Oxnet
The Goldsmiths’ Sutherland Centre for Philosophy and World Religions
Ashton Sixth Form is delighted to be the host institution for The Goldsmiths’ Sutherland Centre for Philosophy and World Religions, which officially launched under its new name in November 2019 as a regional centre of excellence for the teaching of Philosophy, Religions and related subjects, in partnership with Pembroke College, University of Oxford.
About the Centre
Ashton Sixth Form College was chosen as the third ‘subject centre’ to be established by Pembroke College. It followed the successful model of The East End Classics Centre at BSix Sixth Form College in Hackney, opened in 2012, and The North West Science Centre (with Corpus Christi College, Oxford) at South Cheshire College, launched in September 2013.
The Centre aims to raise the profile of Philosophy, Religion and related degree subjects among students who do not traditionally choose to pursue these subjects to undergraduate level, to introduce students to university-style learning, and to equip them to make applications to leading universities.
For 2023/24, the Centre will offer an intensive programme to Year 12 students in state sixth forms from across all the OxNet network areas. The programme includes lectures and seminars delivered by academics from some of the country’s leading universities and a residential summer school at Pembroke College, University of Oxford.
In previous years, in collaboration with the University of Manchester, the seminar series for this course was focused on the theme of “Beyond Belief”. The 2023/24 programme will cover questions of religious conversion, conspiracy theories, political rhetoric and philosophical ideas.
This year's programme will be led by Professor Justin Jones (Fellow and Tutor in the Study of Religion, Associate Professor of Study of Religion at Pembroke College, Oxford, and delivered by academics at Pembroke College. This year, the six seminars in this series will focus on topics around ‘The Challenge of Religion’, will all examine some of these challenges from an interdisciplinary perspective. Students will consider issues such as: religious opposition to environmentalism; the link between religion and conspiracy theories; religion and far-right populism; cultural exchanges between the Global South and Global North; religion and women’s rights; and laws of religious freedom."
Students taking part in the OxNet Philosophy & World Religions programme will participate in:
- Competitive application process (October-December)
- Online Orientation Event (January)
- Study Day hosted at Pembroke College (February)
- Six seminars with leading academics (February-March)
- Essay Competition (April)
- Twilight Talks (April-May)
- Access Week: six-day summer school (August)
OxNet Humanities & Social Sciences, previously Pembroke North, is a unique Humanities and Social Sciences programme based on the theme “Thinkers and Cultures” which prepares participants for intensive learning in competitive universities. The programme is multi-disciplinary, covering History, Politics, Philosophy, Literature and Economics, and aims to develop study skills as well as subject knowledge. Students who have taken part in Pembroke North in previous years have gone on to study at Oxford, Cambridge and other Russell Group universities.
The 2023/2024 programme will include:
- Competitive application process (October-December)
- Online Orientation Event (January)
- Study Day hosted at Pembroke College (February)
- Six seminars with leading academics (February-March)
- Essay Competition (April)
- Twilight Talks (April-May)
- Access Week: six-day summer school (August)
Applicants should be studying at least one Humanities subject at college and are expected to attend all parts of the programme.
The OxNet Languages programme was developed in 2019 and we are pleased to offer it again for 2023/43! The intensive course takes twenty Year 12 students studying either French, German or Spanish at A Level (or equivalent) from the North West, North East of England and London. It is an interdisciplinary course, aiming to answer the question, “What does it mean to be European?” through the study of history, literature, politics. gender and language.
Students taking part in the OxNet Languages programme will participate in:
- Competitive application process (October-December)
- Online Orientation Event (January)
- Study Day hosted at Pembroke College (February)
- Six seminars with leading academics (February-March)
- Essay Competition (April)
- Twilight Talks (April-May)
- Access Week: six-day summer school (August)
Pembroke College have offered an OxNet Science week as part of the summer residential for a number of years and are now pleased to offer an intensive sciences programme! This intensive course takes students studying Science from the North West, North East of England and London, studying the science of Natural and Artificial Autonomy. Students will examine academic material covering questions of artificial intelligence, legal implications around artificial autonomy, programming, mathematical modelling, biological autonomy and will learn how to manipulate data for scientific research.
Students taking part in the OxNet Science programme will participate in:
- Competitive application process (October-December)
- Online Orientation Event (January)
- Study Day hosted at Pembroke College (February)
- Six seminars with leading academics (February-March)
- Essay Competition (April)
- Twilight Talks (April-May)
- Access Week: six-day summer school (August)
The OxNet English course ran for the first time in 2021. It is run in partnership between Pembroke College, University of Oxford, and Oldham Sixth Form College.
The programme of seminar study is focused around Postcolonial Literature, and in particular:
- Racism and Inequality
- Gender and Sexuality
- Environment and eco-poetics
- Freedom and Independence
- Hybridity
A variety of literary texts will be explored during the seminar series, including Shakespeare’s The Tempest, alongside extracts from novels, such as Midnight’s Children, Wide Sargasso Sea, White Teeth, and Girl, Woman, Other, as well as poems by, for example, Langston Hughes, Maya Angelou and Benjamin Zephaniah.
Students taking part in the OxNet English programme will participate in:
- Competitive application process (October-December)
- Online Orientation Event (January)
- Study Day hosted at Pembroke College (February)
- Six seminars with leading academics (February-March)
- Essay Competition (April)
- Twilight Talks (April-May)
- Access Week: six-day summer school (August)
For more information about OxNet, please contact Alex Noble in the Careers & Employability Team or go to www.oxnet.org
