Is Oxford University Racist?

Dave Weeden

I've forgotten the details of her argument, but didn't Diane Abbott send her son to a fee-paying school because she thought that blacks did less well under the comprehensive system? Couldn't the lack of blacks be evidence to back her up - and a more reasonable case than simply assuming racism?

dearieme

"the 7% of British children fortunate enough to be educated privately. That's your scandal": no, that's a bogus comparison. The % going to private schools is irrelevant - at the very least you should report the % of those doing sixth form who do it at private schools. Or, if Oxbridge is your topic, the % of those doing a sixth form that involves A-levels in subjects that serious universities recognise who do it at private schools.

SAM ARMSTRONG

Slow day is it, race baiter?

Mark Gullick

The answer is simple. Of course Oxbridge is racist. Personally, I am convinced that the deans and dons seethe with racial hatred, probably attending torchlight nocturnal rallies in cone-shaped white headgear. I have long suspected that chancellors and provosts gleefully use the n-word while salaciously poring over sweat-stained copies of The Bell Curve. Or it could just be that an absurd sub-culture, which has nothing to do with colour or ethnicity, robs many Anglo-Caribbean and Anglo-African boys of the chance to position themselves in such a way that they might apply in the first place.

DavidDP

There's a reason Lammy was so specific about Black Carribeans, as if you inlcude all blacks you actually get about 1.5%, compared to 1.56% who are black and get three A's at A-level.

If there's racism, it's not at the university admissions level.

M Schwartz

@ Mark Bullick,

The Bell Curve does actually provide a partial explanation for the disparities in terms of the high achievement of East Asian students (see papers by Linda Gottfredson for more recent studies). Cognitive ability is one factor, but conscientiousness and drive are others.

Rob

"As Conor Ryan reminds* us, the Sutton Trust suggests that a comprehensive pupil with BBB at A-Level performs as well at university as a public school educated kid with AAB or ABB... The challenge, then, is to let elite universities remain elite while also opening them up to a wider range of qualified applicants. That means, perhaps, removing some of the human element from the selection process."

Why? Has it occurred to you that the human element might actually be quite good at controlling for differences in background. That was certainly my experience as an Oxbridge admissions tutor when faced with a choice between a very motivated kid from a Tower Hamlets sink comp with a prediction of ABB, and a AAA public school student who really didn't seem interested in the course at all.

Noa

The real scandal was Labours comprehensive destruction of a national grammar school system which educated children on the basis of abilty, regardless of race, colur or creed, and gave them the opportunity to compete on equal terms with the products of the most expensive public schools.

Still, despite the handicaps and perversities of a public education system that is unfit for purpose, people of real abilty still get through that hurdle to compete for places at the best universities.
All things being equal it is only fair that, unless the universities are entirely self funded, all such place should be drawn by lot.

That will end, at a stroke the nonsenses of the race diversity and discrimination industry by restoring meritocracy.

It would be logical, sensible and truly progressive, so there is absolutely no chance of it happening.

Q H

I heard Mr Lammy speaking on radio 5 earlier today and thought how embarrassed he must have been that after god knows how many years of labour education black and northern people don't achieve the standards to gain admission to our best universities. He even had the audacity to somehow suggest this was a failing of Oxbridge universities when it's quite clear they merely receive the substandard output from the state schools. Maybe he should look closer to home before criticising the universities.

Ken

Well, this is just a further sign of the ludicrous consideration of education in political debate in the UK. Blame universities for the lack of standards in the school system. It's a fig leaf and very annoying.

Further considerations - my guess is most black students in the UK simply won't be qualified to apply for Classics degrees. They won't have the requisite language or ancient history A-Levels. So already there's going to be some problems about access.

There's one point I want to raise about the Sutton Trust figures - which is that Oxbridge tutorial education is very different to the education at other UK universities, even top 10 ones. And not every student is cut out for this - despite possibly being able to get a 1st at another university. Take geography, for example. If your passion is fieldwork, don't go to Oxbridge until you want to do postgrad work. The course isn't set up for it.

Additionally, Oxbridge actually know more about every individual candidate than any other university in the country, which deals with admissions far more mechanically and less personally. That's to see if students really are set up for tutorial education (indeed, it's set up to weed out the public school chancers who can churn out exam papers but don't know how to think). It's not a system for everyone, and people really dont understand that enough.

maddy1

Well maybe the candidates were not Florence Goodenough!
Furthermore, maybe they were not interested in the post colonial trash, "Uncle Tom" poetry of say Walcott when they could be studying our amazing legacy of Victorian Literature!

Fergus Pickering

I have rarely heard such bollocks, Mr Massie. You don't seriously advocate entry to Oxford University by lot, do you? No of course you don't. And does it matter that there aren't many West Indians there? No of course it dpoesn't. It matters only that the students should be intelligent with enquiring minds. And reasonably diligent. Which I am sure they are.

Richard Moorhead

One interpretation of the Sutton Trust research is that State schools produce kids with poorer A-level results and it is therefore their fault. Another is that the boost in A-level grades public school kids get is spurious: the educational 'boost' they receive does not impact on positively on their performance at University. In bald terms, a group of public school kid with AAAs is likely to be poorer than a group of state school kids with AAAs (and a group of state school kids with somewhat poorer grades are likely to do as well as the public school group). The Oxford stats show that public school kids are more likely to get in than state schools. This is partly about rates of applications from both sectors, but only partly. If Oxford want to attract the BEST students it has to do something about this or their claims to be entirely meritocratic are built on sand.

Steve Albury

Alex - these figures take no account of postgraduate admissions where the percentage pf ethnic minority students is much higher - claims of racism are particularly stupid when you think about the people who work at Oxford who are normally criticised for being bleeding heart liberals who have ruined the country with their progressive thinking - Lammy is and always has been nothing more than a bad self-publicist

University of Oxford

David Lammy yesterday mounted a very successful media campaign against Oxford and Cambridge as part of the fees clash between Labour and the Coalition. Those interested in this issue should see the full response from Oxford with some context: http://www.ox.ac.uk/media/behind_the_headlines/101307.html

Rabyrover

I worked in a large scientific research laboratory. Scores of Britons from Indian and Chinese backgrounds worked there. But I never came across any black scientists, or even a black applicant. Its not just Oxbridge that gets few black students, it is probable true of most science and engineeering departments at most universities.

Beefeater

Why should Oxbridge care about anything other than the ability of its students? If the spread of acceptable ability can be found from AAA to ABB to BBB (though I do not know what the Sutton Trust means by "performs as well" - does as well in uni exams?), then those who receive offers can be selected at random from that pool. A lottery. Let the racial, class, genius, hard-working, lazy, motivated and geographic chips fall where they may.
Or, tell Oxbridge to give up any pretense at being elite institutions. Just to be sure that there is no lingering race or class bias, employers should be mandated not to ask the graduate job applicant for the name of the degree-awarding university until an offer is made. I am pretty sure that Sutton Trust has a study to suggest that university graduates from other universities perform as well in their jobs as those from Oxbridge.