Cambridge wants to select the top students

Top universities are considering introducing formal entrance examinations to help them select the very best applicants.

With growing numbers of students scoring top grades at A-level - 21.6% of papers were awarded grade A this year - elite universities say it is increasingly difficult to distinguish between good and excellent candidates.

Now an admissions test sat by medical students applying to Cambridge University is to be set by Oxford and by University College London.

The national examinations are not helping us much Susan Stobbs, director of admissions at Cambridge

And other leading universities are in discussion with Cambridge to see if the test can be used in their admissions processes also.

The test, which has been tried at Cambridge for the past three years, involves multiple-choice questions and a writing test.

The two-hour exam - the Biomedical admissions test or Bmat - will be sat by applicants in their various schools in November.

Top bracket 'too broad'

It was brought in for departments of medicine because tutors there were particularly struggling to distinguish between students - this year the medical faculty in Cambridge had 1,157 applications for 278 places and most had perfect A-level scores.

Director of admissions at Cambridge, Susan Stobbs, said the A grade bracket at A-level was now too broad for fair discrimination.

"We do not wish to overburden candidates, but we are faced with the problem that the national examinations are not helping us much with that," said Mrs Stobbs.

"A lot of work has gone into this and other universities are interested because it identifies the skills that are most in demand."

Mrs Stobbs said the university was currently examining the possibility of introducing an entrance test for students wishing to study computer science and oriental studies and other subjects could follow in the future.

Comparing the results of the entrance tests with students' performance at Cambridge did show a close correlation, she added.

A spokeswoman for Oxford said the university would monitor the success of the Bmat and may consider introducing it for other popular subjects in the future.

Oxford and Cambridge used to set their own entrance exams, but abolished them after head teachers in the state sector complained that the system gave an unfair advantage to private school pupils who were carefully coached for Oxbridge entry.