Part II of Four Parts:      Part I     Part II     Part III    Part IV 

Here’s a list of 50 interesting things I learned and observed from a Vancouver / Canadian / North American perspective on the environment, the town, the university, the colleges and Christianity.

  THE TOWN

9.  Every reader needs to trot down to the Eagle & Child pub where C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkein and “the Inklings” lubricated their thoughts by consuming a pint or three. English are known for law and order, and not their cuisine, so stick with the safe pub grub of fish and chips and meat pie. Very tasty, as was the pale ale.

 10.  There is no shortage of coffee shops from Starbucks to Nero to Costa. They all have the common denominator of resembling study halls, with students consuming endless hours of wi-fi and occupying prized real estate—and all for free, or at least for the price of a small coffee.

 11.  When going to a Starbucks in the UK, they don’t have “half and half” or “cream” for your coffee. What’s a Canadian to do? I figured out that the best we can do is ask for “pouring cream” – which is thick whipping cream that they will pour into a small cup for you.

 12.  If you want a regular coffee at a Starbucks, don’ ask for a “drip coffee.” Instead, it’s “filtered coffee.” ‘They also typically don’t have a “regular” and “bold”—no, one type fits all.

 13.  Going to a movie theatre is different.  In Oxford, the two movie theatres I went to were modest rooms with about 100 seats.  The most interesting dynamic was the popcorn!  In Canada and the US, theatres seem to survive as palaces and purveyors of popcorn.  Huge machines, mountains of freshly popped corn and the smell of butter wafting through the air.  In Oxford, popcorn was subdued, no telltale smell, likely made the week before, small kernels, and only avaialble in sweet or salty.  Clearly a First World popcorn.

THE UNIVERSITY

 14.  The university’s past in a nutshell. According to university historian, L.W.B. Brockliss, the institution was a Catholic University (1100 – 1534), an Anglican University (1534 – 1845), an Imperial University (1845 – 1945) and now a World University (1945 – present). There were “religious tests” until 1871 to enter Oxford and other UK universities.

 15.  Oxford has survived and thrived when other late medieval universities didn't.  In the 16th century, other centres of learning included Alcala, Wittenberg and Bourges.  These other European universities are names who are now unknown and unrecognizable—yet Oxford in an out-of-the-way town has continued to prosper and keep reinventing itself.

16.. The UK undergraduate comes in having completed “O Levels” and “A levels” and then enters a three-year undergraduate program—which is very focused from the outset. So, an undergrad entering history will be taking almost exclusively history classes. This is quite different than the US and Canadian model, with a four-year degree, the first two years of which are quite general.

17.  Oxford is a tutor-based system in which the majority of courses are taught one on one by a tutor (sometimes there will be two students per tutor). So, instead of sitting in large lecture halls, the student is generally sitting across from the professor, the actual authority in the field.

18.  The tutor-based approach is, of course, massively labour intensive—but it creates a powerful learning dynamic. An undergraduate student in philosophy, for example, may be getting tutored by one of the leading philosophers in the world. By contrast, in most North American universities top professors get rewarded by not having to teach undergraduates.

 19.  The tutor will ask the student to read a number of books, address certain questions and then write papers. The format can be intense, and the students are expected to be able to debate their views. An undergrad at Oxford may write over 200 papers during the course of their degree.

 20.  Oxford is expensive, so accessibility is an issue.   The undergrad tuition is about GBP15,000 and then room and board can be the same amount. Coming from a US private school system where US$35,000/yr is not unusual, those numbers may be comparable. But coming from a Canadian system, where the top universities such as McGill charge about $9,000, it’s a massive difference.

 21.  UK students can get loans for tuition. They pay off the loans when they start making money.       If they never make money they never pay it off.   So, cost is not a barrier.

 22.  Oxford can only charge tuition on the same scale as any other university in the UK.

 23.  Brexit will have ramifications for the academic community, as much funding comes from European wide sources, through the EU.       Also, if there are restrictions on visas and movement of people to the UK this could have implications.

 24.  The understated British approach. Despite the big brand of Oxford, it still seems undermarketed—at least from a North American perspective. There are a smattering of gift stores with Oxford merchandise—but not a large central university store. If marketing was run by Americans, there would likely a multistory complex with an army of cashiers!

 25. There are three terms: Michelmas, Hilary and Trinity. There are five week reading breaks and then three months in the summer. I asked, how do students get jobs for those short periods? They don’t. Those are times that they are doing extensive reading and possibly writing exams.   I am used to teaching in Canada where a one-week reading break is a break from reading, rather than to do reading. Students are generally planning their skiing or other frolicking.

26.  The university has a world-famous Bodleian library which includes the iconic Radcliffe Camera. As a Visiting Scholar, I could get a "reader’s card."  I had to read out an oath which includes “not to bring into the library or kindle therein any fire or flame.” I had no problem; I am not a kindler.

 27.  Sports doesn’t define or contribute to the identity of the University of Oxford. Of course, there is the famous rowing competition with Cambridge, but besides that there are no varsity teams. In other words, there is no circuit where Oxford competes.

 28.  The university has its own museum—the "Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archeology," founded in 1683, with world-famous collections ranging from Egyptian mummies to modern art. This museum could likely surpass most major North American city museums, due to its stunning collection accumulated by researchers over 100s of years. Not many new universities plan on incorporating a museum in their midst.      

 29.  One interesting British tradition is there is no charge for museums, in contrast to the rapacious approach on the Continent where the assumption is that droves of tourists will not be put off from the Louvre or Rijksmuseum for 15 – 17 Euros.

 30.  “The Other Place.” That’s how people refer to the University of Cambridge.