The small and cosy St Peter’s College is 250m Carfax, just off Oxford’s main High Street and round the corner from the newly developed Castle site. Originally founded by a disgruntled Liverpudlian Bishop in the hope of offering a university education to those who might not be otherwise able to afford it, it became an Oxford college in 1961 and the worthy Bishop’s plans went out the window (although it still maintains a strong open access policy). Its buildings are a low-key collection of Georgian, Victorian and nasty 70s affairs arranged around four grass quads. St Peter’s is a friendly and relaxed college, noted for its strengths in sport, art, music and drama, as well as its spectrum of joint honours courses.
| Sex ratio (M:F): 51:49 |
Founded: 1929 |
| Full-time u’grads: 396 |
Part-time: n/a |
| Postgrads: 125 |
Mature: n/a |
State:private school: 53:47
|
International: n/a |
| Academic ranking: 21 |
Disabled: n/a |
Bar with adjacent games room – more students drink in town; strong and diverse drama; student bands and four bops a term in the JCR; choral concerts and recitals; occasional club events in town; black tie dinner each term, ball every other year; two libraries – one law, (40,000 books in total) open 24hrs; 15 PCs and more for student hire; Ethernet in all rooms. Anglican chapel. Fortnightly mag, Peterphile. Piazza for snackish delights. Sporty – football, cricket and tennis doing well on the bloke front, netball and hockey women-wise; darts club; shares sports fields with Exeter and Hertford Colleges (football, rugby, squash, hockey, cricket, tennis, gym). All first and third years live in, most second years scavenge their own beds; accommodation split between main site (£95/25wks), College annexes (£92-£98/38wks) and self-catered College houses in town (£85/38wks); St Peter’s has planned to accommodate more of its undergrads by building some fancy annexes five mins away; rooms small but pleasant (35% en suite); better kitchen facilities off main site; optional formal dinners; termly fixed meal charge (£133-£306 depending on housing); parking next to impossible. Welfare-heavy JCR; LGBT Officer and soc, Postgrad Officer and soc, Women’s Officer, disabled access okay except in library. Access fund: £500-1,500 a time; means-tested bursary scheme; travel funds and exam-tested scholarships. DVD prospectus available.
FAMOUS ALUMNI
Edward Akufo Addo (ex-President of Ghana); Carl Albert (former speaker, US House of representatives); Revd W Awdry (creator of Thomas the Tank Engine); Simon Beaufoy (screenwriter, ‘The Full Monty’); Lord Condon (former Met Police Commissioner); Ken Loach (film director); Sir Paul Reeves (former Governor General of New Zealand); Peter Wright (author, ‘Spycatcher’).