Cambridge and in Cambridge I
go to Robinson College
So if you ask me why I chose Robinson 
 college, I chose College because...
I'm gonna be honest Courtney Daniella went there
and then that was like the only college
I had really heard of at a time.
Like Kings, Trinity, didn't know her
So when I went into more detail and in like really investigating colleges
I researched the average BMAT score for
each of the colleges and then Robinson's
was like achievable which was good and
then I looked at the website for
the applicants to offer ratio for my
subject and that Robinson was also okay
So I thought like if I wanted to
apply, especially cuz it was so last minute
I was like "I'm gonna give myself the best chance to actually get in", so I applied to Robinson
And also, they had the highest amount of ensuites per the population
I'm not sharing a bathroom, that is a myth, I do not want to do that
And I have a shared one since, so
who's winning now hey hey
Those are the main reasons I chose Robinson but love it 
Like the architecture is very intersting
It has character
One of our six form helpers at the time was
He was a recent graduate from
Cambridge, which is really weird how
everything worked out 
But yeah I told him after I'd applied which
college I applied to and he was like Robinson, 
that's very red, like it has a lot of red brick
And I was like, okay
Fully knowing that I hadn't seen
what this college looks like 
Did I even Google it? Did I Google it? No
Also, Google colleges!
So with medicine, you don't have to send off any previous work which is good 
But you had to do the admissions test before the interview
So you find out what you get, like a few weeks before the interview
And for preparing for that
BMAT, because obviously, I was the
only one in my school who applied for
Oxbridge and only one applying for
medicine at Oxbridge.
We had two of us applying for medicine that whole year
and yeah I was the onyl one doing the BMAT and I didn't have much support
in terms of revision and every morning
before school started I had to get to school
30 minutes, 45 minutes early anyway 
So I used that time to go on
BMAT ninja, which is why the main resource I used and do loads of practice questions before school started
And I didn't really wanna tell my teachers I was applying so I still had to keep up with the work and
then be revising for the BMAT at the
same time so what that's what I did
so in terms of personal statement, it was
the longest part that application.
But it was also my most enjoyable I guess.
I quite enjoyed writing it
So with the personal statement, first thing about Cambridge is, you have to make
it quite scientific.
Ooh, one of the other reasons (I just forgot)
One of the reasons I thought I wouldn't  apply is because I don't like reading
Sorry, I do not like reading
Well I didn't use to
But I'm enjoying it, I'm learning how to enjoy it
I didn't use to like reading and I used to read
So I always thought that all Cambridge and Oxford people like read for fun
and that's what they do because
they're nerds
I'm sorry but I was like my preconception
So I didn't like reading and then when it came to my
personal statement I was like "Do I have to
read a research paper and like say how I
enjoyed it and all that stuff"
but then everything ties together
because what I ended up writing in my
personal statement was about
I don't know if you guys have watched Concussion,
the movie with Will Smith playing Bennet Omalu
Who's an American medical doctor
Nigerian American medical doctor
He found out about the effects of American football on the brain and like the
effects on behaviour and stuff.
And I watch that movie on the on the way back
from the Oxford shadowing day and then I
was really interested in it so I researched more about it
Then I wrote about it my personal statement so
I didn't have to read, I just watched a
movie
Yeah, it was really interesting, that's what I ended up writing about in my personal statement
And then I did work experience at a care
home and loads of them had dementia as
well so I managed to tie that in with
the CTE - the disorder and I managed to
tie that in. I was really interested in that as well
So my personal statement
was split into work experience and interests
volunteering and then I linked that back to my interest in medicine and all of that
Then extracurriculars
So, I just have a little list of what I included
So I included that I was a prefect, I was in the school council for two years, I taught primary school children how to read
And I also supported with, especially the kids that had more trouble keeping up with the rest of the class.
I would do 1-on-1 classes in them
and that was every Monday during year 12, 
I did that
I also did athletics and netball and I was in the church choir for 10 years.
so I added that all of that in my personal statemet
I had loads of people that gave it to
I gave it to my form tutor,
my brother who does medicine as
well, one of my brother's friends who
happen to be at Cambridge at the time 
When I tell you everything's
ordered steps because like there's so
many things that interlined
That just made it possible for me to go
So I dm'd random people on Twitter
All I did was type a passive statement medicine
on the Twitter search and then some
people had like put tweets out a few
days before - which is a random as well
"I'm a fourth-year medical at Imperial...", I think one of them said "...if you need me to read over
your personal statement just dm me"
I dm'd two of these people and they were so much help!
Let me tell you, it's so mad
My whole journey to Cambridge was like ordered steps and like destiny helpers for real
So I sent off my personal statement and then also we have to do a SAQ
I just wrote more about like was really
interested in, like the Bennet Omalu thing
and then spoke some more about my
work experience I could have add into
my personal statement cuz I didn't
have enough words and then yeah
Yeah, so I had sent off my application,done my SAQ
With interviews, I prepared for it with
help from two of my biology teachers
Interviews, like I said before, the first time I was in Cambridge so I was like
"This is nice, it's a nice city"
I didn't really get to look around because
I thought I'd be late for my interview,
I wasn't, I was early and the interview
was a very interesting, lemme tell you!
But I'll kinda do a different interview
story because it was quite an
interesting day
My interview was quite good, I had three and
I thought most of them might of them had two, but I had three that day
I was there from like 2 till 7-ish
After the interview it was the long wait
to find out whether you got in 
and I remember
Okay so this is the story,
so there's like a specific day that
Oxbridge send out their results
like the Oxbridge results day. and everyone was like really panicky on like Twitter
So it was a day that we were meant to get our letters or
emails and I remember that day, I
was going to have a mock the next day
so I was at home anyway. I was like
really wait for the letter
and then that night I was in my bed and
I couldn't sleep and it was like 2am
I had a mock the next day. 
It was a maths mock as well
and then Youtube recommended
was like a video of like students who
commit suicide or something like there's
mental health videos show what's that
now one of them was of a person who went to Oxford I think and then he was like
under so much stress and all of that and
then I went to bed thinking.
Yeah God, if you don't let me get this
thing is because you care about me and
you don't want me to be stressed so that
is why I won't get in and if you do let me
get in then, that's great but if you
don't let me get in then isn't good
because I will not be stressed.
And that I was my mindset I wasn't like to...
And I think that really relieved me as well because I'm like "Why do I wanna
go through all this stress and break my
head" Why?
But the next day I went to my mock
Now I was in that sixth form study
area, silent study, it was just a place,
it wasn't in the room it was just a area of
air and seats. So then, our head of
sixth form at a time... 
like not everyone knew I had even applied
Because we were meant to have our results the day before and I hadn't told
him that I got in, so he just assumed that I didn't get in
and then, he shouted! he yelled! in front of the sixth form area
and like I told he's not a room, it's an
area, just a space, so there were bare people there
and then he was like "I guess it was
no use then" and I was like....
I was doing my work, my head
and it was like outwardly I
was like "um I haven't got an email yet so I wouldn't... I don't know
I'm just gonna do my mock and then
see if it comes later" and then obviously
but him and I was like
But in my brain, I was like "WHAT?! WHAT DO YOU MEAN!!"
But yeah but I didn't really deep it until when I got home and I told
my mom and she was like huh 
but yeah so then that day actually
he was like after you finish a mock come and meet me so we can open your email
together, cuz he assumed that I'll
get the email by then
So then after the mock, I saw the email in my phone and I ran home.
I don't want to open it with anyone around
I was gonna like, wait I got home and then open the email and then see like what the
option was. But then, I just couldn't...
my walk hoe is an hour I just couldn't
wait an hour to get home and then open
the email. So I opened it like when I was
outside school property and it was like 
Congratulations...blah...blah...blah... you got in
and I ran...I ran down the street of the
school.
 I know where I was running to
because my house is still far 
But I ran and I try to call my brother
cuz obviously he does medicine too
and he didn't answer,  I tried
to call my dad, he didn't answer
Then I tried to call my mum she did not
answer either
My sister was still in school
so I couldn't I tell her 
So I call my best friend and she screamed and we were both
screaming, we were both screaming while I
was running down the street looking like
a were, like a mad lady 
Then I
stopped running cuz  I'm not fit 
I stopped running and walked the way home
After I told like sixth form and stuff and then
they were happy as well then of
course we did a levels 
What an interesting time
I was nervous because the exams are very
interesting 
One of the maths exams I
missed a whole question probably like a
question in the half
 I missed our whole question
because I was like my brain hurts and I think was our very last exam
like my brain hurts, I've done too many exams
 I'm tired of this
I missed out like one question and a half
but I tried... I tried
So when it came to results day,
 I was quite confident with
maths , but then there was like biology and
chemistry and the biology exam was the
one where everyone's crying so I didn't
know what to think about that
Chemistry was quite an iffy subject anyway
So then I saw my results on the day
I didn't even I could see my results I
would logged unto track and then I
jumped from my bed because I'm on a bunk bed
I jumped from my bed and everyone was still asleep 
And I was like "Wakeup everyone! I got in"
My whole family were so happy 
My dad and my mom were dancing
my dad prayed for 30 minutes
I almost missed results day
I almost missed results day because by the time I got back to school the teachers were gone! they were gone!
I hope you enjoy listening to my story about how I got into Cambridge
I think what I want you guys to get from it the most is that no
matter how ill-prepared you may feel, or
how disadvantaged you think you might be
you still need to try and if I never
tried I wouldn't have seen what I could do
But, honestly if you would like to go I
believe that you can and this channel
to encourage as many of you guys as
possible to really achieve your dreams, whether it is applying to the top medical
schools or even considering medicine in
the first place
or applying to Oxbridge or the top or
Russell group universities
It is to empower you
with the confidence that you can and you
will!
So yeah make sure you subscribe, share
and I'll see you in the next one!
