Yes
Sara Semic
As much as I would like to say that I geek out over my course and take great pride in my essays, starting with the outline and fi lling it in gradually like a painting with nuance and depth, the reality is that I bash it out in order to submit it by the deadline, and hope that it’s legible. As a humanities student blessed with a schedule unfettered by labs and a workload that can be crammed into one arduous weekend, perhaps I ought to check my degree privilege before waving aside the case for the importance of the Oxford degree.
However, with so much flexibility and freedom it seems a waste to spend my time chained to a desk, going through the reading with a finetooth comb when I can achieve just as much by skimming the texts. And if, according to the old maxim, ‘the vast majority of humanities students get a 2:1 anyway,’ then why would I want to look back on my nine short terms of university and remember the abyss of the Gladstone Link, or obsessing over the origins of WWI?
The real privilege of being at Oxford lies not in the unique tutorial system nor the abhorrent subfusc, but the roulette of societies and extracurricular opportunities available – from student journalism to quidditch and everything in between. At Oxford you have the privilege of being able to try out things that you’ve never done before, and most probably won’t have the chance to once you’re stuck in the rut of the nine to five. It is by joining the countless societies, or indeed starting your own project, that you can discover where your true interests lie (once you’ve realised that your heart just isn’t in Macroeconomics). Plus, to those of you complaining about catastrophic backlogs, given our obscenely long breaks in between, we have more than enough time to catch up on lost sleep and missed work and still binge on Netflix.
On a purely social level, the importance of your extracurricular ties is a no brainer. We defi ne ourselves here in relation to the diff erent Oxford ‘scenes’, distinguishing the thesps from the rowers and the union hacks, rather than the Classicists from the Theologians. On top of this, it has to be remembered that without any society allegiances you run the risk of falling off the radar and sacrifi cing any chance of a spot in Cherwell’s illustrious Top 40 list.
Jokes aside, getting involved in the wider university network allows you to escape the college bubble and meet more like-minded people, who share your interests and niche tastes. Is that not more valuable than attaining a distinction on an essay or a tute sheet?
But even for the career-minded, your extra curricular involvements are all the more vital, both for building future contacts and for standing out from the legion of other students hoping to climb the greasy pole of success in a Magic Circle firm. For the careerists, your time at Oxford is as much about rampant CV building as it is churning out essays and attending lectures. Indeed, being able to show that you can head the Guild and CapitOX whilst holding down a 2:1 is what will stand you in good stead in the overcrowded job market. Employers want to see that you can juggle multiple commitments, lead projects and solve real problems. As much as your tutor will try to impress upon you that your self-worth rests on you acquiring a First, employers will tell you it really isn’t the be-all and end-all, and can even be off -putting for those who think all Oxbridge off spring are just socially inept creatures.
Furthermore, it’s easy to become so absorbed and caught up in the ivory-tower learning of your degree that you lose a sense of perspective and forget that there is a world beyond the dreaming spires. Countless societies and organisations actively engage with political debates and try to tackle the problems that face us all. The Oxford Hub, for example, gives you the chance to make a real diff erence in the wider community, rather than just theorise about solutions in your essays or tutorials.
But does it need to be an either/or question? Surveys have shown that those who maintain an extracurricular commitment are more likely to receive a First in their examination compared with those who ‘just study’, so there’s no reason to sacrifi ce an interest for the sake of your degree either. And I doubt that I’ll look back on my reel of Oxford memories wishing I had had more sleep.
No
Josh Caminiti
I feel somewhat obliged to begin my piece with the small caveat that the irony is not lost on me, and neither, I hope, on my readers, of using an extracurricular engagement (Cherwell) to argue against the relative value of extracurriculars.
This is a helpful, crystallising irony, as it is to show that my true thesis is not to advance a scholarly hermeticism (as Chaucer’s ‘Sire Clerk of Oxenford’ does), or that extracurriculars are wasteful or useless, and should yield in favour of our academic pursuits in every instance, but rather that it would generally be better for us to excel academically than in extracurriculars. However, the essence of the old adage preserved in Brideshead Revisited that to get anything above a third, if not a first, is a waste of time, still chimes a ring of truth for many students. They feel that to be at Oxford means, firstly, to be at Oxford, and secondly (only secondly) to study here. But the 1920s, and the frolicking days of the ‘gentleman’s Third’, are long gone.
To move past a fashionable evaluative nihilism, it would be helpful to establish the grounds on which one thing can be said to be more important than another, or, value-conferring properties. An exhaustive purview of them would neither be commensurate with the allotted length of the piece at hand nor the patience of its readers, and so we will be restricted to considering two: being beneficial for our futures (loosely interpreted) and being fulfilling (socially, existentially, epistemologically etc).
Although, as an arts student, I try my hardest to avoid thinking about future employment prospects, this debate would be incomplete without considering them. When it comes to that great and beckoning hereafter, the ‘real world’, there stands the question, ‘Would I value more walking away from university with several solid extracurricular achievements and engagements under my belt, or a swanky scholar’s gown, a relative mastery of my subject-matter, and the pedigree confirmed by a well-respected degree?’ Oxford boasts that over 95 per cent of undergrads find themselves employed or engaged in further studies six months after graduation, so it seems like, whichever side you take in this debate, you will be ‘just fine’.
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If we had to venture a guess as to why Oxford students seem to do so well on the market, I am confident the answer would lie in the universally-recognised high standard of education we have received, indicating both a passably industrious work ethic and commendable learning. In the outstanding majority of cases, employers tend to strongly favour applicants with good degrees in a relevant field compared to those who have dabbled in extracurricular activities. For a minority of students, perhaps, their extracurricular activities will lead them away from the path set out from their degree: but for every rower who participates in the Olympics there are thousands more law students who become lawyers, economics students who go into finance, and medicine students who go into medicine. Our degrees have, for the most of us, already plotted the trajectory of our future lives, and to excel along this path is to excel in the future.
Il faut cultiver notre jardin – what is too often overlooked, and often can only be appreciated in retrospect, is the intense fulfilment and self-cultivation that our academic life can provide us with, in a way that equals if not outstrips the fruits of extracurriculars. Putting aside sloppy considerations of utility for a moment, the knowledge and skills that we receive as part of our degrees (provided we maintain our end of the bargain as students) are of inestimable value, and “the best provision for old age” (as an aside: spurious Aristotle quotes are the best Aristotle quotes). I genuinely enjoy my degree, or rather, the content of which it is so constituted, and for me some of the greatest opportunities offered by Oxford are to be found in a reading list, not a boat house.
A good education teaches us to delight in the education received; Hamlet to an English student, or Cicero to a classicist, or (even) the Krebs Cycle to a biochemist. To respond informatively and creatively to questions that matter to us is one of the noblest tasks we can undertake and a fundamental part of getting a degree here.
This is the only time in our lives where we will have the outrageous privilege of dedicating our days to the increase of knowledge in an ever-growing depository (or rather flame, for ‘education is not the filling of a bucket’), with access to some of the greatest educational resources in the world and under brilliant tutelage.
To see our degrees as slavish contracts we have unwittingly entered into, with extracurriculars our only hope of real fulfilment and enjoyment, is too see incorrectly. In all this discussion, I am reminded of the words of Ecclesiastes (non-inclusive, blame King James) that, “to rejoice in his labour; this is the gift of God”. Now, to avoid charges of hypocrisy, I should really get started on that essay.
