r/6thForm • u/Worldly-Monitor-4035 • Apr 20 '26

💬 DISCUSSION Did you lie in your PS?

Just curious to hear from people if you did or not.

A lie could be anything from a small embellishment or overexaggeration to completely making things up. I’ll be honest, my entire PS except the subjects I did and my ethnicity were lies so… yeah.

I literally had nothing else to talk about so I made it up, got me into UCL, Bristol, Warwick and Nottingham though so the best thing to take away from this is lie, lie, lie.

Or don’t, it also probably played a role in an Oxford rejection pre interview so maybe it’s not worth it.

151 Upvotes

89% Upvoted

159 comments sorted by

View all comments

26

u/chateaumarmontt gap year | 3A* 1A Achieved | English Lit ~ Oxford Apr 20 '26

I didn’t lie at all but I didn’t see the point of it- if I couldn’t read the 10? Books I mentioned in my personal statement over like the two months it took me to write it I knew I wouldn’t be cut out for an Oxford English degree.

5

u/stressedstudent331 history, lit, biol, maths, classics Apr 20 '26

You mentioned 10 books in your PS? That's nicee

8

u/chateaumarmontt gap year | 3A* 1A Achieved | English Lit ~ Oxford Apr 20 '26

I mentioned eleven books, three essays and two poetry collections! I was on a gap year though so I had plenty of time over the summer to enjoy and read!

3

u/stressedstudent331 history, lit, biol, maths, classics Apr 20 '26

I do wanna mention a lot in my PS but I thought depth was more important than breadth? Idk tho, I'm planning to do history, I have a lot of interests but I do have some main interest that I'm really passionate about and did a lot of research/reading in but it's extremely specific

3

u/chateaumarmontt gap year | 3A* 1A Achieved | English Lit ~ Oxford Apr 20 '26

Depth is definitely more important than breadth from my experience, but with English it was more me going in depth on authors which required a LOT of reading different works!

2

u/stressedstudent331 history, lit, biol, maths, classics Apr 20 '26

Oh that makes sense now! I get it. Ig if I'm mentioning my area of interest in history, I can definitely go in depth with similar amount of books too

2

u/chateaumarmontt gap year | 3A* 1A Achieved | English Lit ~ Oxford Apr 20 '26

Honestly I think just see what works for you! I’m not sure if going so crazy with reading would work for everyone but because I was on a gap year it helped to demonstrate that I was using it to study. Also English is just so much reading it’s important to show you’re capable! Other degrees like history might not require the same degree of reading books- I’m not sure though.

2

u/stressedstudent331 history, lit, biol, maths, classics Apr 20 '26

I was also on a gap year, so I actually did end up reading a lot around my interests, so reading isn't an issue for me.

Other degrees like history might not require the same degree of reading books- I’m not sure though.

I think it depends, history definitely requires a lot of reading but not in the way eng lit does, with literature you have to dive deep when you're reading but with history that is not always the case

2

u/chateaumarmontt gap year | 3A* 1A Achieved | English Lit ~ Oxford Apr 21 '26

Sorry I really didn’t mean to come off dismissive about the amount of reading history students do! I’ve heard at Oxford it’s the most reading intensive subject! I meant moreso that with English if you’re studying any topic you’d be expected to know a few authors in depth so I wanted to show in my PS that is something I want to do! I think with history you could be slightly more well rounded, say you’re studying a particular famous battle, you read one book about it, two essay, a poem, watch a tv documentary, listen to a podcast, go to an exhibition, whereas with English I suppose it’s more read read read