Welcome to Management Studies Tripos admissions
If you are an undergraduate student at the University of Cambridge, you have completed at least 2 years of another Tripos and you are interested in pursuing a career in management, then this programme is for you.
Please note that it is not possible to take the Management Studies Tripos immediately on entry to Cambridge (ie in your first year), nor is it possible to transfer to the programme from any other institution in the UK or abroad.
Who we are looking for?
We’re after University of Cambridge undergraduates, with a strong academic record and an interest in acquiring the knowledge and skills associated with good management.
The Management Studies Tripos is for you if:
- you are in your second or third year of a University of Cambridge bachelor’s degree
- you want to become more knowledgeable about the world of business and management
Application process
Here are the key steps to our application process.
- Step 1 – College Tutorial Office
- Step 2 – Application
- Step 3 – Application review
- Step 4 – Offers
- Step 5 – Appeals process (if relevant)
College Tutorial Office
Inform your College Tutorial Office
The first step is to inform your College’s Tutorial Office that you are interested in the Management Studies Tripos. Your College may ask you to attend informal meetings (with Directors of Studies, Tutors, etc) before endorsing your application.
Application
Apply through your College’s Tutorial Office
Colleges are asked to provide the Cambridge Judge MST Office with the names of interested students in April 2025. Please note that your College may have an earlier deadline than this for their own administrative purposes.
Entry is competitive, and you should have a strong academic record over your 2 or 3 years at Cambridge.
Application review
A review period where we consider applications
The MST Admissions Committee meets in May 2025 to review applications and decide on the minimum entry requirement.
In addition to the academic record, comments from College Tutors and Directors of Studies are also taken into account, so candidates should not assume they will be made an offer even if meeting (or exceeding) the requirement.
Offers
Progress to Offer
Candidates from MML and AMES Tripos who are on the Year Abroad and intending to take MST as a Part 2 on their return will receive unconditional offers in May if their second-year grade meets the said requirement set by the MST Admissions Committee.
All other candidates are also contacted in May to be made aware of the academic entry requirement, although decisions on third-year applicants are not made until June, upon the publication of 2024/25 examination results. Decisions on second-year applicants will be made in July, after the publication of their results.
Upon Colleges verifying examination results for 2024/25, the Programme Office will contact you to either offer you a place or inform you if you have been unsuccessful..
Appeals process (if relevant)
Entry to the Management Studies Tripos is highly competitive, so we can’t provide individual feedback on the review process and decisions. However, you can make an appeal within 28 days of receiving your formal written admission decision.
Our minimum requirements
Take the first step with our checklist to see if you meet the course requirements.
For 2025/26, we anticipate the minimum entry requirement will be at least 67% over your previous 2 years of Cambridge study. Please note that the minimum requirement for applicants in their second year may be slightly higher than that for third-year applicants. Places are limited and third-year students will not be eligible to apply again. The admissions criteria are:
- Third-year students: If you are currently in your third year of study, offers will be based on a weighted average of results from your second-year (30%) and third-year (70%) university examinations. Applicants currently on their Year Abroad (eg Modern Languages students) will be considered on the basis of their second-year results.
- Second-year students: If you are in your second year to study, offers will be on the basis of your current year’s university examinations. First year results will not be considered in the admission decision, except where no other results are available.
References from your College tutors and directors of studies may be requested by the Tutorial Office to make their final decisions.
It is not necessary for you have a high level of mathematical knowledge. However, if you don’t have a mathematical background (or mathematics to A-level), you might want to prepare for the programme by studying some mathematics and statistics in advance.
Alumni profiles
Meet our Management Studies Tripos alumni and see for yourself how well you’ll fit in.
Eva van Wyk de Vries
MST 2023
"The MST was a fantastic opportunity to develop a well-rounded set of quantitative and qualitative business skills that apply not only to many industries and jobs but to personal life as well!"
After graduating from high school in France, Eva took a few years out before joining University of Cambridge. On completion of her English Tripos, she was drawn to the Management Studies Tripos because of its potential for providing a well-rounded introduction to the world of business.
She found the programme fast-paced as lot of new material on novel topics such as Accounting, Finance, Economics, and Operations Management is covered, but also extremely rewarding as it became possible to see practical applicability to the real world. She enjoyed the very hands-on nature of the Tripos, and the opportunities for collaboration and teamwork which is not only a good peer-learning opportunity but also generates a nice social atmosphere.
Upon graduation, Eva joined a Tech, Media and Telecom (TMT) consultancy in London as an Associate Consultant – a job that she believes would not have gotten without the quantitative skills developed in class or the appreciation for the problem-solving nature of consulting garnered through the final year project.
Tobi Dairo
MST 2023
“As a medical student, I found the MST course to be a fantastic opportunity to expand my knowledge to include various disciplines such as business strategy, economics, finance, negotiations, and marketing.”
Tobi attended Aylesbury Grammar School for his secondary education. Driven by a passion for science and a desire to help others, he began his medical studies at the University of Cambridge in 2021. After two years of pre-clinical medicine, Tobi joined the MST programme for a one-year intercalation course.
Tobi found that the programme provides an excellent opportunity for students wishing to gain and apply skills relevant to a host of real-world contexts. The teaching builds upon management theory by drawing on real-world case studies, and students have plenty of opportunities to apply what they learn to the latest challenges facing businesses. This year of study enriched his medical education by enabling him to integrate business and management concepts into healthcare.
A standout aspect of the MST programme is the month-long consulting project at the end of the academic year. This offers students the unrivalled opportunity to tackle a challenging problem in an area they’re interested in, solving an important issue for a client. Tobi gained practical experience in solving business problems in healthcare through a medically-oriented MST consulting project with a biotech company.
Tobi believes the MST programme is uniquely positioned to provide students with the knowledge, skills, and experience necessary to tackle pressing business challenges in their field of interest. He returned to the clinical stages of medical school following the completion of the MST programme looking forward to using the knowledge and skills gained from the MST programme and his diverse experiences to address the challenges faced by healthcare systems and improve patient outcomes.
In addition to his academic pursuits, Tobi has been actively involved in football and basketball at St Catharine’s College and has played for the University basketball team. Beyond university studies, he completed a Health Data Science internship with NIHR BioResource and participated in the Strategy and Product internship at Jane Street. The skills he acquired from the MST programme have proven valuable in various contexts, from professional work to sports and everyday activities.
Cosimo Burdett
MST 2023
“If someone had told me that after only 7 months as a student at Cambridge Judge Business School, I would be helping the owners of a drinks manufacturing company to refine their marketing strategy, I would not have believed them. However, it is a testament to the value of the learning experience and opportunities offered by this course that what initially seemed impossible to me became a reality.”
Cosimo was born in Italy and raised in Bristol and Cambridge. Before joining the Management Studies Tripos, he completed the Modern and Medieval Languages Tripos, with a focus in French and Italian language and culture. He was awarded the Boorman Scholarship by Corpus Christi College at the end of both his first and second year of study. He then chose to spend his third year at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris, before returning to Cambridge to complete the fourth and final year of his degree at Cambridge Judge Business School. After graduating with First Class, Cosimo is started his career at a hedge fund.
Cosimo valued that the Management Studies Tripos strikes a fantastic balance between offering a deep theoretical understanding of the subject and opportunities to apply this knowledge in simulated and real-world contexts. The course is structured to build up students’ skillsets rapidly, irrespective of their academic backgrounds, from the very basics to advanced courses. The Consulting Project during Easter term represents an outstanding opportunity for students to further hone the skills they have built up over the previous 2 terms while advising business leaders on how to solve important issues affecting their organisations.
The idea of changing Tripos subject for the final year was daunting in first instance, but Cosimo found that the world-class teaching and resources offered by the Cambridge Judge made the transition much easier than anticipated. He believes the Management Studies Tripos was a perfect launchpad for a career in business, broadening horizons beyond the previous Tripos, while facilitating the development of fundamental business skills.