AIBU - gutted for them regarding early entry subject rejections (non-oxbridge)

[westerdays]

I teach a STEM subject at sixth form level. in the South West of the UK.
I'm also involved in the UCAS process for our school's applicants.

Our school extends support to would be medics/dentists/vets etc who don't get a uni place on those type of courses first time round.

Some pupils resit an A Level (or 2), some just need reassurance that many very able applicants do take more than one UCAS application to get a place or advise on their chances given their UCAT score/likelihood of increasing that score, or a realistic opinion on their chances.

I've noticed that the non ethnic lads at our school are having the toughest time securing places to study medicine/dentistry/vet sci, no matter how good their academic track record or how high their UCAT score, the interview performance seems to trounce all of that. I had one lad who, having applied for a third and final time for dentistry last year was rejected again post interview. He's going abroad to study dentistry and his plan is then to return and work his way through all the processes required of "non uk trained" dentists before they can fully practice dentistry in the uk. He's always been an extremely able all-rounder and I have no doubt that he'll pick up enough of the local language quickly enough to assist with his studies.
We're fortunate enough to have enough parents who are doctors/dentists/pharmacists/vets etc volunteering to do multiple practice interviews, but it's generally the girls/ethnically diverse boys who seem to have most chance of getting the offers after interviews these days even though our "mock interview panels" haven't found any major distinguishing factors between many of our school's applicants when it comes to feedback to aid interview performance in the real thing.

If cityofgirls and AnotherOxbridgeTutor are Cambridge and Oxford Admissions Tutors, then I am truly embarrassed for these institutions: one does not seem aware that Oxbridge publish detailed data on admissions and the other does not seem to understand there is a difference between absolute numbers and proportional numbers.

Further, if an applicant with all 5s&6s at GCSE is capable of passing Oxbridge's own entrance exams and the interviews then either something went seriously wrong at GCSE (serious illness?) or they had a deepfake sit the entrance exams for them.

I am not at all sure what you mean by this. The aptitude tests and interviews are not pass or fail and candidates with low GCSEs also tend to badly on them. That said, we are some taking students with lower marks on those tests in preference to those with higher marks.

I am also not sure what you mena by your reference to not understanding absolute and proportionate numbers. Perhaps you could explain. I have put links to all the data I am referring to in my posts.

No they don't.
If you follow my links the numbers are there. Taking the Oxford numbers (links and page numbers above) in 2023 (most recent stats)
Women: 7444 applicants results in 1551 offers i.e. c21% of women receive an offer.
Men: 7192 applicants results in 1354 offers. i.e. c19% of men receive an offer.

They give the numbers for the last 5 years and you will see that the proportion of women receiving an offer is higher than that for men in each year.

For the reasons given above it can be misleading to look at the overall rates and the picture is much more complex.

I’m glad if girls do get more offers (as their a level grades tend to be higher) 👍

This article was in The times a few days ago:
https://www.thetimes.com/uk/education/article/universities-failing-to-promote-diversity-will-face-funding-cuts-hfr3nd6gd

As part of the plans, universities will have to show the promotion success rate of underrepresented groups and the percentage of black, Asian and mixed-race academics eligible for funding. They will also have to provide evidence that diversity initiatives are being “appropriately recognised”, The Times reported. 8 Feb 2025

The Times article may not open, here's a link to the evening standard article:
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/universities-diversity-funding-cuts-b1209915.html

What got my attention is John Armstrong's statement in the Evening standard article : “There’s a serious risk of promoting positive discrimination over merit-based hiring.”

This is ridiculous. Asking someone to give a link to the data they are using, so that they are not posting it randomly, is not equivalent to not knowing it is there, FFS. @Sapienza had not answers any of the questions I posted in response to that data, which is averaged across lots of different subjects and colleges.

There are no deepfakes: this is silly nonsense. We don’t have entrance exams to “pass” (or fail) — it doesn’t work like that. Some subjects operate tests which are scored in a range, and the test scores are compared to GCSE and other public exam results. But we also take state educated candidates with lower test scores than candidates from private schools. A candidate from a school ranked internally by us as, say, a “C2” comprehensive may get an offer with a lower test score and GCSE profile than one from a top grammar (“G1”) school or a middling independent (“I2”). Each candidate’s results will be adjusted relative to their school, local and national data and then they are all ranked in a quintile system which will put a candidate's GCSE and test scores from a G3-C3 school, in higher quintiles than the same results profile from a I1-G2 school.

There’s nothing wrong with this if you’re using it to compare candidates’ achievements relative to their school type and level of educational privilege, with the aim of levelling the playing field. It does become a question if you are rejecting candidates who are much more qualified than others purely on the basis of identity/background. Universities haven’t caused these different levels of social and financial advantage or disadvantage, but there is a pretence that we are somehow supposed to fix them (as opposed to make judgments taking these into account).

@cityofgirls, I have already pointed you to both the Oxford Admissions statistics and the Cambridge Admissions statistics for undergraduate students.

Bizarrely, you were unaware of the existence of these publications despite claiming to 'do Oxbridge Admissions'.

I’m not unaware of them: I just wanted you to give a link to the data! (You realise of course that we don’t actually look at the university’s applicant-facing webpages - why would we? Central admissions and the IT people update the university website, not us.)

First of all, you know of course that these are averaged across a range of subjects and colleges, including subjects where the reverse is true (in many arts and humanities subjects there are very few men, white and privately educated or otherwise). The data is skewed by science subjects and maths, which distorts the overall picture, for complicated reasons (maths, for example, is very heavily male-skewed).

But you realise that none of those stats are actually relevant to what I and @AnotherOxbridgeTutor were saying? Do let me ask you again the questions you haven’t answered. Of course it’s in response to data like this that we are being told to admit less good candidates above better qualified ones, purely to make the data look better. Is that justified, in your opinion (many think it is)? Is it unfair if you are an extremely high-achieving candidate, to be turned down solely because you make the data look bad? (Of course, they don’t get told that!) I’m assuming that you think that’s fine. Others in the thread think it’s discrimination. But it’s a valid and important discussion as to whether it is fair or not.

In my opinion, what we have always done in my subject (which is to try and admit applicants fairly, taking into account their background); is very different from what’s started to happen in the last 2/3 years, which is us being told that we can’t admit some excellent candidates solely because they attended a private school, for example.

Told by who cityofgirls?

As I said above, our admissions team (the admissions tutor/s in each college).

That's a remarkable coherence among independently minded tutors. I genuinely find it astonishing. I also would also expect certain colleges to hold out as a body against any such edict from even higher up the admissions food chain.

Did the admissions tutors posting here go to private school I wonder?

Dentistry in the UK tend not to do traditional interviews but assessed stations instead. If it's taken 3 go's OP I'm not sure your candidate is necessarily cut out for it.

It happens, I am sure of that. A decade ago DCs peers across a number of London private schools knew which University departments were a long shot for applicants from their background. After a few years of some very strong applicants being rejected, things would revert back to normal. In the meantime those strong applicants went to Imperial, UCL or LSE and did just fine, as did the reputations of those Universities. We are very lucky to have a good choice in Universities, and Oxbridge clearly have social mobility as well as academic priorities. They may not get it right every time, but in the process will find some real talent who thrives in an Oxbridge environment.

DS found this in the jobs market as well. He was heading for a distinction in a very technical Masters, considered to be the best in Europe. He applied for a graduate job in an organisation specifically interested in his skill set, but was not offered even a first Zoom interview. The previous year he had been runner up, after a multi-stage interview process, for one of their internships and got the "You met the standard, not enough places" letter. At the same time he made a long list for the equivalent organisation in the US, despite no links with the country, and indeed has since had an internship with them.

It was not a big surprise. The head of the organisation had been making a lot of noise about the need to increase diversity. As a small and specialist organisation it probably did not have a lot of staff turnover, so the only way to achieve diversity aims would be through recruitment.

DS is fine. He has since earned a PhD, and is working as an academic in the field. He is talking about reapplying, at a level where the strength of his CV will be more important than the colour of his skin or the school he went to.

What did bother me at the time was a left-wing trustafarian friend saying that the decision not to hire him was correct. We as a society had to compensate for colonialism. I immediately saw all my Irish forebears turning in their graves. My late father, who grew up in a two up two down tied railway cottage in New Cross suffered discrimination during the No Blacks, No Irish, No Dogs era. He survived. My son will as well. At some point down the line, merit comes into play.

No I went to a comprehensive school that had a significantly below average attainment profile and a high number on fsm. In my experience, those of us in this position are especially concerned about the current direction.

That makes little sense to me. I went to a comprehensive school and spend lots of time trying to encourage others. I hope it’s not a Badenoke drawbridge thing.

No.

I am really sorry we must not be communicating what is happening clearly enough. We have strongly supported encouraging applications from students from these backgrounds, have spent huge amounts of time running open days and summer schools, have put great effort into designing admissions procedures so that they are finding the most talented students whatever their background. But the current moves are to taking some students because of their background despite the fact that the data we have is far weaker (even looked at in context) than other successful candidates, and that is very different. Admitting a student is just the start. Most of our student facing work is in teaching, assessing and supporting students. We can see the impact in that work and it is very difficult for students who were admitted even though all of the data suggested they were going to struggle. It’s also makes it more difficult for the (very many) talented students from those backgrounds who suspect they were admitted for diversity reasons, when in fact they are very much there on merit.

We do spend huge amounts of time doing that - I’ve spent decades working in widening participation / target schools programmes. But this misses the point. We want to admit great applicants with lots of potential, whatever their school background. That doesn’t mean we also think it’s okay to turn excellent candidates down purely because of their school background, and take others who are less good instead, just to make the admissions data look better.

@AnotherOxbridgeTutor x-post! Honestly I wish that private messaging was working because it would be great to swap thoughts in more detail. My subject is one that traditionally does huge amounts of outreach and admits a very diverse student profile, so it’s especially galling when we occasionally do want to take a truly excellent private school candidate, and are told we can’t (largely because other subjects don’t do as much outreach as us).

It is not hard to understand why parents of privately educated young men not getting a place at Oxbridge or landing their dream jobs after university see discrimination everywhere. Back in the day, the privately educated mediocre fathers of these boys routinely got a place at Oxbridge. In his autobiography, a former Headmaster of Westminster School says Oxford used to plead with them to give them (Oxford) a few bright boys and in return Oxford would admit weak boys. I forget the name of the headmaster but can find name of his book should anyone want more info. I don't think this scenario exists anymore. Yes, there are a lot of white privately educated boys at Oxbridge now but they are there strictly on merit. The world has changed and competition for places is fierce now but these parents are stuck in the days when everything was so easy for them.

And it's hilarious to see a few people paint a picture of BME taking up all the places at Oxbridge and in the workplace. The reality is that Oxbridge is still overwhelmingly white, as it should be. Walk around Oxford or Cambridge and count the number of BME students that you see, ok, not a scientific method, but you should see less than 30%. There's nothing controversial about these numbers, BME, after all, is just that - a minority.

Real Oxford Admissions Tutors reject all sorts. I doubt there is a blanket policy to turn down anyone because of their background, haven't they just rejected a South Asian girl with an IQ of 161 and 34 x 9 GCSEs and doing 28 A-Levels from a state school? I am not certain about this it is just a rumour I have heard from some young people.

I think the point being made here is that the key criterion for admittance should be merit. Target those less likely to apply but use merit (in context) not quotas to fill places.

FWIW DS’s Cambridge college looks to be diverse (from seeing matriculation photos, attending parent events) although many students are from a handful of London state selective schools.

The state school girl (selective London school) with 34 x 9 GCSEs is British-Pakistani. Are Oxford targeting those less likely to apply then going out of their way to reject this calibre of student in favour of someone with 5s&6s at GCSE?

This makes no sense whatsoever.

Are there parents and teachers encouraging YP with 5s&6s to apply to Oxbridge? Presumably these students don't do well in admission tests or interviews. I find it very hard to believe admissions tutors and colleges would agree to teach such students.

https://telegraph.co.uk/gift/1125230d3a7e5725

"Oxford and Cambridge to move away from ‘traditional’ exams to boost results of minorities.
Universities considering open-book tests and take-home papers in bid to close achievement gap between students from different backgrounds"