Oxford Mathematics Admissions Test (MAT) 2023 in 10 minutes or less

We would like to thank everyone for their feedback which has been invaluable in helping us understand what happened and who was affected.

In this video James Munro explains the solutions to the Oxford Mathematics undergraduate admissions test. Quickly.

Correction: at 08:36 Q6(vi), the 7 should be a child of the 8 (not of the 3). James has been asked to spend longer than ten minutes on the next video!

[myththelegendtyson]

I would just like to point out another viewpoint. Some students who did not experience crashes had less thinking time to work and check work than other students but also had experienced disruptions due to tech staff fixing other people’s computers while working. I was disadvantaged this way I believe. But it’s so hard to pick a side, how do you determine who was more disadvantaged without being subjective. I personally believe that interview boundaries should be considerably lowered and less focus should be on the MAT or they should give out another shorter MAT multiple choice paper for all students to sit (not via computers of course). I really hope Oxford Admissions sees both perspectives including the one I just mentioned rather than just help students who experienced crashes as everyone had their own unique disadvantages. Please read this Oxford.

[yeet]

Hi James, please could you take into consideration that there has been a lot of cheating during the mat. We had almost 7 hours of exam settings as the exam was not loading up and there were literally pupils discussing the answers whilst the invigilators tried to get the system running. It also kicked me out twice during the exam, which caused me (and probably many others) to severely underperform. Best thing to do would probably be to make another, short multiple choice exam (paper-based this time) to inform decisions. I have also heard there's been cheating as different time zones get the exams earlier and people tell other time zones the answers. Please read this James, and take it into consideration. Thanks.

[ilikeplanes]

Hi James,
I really think the department needs to email everyone who took the MAT with the information at the beginning of this video! I have talked to many other candidates who had no idea they could send in special consideration forms or complete the feedback form in order to communicate the difficulties they faced in the exam. If, as you said, the department is going to base their decision on these forms then it needs to make all candidates aware that they should complete these or contact their school/college to do so, otherwise you will not gather the full picture. Currently the only way to know about this is by watching this video or by happening to come across it on the website, but many candidates are (understandably) purposefully avoiding this video. I am worried that if this information is not fairly made available to every candidate then the department will miss many many cases of the disruption that candidates faced - from my experience it seems that the majority of candidates have not heard that they should submit one of these forms, how should they know to watch this video in order to gain this information?
I really hope somebody from the Maths Department reads this and considers what I am asking for.
Thank you.

[xuantungle]

Although I did quite well, there were still many technical issues that has caused me a lot of troubles. I strongly believe that written tests, like the MAT, should be reverted back to paper-based only, instead of being a hybrid test.

[phoona]

completely unacceptable, leaked papers in Hong Kong, disruptions leading to loss of concentration and exhaustion. This test needs to be scrapped immediately and a shorter test needs to be made

[ALL]

Actually it seems that 2023 MAT paper was severely leaked in other countries due to this technical issue. I’m wondering whether it is unfair for all candidates? Will oxford take any steps to deal with this circumstance?

[OxfordMathematics]

Correction: at 08:36 Q6(vi), the 7 should be a child of the 8 (not of the 3). James has been asked to spend longer than ten minutes on the next video!

[tanishqmittal]

Wasn't it a bit more difficult than previous years. I got caught completely off-guard

[oliknightley]

8:42 is the code for that octatree (part vi) not 1618338? 3 appears in the code once so it must have one branch, and 8 appears 3 times so it must have 3 branches. Surely the octatree should have 7 directly branched off 8 rather than off 3

[henryh]

Whilst there were technical difficulties which affected many people (including myself), I think it is crucial that the time allowed for the paper remained the same. Thus, the only factors that led to underperformance were stress or fatigue, which shouldn't impact the scores too much. Of course, special scenarios should be carefully considered, and the special considerations form serves this purpose. Many students have prepared for this test for a long period of time, and for the paper to just not count would be unfair to these students, especially the ones that did well. Perhaps, a better alternative would be to interview slightly more students than usual, or to create a shorter paper-based test for the students who were victims to technical difficulties and felt they underperformed which could be used in conjunction with the initial MAT to decide if they get an interview.

[ilikeplanes]

The Classics department has now emailed all their admissions tests candidates with information about submitting special consideration forms, the Maths department needs to do this as well so that everyone actually knows to submit these forms! Not everyone who took the MAT has seen this video or looked at the website and there are many that don't know they should submit these forms!

[Christolovemath]

Although I did well in MAT days ago, I have been quite worried and disappointed these days. It turns out that some students who haven't sit the exam in other time zone can easily find the answers online. It seems so hard to obtain a fair result in this exam. I'm wondering whether the result will influence the shortlist and application for IC, Warwick and other colleges.

[laurayan]

Due to differences of time zone，the problems and solutions have been leaked out on social media platform even before the test of some areas took place. Is it fair? Can't imagine such a big bug appears in this serious test.

[karimboumghar]

Pretty sure there's an error for Q6 vi) ; the tree given as an answer gives sequence 1618338. You want the 7 to be under 8, not under 3 !

[gitgudnga]

it wasnt hard i was jus stressed from the technical difficulties

[hanyyuj]

Hi James, I hope you are having a good day. I wanted to reach out to you regarding a question about special consideration. I was wondering how special consideration is accounted for in the exam process. It's clear that a significant number of people are applying for special consideration and it's not just a small group that's affected. In fact, even those who were in the exam hall with individuals experiencing technical difficulties were disrupted too. I believe that every applicant has put in tremendous effort for these exams and we all recognize importance of the exam in the next stage. Consequently, the added disruption has greatly affected our ability and confidence in completing the exam. Please can you kindly take this into consideration.

[lsjkl]

In my opinion, the most reasonable way to deal with the problem is to cancel the results of areas with technical problems and retain the results of areas without technical problems but reduce the proportion of MAT results

[dijkstra]

this should be renamed "10 minutes of silence randomly interrupted by 'damn'"

[DBY-eg]

Hi Dr James could you please kindly consider a second chance of MAT of some multiple choice questions to determine the actual grades

[oval]

Hi Dr. James, I am wondering if there is cheating involved, I found people saying that they have access to papers through special networking with British Council (I'm in Mainland China), and how could I report people like that?