Sample question from Cambridge’s new entrance exams have been released by the Mail on Sunday. 

The questions shed light on the type of challenges future would-be undergraduates will have to navigate in October and November.

They include asking students to discuss if “all revolutions must necessarily fail”, or whether “the recent European migrant crisis has challenged or reinforced racism”.

The tests will be tailored for different subjects and feature both multiple choice and traditional essay questions. They will supplement the existing interview system and will replace existing tests faced by about half of applicants.

Click below to see some of the questions, or keep reading for more news and reaction.

Veal, veracity and viewing angles: example questions from the new entrance exam

Many of the questions have a strong resemblance to parts of Oxford’s Thinking Skills Assessment (TSA).

They are believed to be a move to replace AS-levels, recently abandoned by the government, as an indicator of expected A-Level performance. Cambridge University was outspoken about government plans to separate AS-levels from A-levels, arguing that AS-levels were the best predictor of how well a student would perform in every subject except Mathematics.

Candidates might also be expected to compose an essay on George Orwell’s observation that “there are some ideas so wrong that only a very intelligent person could believe in them”, or tackle maths puzzles.

Announcing the change in a letter to UK schools and colleges, Dr Sam Lucy, the University’s director of admissions, said that the new tests would provide "valuable additional evidence of our applicants' academic abilities, knowledge base and potential to succeed in the Cambridge course for which they have applied".

"This move is a result of responding to teacher and student feedback, a desire to harmonise and simplify our existing use of written assessments and a need to develop new ways to maintain the effectiveness and fairness of our admissions system during ongoing qualification reform," Dr Lucy said.

While accepting that the introduction of entrance exams might be a rational response to the scrapping of AS-levels, Alan Milburn, the former Labour minister and chair of the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission, criticised the move.

“Looked at through the social mobility lens, it clearly has the potential to raise a further barrier to equal access. Bright students from less advantaged backgrounds tend to miss out on the intensive tutoring their better-off peers receive”.

Lucy tried to calm such fears in a letter to UK schools and sixth forms, saying: “[n]o advance preparation will be needed, other than revision of relevant recent subject knowledge where appropriate.”

Before entrance exams were phased out in the 1980s, students had to pass them before they were invited for interview. But Lucy assured UK schools that “they will form part of our holistic assessment of applicants rather than being a standalone mechanism for interview selection.”

The assessments will cover those applying for entrance in 2017 and will take place either before or at interviews, depending on the course being applied for. At-interview assessments are expected to last one hour and will be limited to Architecture, Classics, Computer Science, Education, History of Art, Land Economy, Law, Linguistics, Modern and Medieval Languages, and Philosophy.