I attended a private view of the Jeff Koons Exhibition at the Ashmolean last Friday.  After coffee and croissants, Xa Sturgis, the museum's director, told us the story of how the Exhibition came to be:
An Oxford University student society named after Edgar Wind, first Professor of Art at Oxford (see https://edgarwindsociety.co.uk/) decided to inaugurate a prize and present it to Jeff Koons.  Koons was evidently thrilled and flew straight over from the States to receive his prize.  He was slightly surprised to be greeted by 35 students in the basement of the Ashmolean, but was sufficiently impressed by the museum to subsequently agree to work with them to stage this exhibition.  
If you like steel representations of balloon animals and blue meditation balls in unusual settings, then this is definitely the exhibition for you.  

This is one of the last college barges still in existence.  Many date from the 19th century. Members of colleges would use the barges as changing rooms and common rooms and watch the Torpids and Summer Eights rowing races on the Isis (the local name for the Thames) from these barges. One of them was sold in 2014 -  asking price £150,000.   This one is hidden near Donnington Bridge.

This is a Harris Hawk, regularly employed by some of the Oxford University colleges (and Oxford Castle) to discourage nesting pigeons.  He comes out once a week and his job is to fly around looking hawkish....

No, not Xmas or Hanukah, but……….. ‘Interview Time’.  Just as they come to the end of an exhausting term, which began with the induction of the ‘freshers’ in October, the academic staff of the colleges of the University of Oxford are gearing up again to choose next year’s intake.  No ‘eight week term’ for them, nor for all the college and university staff - the administrators, who organise this mammoth logistical undertaking, the porters, the catering teams and the scouts who have to clean the rooms.
Just to put it into perspective, last year the colleges of the University of Oxford received over 20,000 applications.  All of these applicants needed top scores (or predicted scores) in their A’level or equivalent exams just to attempt the selection process.  Next, in most cases, they needed to do a written test, taking the form of an aptitude test for those subjects which they had never studied before.  
Such is the University’s eagerness to leave no stone unturned and no prospective Einstein undiscovered, that 10,000 of these applicants were invited to come and stay at a college and be interviewed.  Moreover, they weren’t just interviewed once, but twice (at different colleges) and, in some cases, three times.  And all for just 3,200 undergraduate places!
The legendary Oxford Interview is really designed to give the applicant a taste of the Oxford Tutorial, the traditional hour a week which most Oxford students spend in close conversation with their Tutor.  Once at the University, they have to come to tutorials equipped with an essay or problem sheet that they have spent the previous week researching and writing.  For the interview, no essay, but a daunting leap into the unknown when they can be asked anything related to the subject they want to study.
To make the process a little less terrifying and to find out more about Interviews at Oxford, go to the University of Oxford’s website at https://www.ox.ac.uk/admissions/undergraduate/applying-to-oxford/interviews?wssl=1 .  This will give you a real taste of what to expect as an interviewee.  It also gives some interesting insights into what the Tutors are looking for and contains some advice from former (successful) interviewees.