I chose English because I had really enjoyed it at GCSE and wanted to take it further. The A Level takes the bits that I found interesting and just expands upon them. The breadth and worth of analysis that you cover is much greater; it is a step up but it is definitely manageable with all the great support that the teachers give you! The lessons are definitely my funniest in any subject and are basically always just one big discussion.
My favourite part about the college is the level of independence they give you. It is very different to school, you are treated like an adult and have the freedom to get involved with as much or as little extracurriculars as you wish. For example, I mainly took part in a student-run philosophy paper and took AS Further Maths in upper Sixth.
I wasn’t initially sure what course at Oxbridge I wanted to apply for, so in first year I was in both the Humanities and Social Sciences groups. Both significantly helped me gain confidence and articulating myself in interview situations, through both debates and (in U6) 1:1 mock interviews. I ended up picking a very interdisciplinary course (Human Sciences) that few people from Godalming had applied to before, but I still had a high level of support and interview prep from the Social Sciences, Humanities and Biology Aspires. They also helped me prepare for the admissions test that I had to do for my chosen course. The Aspire programme truly laid the groundwork for me to be confident in my interviews, and I could not have gained a place at Oxford without it.