Month: October 2017

The Oxbridge Myth

Photo of a typical oxbridge college
My College, St Peter’s Oxford. Photo from Wikimedia

There’s been a lot in the news recently about how Oxford and Cambridge are failing young people who are educated by the state system and how they perpetuate the elitist machine that runs the UK.  As ever, I’m frustrated with the polarisation of the argument perpetuated by the media, which boils down to “it’s fine” and “everything is broken”, which no room for focussing on the nuances of the problems.  As a state school student who went to Oxford1, I thought I’d weigh in with my own experiences and where I believe the issues are. Continue reading The Oxbridge Myth

M337: Group theory becomes relevant

My M337 books are starting to look a little dog-eared after a few weeks of commuting!

One of the things I’ve enjoyed least about my OU Maths journey so far has been group theory.  I ploughed through whole swathes of M208 applying the techniques and not really seeing the relevance1  I found group theory and the proofs related to it tedious.  Mainly because I was proving something that was “obvious”.  However, I’ve always had a healthy acceptance of partial learnings – knowing that if I was being taught a technique then there was a reason for it. Two years later and that reason finally hit me. Continue reading M337: Group theory becomes relevant