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Social and Extracurricular Aspects

It is not possible to produce a well-rounded doctor through academic efforts alone: personal development is a critical feature of students' time in medical school. Oxford provides excellent facilities for social, academic and sporting activities. The University's language laboratories and computing facilities and courses are freely available to students. Music and the arts are also very strong in Oxford, at both college and University level; and the sports facilities are extensive and of a very high standard. Although academic achievements within medicine are obviously important, development of your skills and interests outside of medicine should also have a high priority. Graduates are expected to have a mature and professional attitude to work: you will be expected to be able to balance your commitments in such a way as to develop your outside interests without compromising your work in medicine. Social opportunities probably flourish most strongly in the college environment, which is one of Oxford's greatest strengths. Students on this course will be expected and encouraged to take an active part in college life.

Colleges

Colleges are an integral and important feature of Oxford life; every student in the University is a member of a college. The college provides academic support in the form of a weekly tutorial with a personal tutor (at least in the early years of the course), and it also offers opportunities to mix with students in other disciplines. We regard it as very important that students should broaden their horizons as much as possible, and mix with people from disciplines outside their own. This is especially important in medicine: it helps to relieve the pressure of clinical practice, and it encourages the broader social outlook that helps to make a good clinician. Colleges provide opportunities to take part in social and recreational activities of all kinds. Most will also provide residential accommodation for at least the first year and usually for further years of the course.

Ten colleges offer places on the graduate-entry course.

The reasons for the restriction on colleges are that we wanted to make sure that there would be at least two students on the four-year course in each year at each college, and we wanted to know that the medical tutors were prepared to offer full tutorial support for the new course.