Cambridge to 'drop state school admissions targets'

[Stripedquilt]

A lot about this in the news this morning.

One thing I don't understand - 'The institution is focusing on a new access plan to be put into action from the academic years 2025-26 to 2028-29.'

Will this apply to the applications made later this year for the intake of the academic year 2025-26? Or does it mean they start implementing the new access plan from 2025-26 onwards - so the state school targets would be dropped for those starting uni in autumn 2026, not 2025?

Thanks for any clarity!

Doesn't this all highlight the reason for abandoning the crude state/private ratiio as there are many state schools with equivalent students to private schools. The state good private bad mantra is unhelpful in analysing backgrounds of successful applicants.

I wonder if it is the press and the Sutton trust that have led Oxbridge to race down the league of university private school intake and I question whether this in itself is a good thing or just quite a coarse means of satisfying calls to end elitism.

I know schools in my town with 20% fsm and are sited in deprived areas and I think for the vast majority in those schools Oxbridge entry isn't on the radar. The teachers really have a raft of issues to deal with and improving Oxbridge entry sadly is not high on the list. The best way to serve bright children in these schools would be in my opinion provide transport to move them to a better school.

We also have I think the incontrovertible fact that bright people tend to get better paid jobs and love in nice areas (possibly affording private school) and have bright children with good home and social environments. This fact massively skews intake to Oxbridge to this demogrpahic if you have a fair admissions system; I really can't think how you can get round this regardless of the amount of calls made from those calling for social mobility.

Why not just abandon targets or possibly even publishing background data as there maybe nothing really significant to be gained from it apart from controversy and a certain pressure to positively discriminate.

Can't agree more

The universities now with the most private school students are places like Imperial, Durham, Bath, Edinburgh, St Andrews and UCL. Has Durham's reputation diminished because of an increase of private school pupils? I would argue not.

Maybe Cmabridge are dropping their targets because they as other universities not having the same pressure applied and decided it was unfair that there was pressure places on their admissions systems but not in others to the same degree?

@DEI2025

I am not trying to detract from any bright pupil applying but statistics do seem to give a skewed impression of intake and aren't helpful. The statistics can be picked up by the press and used to write stories about how Oxbridge are missing against poorer students o r not doing enough to broaden their intake. How much should the universities can and should do!? Is there a limit for the reasons I outlined above?

biasing

It's not all Kent Grammars, but the ones in my town certainly get roughly the same as the poorer performing private schools. Yet in this application of biasing towards them they would be at an advantage to a super selective Grammar as their cohort scored lower on average and they are less selective, despite being more selective than the privates. They do not to as well as the high scoring private in the area. I suppose you do have to ask how they take the cream of the local crop and get similar results to private kids who didn't pass 11+.

I don’t think you see the poorer performing private schools in the league tables! Certainly here the grammars do better because the privates take dc who didn’t get the 11 plus. Mostly. So the bulk of the brightest are in the grammars apart from Wycombe Abbey!

@mids2019 I agree with your analysis. It’s also interesting that privately educated pupils have plummeted at Bristol. Down 10% in a few years. This probably means private dc are going elsewhere to keep numbers up! Exeter is much higher. We also worry too much about this as most young people co-exist quite happily.

I do think how young people are brought up affects where they might want to go for uni. Oxbridge is not on the radar in some areas and dc are not interested. They see articles about poshos and run a mile. I’ve just seen a photo illustrating the posho uni league table. It was young women at horse racing. They are in the cheapest enclosure but just a photo labels them as something they are probably not! I think this country cannot get away from class or perceived class. It doesn’t help move us forward.

No, they don't often appear in the league tables but the information is online. You can see the % scoring 9-7 and 9-4 respectively and if there's only an average of 3-5% improvement going to a grammar and not 100% getting 9-4 (which the privates do get) I would wonder how this is possible given the imbalance of ability at 11 and all of the tutoring paid for. It would be interesting to do a full survey on earning for Grammar parents and get a fuller picture.

I have personal knowledge of young people who have pushed themselves to take part in things aimed at high achievers where there is a high percentage of privately educated and affluent people take part (my own child included).

It didn't go well to be honest. They felt out of place and even though the other participants were lovely and didn't intend to make them unwelcome it was the little things (like not understanding that one young person had to forgo a week of work earning money in the holidays to attend which impacted on what they could afford/actually helping their family to survive and during a conversation about a health issue that the NHS was refusing to deal with one person said, why don't you just go private.

When you come from an area like I do that is something like the 3rd/4th worst GCSE results in the country the gulf is just too wide.

@TheGhostOfKatesProlapse then it would seem fair that the results of a DC from the grammar in your town with say four A stars is considered contextually better than those from the super selective grammar and the private as they are outperforming their cohort to a greater degree. I wouldn't call that bias or preferential treatment at all.

Widening participation in its current form is not perfect and probably too much of a blunt tool but it has to be a good thing that there is a shift towards greater inclusivity. Shining a torch on a very small grammar sector just muddies the water and the bigger picture is that a very academic DC from a poor background and struggling school has as much right to be at the elite universities than anyone else. These individual DC should be the ones to consider whether the fit is right for them to apply and outreach programs are doing great work in that respect. A higher number of bright DC are applying from less affluent backgrounds and that is making competition tougher for DC from the private sector. One thing is sure, if you don't apply in the first place you are not going to get in. I don't agree with state targets for the sake of it but it is inevitable that any program will have parameters in place for the measure of its success. I don't see anything wrong with having a target of having a broader socio-economic group applying. Contextualisation of results is common sense but needs to be more finely tuned. Oxbridge doesn't typically give contextual offers so IMO academic integrity is being maintained.

If we want fairness in the system then surely refinement of WP is the way forward, not scrapping it.

@Comefromaway we can find failures at university from any stratum of society. When I studied at an elite establishment a long time ago, there were several extremely wealthy DC in my cohort who fell by the wayside due to excessive use of recreational drugs, facilitated by having lots of money to spend on them. That doesn't mean that I believe extremely wealthy people shouldn't be at top universities.

IMO there is only one thing worse than a very bright DC ruling out Oxbridge as it is not for 'people like us'. That would be society making that judgement on their behalf.

This wasn't a university, it was a summer school type event.

IMO there is only one thing worse than a very bright DC ruling out Oxbridge as it is not for 'people like us'. That would be society making that judgement on their behalf.

Not Oxbridge but in the world of music I am really trying to get across to the young people I meet that these places can be aspired to (myself and my dh are from similar working class backgrounds to them). The lack of role models and mentors to help them through the process is a big thing so we do what we can.

But honestly, the colleges don't help. Highly talented young people are marketed to by a small number of lower ranked institutions and that is all they know. And the fight to get the college to do reference for early entry on time defies belief.

@Comefromaway I imagine music is a very difficult area to navigate and it sounds like you and your DH are doing great things. I hear what you say about the attitudes of schools/colleges and I think in some cases the institutions' own horizons benefit from the likes of Oxbridge outreach programs. There seems to be huge variation in individual school support for elite university applications within the state sector. One enlightened teacher can make a big difference in a school. It is very sad if a school has a super bright kid with little or no support from home and then they play their part in narrowing down options for them through their own ignorance. This is why I believe the outreach programs are just so important.

If, through an outreach programme a young person even just gets to meet someone they can connect with, who can help them with the process then they can aim higher.

I’ve just seen a photo illustrating the posho uni league table. It was young women at horse racing. They are in the cheapest enclosure but just a photo labels them as something they are probably not!

People from all backgrounds go racing so why would anyone think they were automatically ‘poshos’?.
Would a photo of young people at a football match put off applicants?

@Barbadossunset Well the editors of that league table did! It wasn’t anything to do with applications but it plays into stereotypes. These people are not like you! So avoid. I’m not sure if the bottom of that particular league table is illustrated with ferrets racing? It just illustrates how society makes judgements on sport and what you look like!

I know lots of schools do tours and sample sessions at their local university. That uni might be wholly unsuitable for quite a few students but if these young people don’t have engaged mentors or parents, they don’t aim high. They aim local!

It just illustrates how society makes judgements on sport and what you look like!

That is a good point. If they want to use sports in their photos they should use photos of football as that encompasses all backgrounds.

A lot of young people become involved in spectator sports that they are also able to take part in. Football is a cheap sport for schools to provide, there are hundreds of local grassroots football clubs across the country and professional teams in these areas are out there every week scouting for talent. At a basic level all an inner city working class child needs is a piece of grass in the local recreation ground and a football.

Horseriding on the other hand is expensive, requires access to a stables, horses, suitable area to ride in. Horses are expensive to upkeep etc. Hence why it is perceived as a "posh" sport/activity.

Sorry havent rttt. So I may be repeating, but a crude state v private split doesn't work. Grammars really shouldn't be counted in the stats, nor should some comprehensives which are clearly in super affluent areas. That said, contrary to MN lore, the vast majority of comprehensives aren't 'leafy'. My own children attended such a school! In some ways the over-simplification of giving consideration to state pupils disadvantages the vast majority who probably are in at best average institutions, and at worse schools like the one my children attended. There needs to be more nuance.
My son went to Cambridge, and the only state school friends he had were from grammars. He met very few people who like him had been to pretty crappy comps.

This kind of stirring doesn't help. It's behind a paywall and I don't subscribe to the Telegraph but you can get the gist from the headline https://www.telegraph.co.uk/education-and-careers/2023/11/12/how-to-save-100000-and-beat-clampdown-on-private-schools/

I don't even need to read it - just move to an exclusive Grammar area, tutor your kid for years to pass 11+ and get into a Grammar. They're full of people who would on paper be paying for private, as I have said. They should be on a par with the private sector.

@TheGhostOfKatesProlapse with reference to your specific area, you are saying that the grammars underperform given their selective intake and that they get worse results than local less selective private schools. That means they must have significantly lower value added and so how should they be considered on a par with the private sector. Can you see that is a contradiction?

You could say they don't work as hard as the kids at private school to achieve - their attainment 8 are far lower. The children at both private and grammar are not disadvantaged children. If Oxbridge actually wants diversity they are not going to find it in a pool of MC parents who can afford to move to affluent areas and tutor their kids all through primary and secondary school because they'd rather keep multiple cars, a mansion and a pool than pay for education.