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.
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.
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)
- Online Study Skills Event (February)
- Six seminars with leading academics (February-March)
- Essay Competition (April)
- Twilight Talks (April-May)
- Access Week: six-day summer school (August)
OxNet Humanities, is a unique Humanities 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.
This programme will include:
- Competitive application process (October-December)
- Online Orientation Event (January)
- Online Study Skills Event (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 is run by Pembroke College, Oxford, in close collaboration with colleagues from Queen Mary, University of London and Princeton University. It is aimed at pupils who wish to study any language at university, either at advanced level or ab initio (from scratch). It is a course that aims to enhance pupils' language skills and critical thinking ability by exploring areas of philosophy, politics, history, linguistics, translation, and cultural studies, among others.
Students taking part in the OxNet Languages programme will participate in:
- Competitive application process (October-December)
- Online Orientation Event (January)
- Online Study Skills Event (February)
- Six seminars with leading academics (February-March)
- Essay Competition (April)
- Twilight Talks (April-May)
- Access Week: six-day summer school (August)
The OxNet Science programme aims to explore a broad range of scientific fields, from artificial intelligence to protein folding chemistry.
Over the course of the year, you will learn to use mathematical models to computationally manipulate and analyse data from a range of scientific settings. During Access Week, you will have the opportunity to investigate your own scientific niche. These areas change year on year, with past examples including autoimmune diseases, medicinal chemistry, and methods of numerical optimization.
Students taking part in the OxNet Science programme will participate in:
- Competitive application process (October-December)
- Online Orientation Event (January)
- Online Study Skills Event (February)
- Six seminars with leading academics (February-March)
- Essay Competition (April)
- Twilight Talks (April-May)
- Access Week: six-day summer school (August)
Please note that we give preference to candidates who are currently taking at least one of the following A-Level subjects: Mathematics, Computer Science or Physics. This is due to the coding requirements of the programme.
Launched in 2021, the OxNet English course is run as a partnership between Pembroke College, Oxford and Oldham Sixth Form College. The programme of seminar study is focused around postcolonial literature, with close attention to the following themes:
- Racism and inequality
- Gender and sexuality
- Environment and ecopoetics
- Freedom and independence
- Hybridity
A variety of literary texts will be explored during the seminar series, from Shakespeare’s The Tempest to Bernadine Evaristo's Girl, Woman, Other to poetry by Langston Hughes, Maya Angelou and Benjamin Zephaniah, among others.
Students taking part in the OxNet English programme will participate in:
- Competitive application process (October-December)
- Online Orientation Event (January)
- Online Study Skills Event (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
