Is Trinity Hall Cambridge right about elite schools?

[mids2019]

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2026/jan/07/cambridge-college-elite-private-schools-student-recruitment

Interesting position but maybe there are those at Cambridge that think encouraging students from the state sector has gone too far? Wonder if other colleges will follow suit.

As ably demonstrated by George Abaraonye ABB entry.

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/sep/11/oxford-union-condemns-president-elects-reported-comments-on-charlie-kirk-shooting

The top 1% of earners is more or less evenly divided between those who use the private sector and those who use the state sector to educate their children.

I can well believe that. On mn there are quite a few posters who boast about sending their dc to state school - even though they could easily afford private school - because they have morals.

@januarybikethief
I agree that young people have different talents but I don't think most state school students are pushed towards certain subjects. Large numbers choose psychology (second most popular subject after maths), history and sociology because they find the subjects interesting not based on employability.
I agree that Cambridge should not take computer science students if at interview they don't seem to be aware that it is not an IT/software course. However, I think that Cambridge could probably have offered another 20 places easily from the 1837 who applied and still had good quality students.
And what is your argument for why 90% of the 1571 Economic students who applied in 2024 were turned away as I know that Cambridge requires Further Mathematics A-level (if the school offers it) so I assume the students applying are mathematically able? IMO they could have offered another 20 places too without dumbing down as these people often go to UCL, LSE, Warwick etc. and do very well in Economics. Why were 85% of the 1604 Law applicants turned away in 2024? This is another course Cambridge could offer 20 more places on.
It seems strange that there are so many places for medieval and modern languages and Classics at Cambridge given the small number of students who could apply. Why were there only 108 offers for psychological and behavioural sciences (8.6% acceptance rate compared to 152 for medieval and modern languages when psychology is the second most populat subject in the country at A-level? Why is Cambridge so focused on subjects e.g. classics that are usually only offered at private schools and state school students are less likely to apply for?

Not all state schools are equal.

I’d like to see that statistic analysed in terms of state schools type - Grammar? Single sex? Comprehensive? Location?

It suits some people (Labour politicians and others) to say ‘state schools’ of course..

Because their kids are eligible to go to a decent state school, more likely.

This is getting tiresome. They take the number of students that they have room for, that they have staff to teach in a tutorial system. Numbers are limited. It has always been the case that there are more students with the requisite 'A' levels than there are places on each course. The Colleges pick the ones that they think will suit the course best, as they are perfectly entitled to do.

They are very unlikely to start taking away places from subjects that you consider unimportant in order to train more computer scientists. Ancient universities provide an education, not just training for employment.

As you say, CS students do well at other Universities. Not everyone can go to Oxford or Cambridge.

Large numbers choose psychology (second most popular subject after maths), history and sociology because they find the subjects interesting not based on employability.

@fairyring25 another reason (certainly at DD's school) was because many students simply didn't have the grades to do other subjects. As a result the psychology classes conatined a much more mixed ability group of students than, say, maths or chemistry.

Because cam employs lecturers /tutors in those subjects and don’t want to/can’t sack them all to make way for more contemporary subjects? It’s set in its ways?

"Why is Cambridge so focused on subjects e.g. classics that are usually only offered at private schools and state school students are less likely to apply for?"

Because international applicants are a thing; and because a point is reached when the tail has to stop wagging the dog.

Oxford has been around for about 1000 years, Cambridge about 800. Free secondary state education has been around about 100 years.

I suppose the private schools have many centuries of symbiosis with Oxbridge that state schools don’t. Grammars were a conscious effort to bridge the gap which were rejected by the left about 40 years ago.

I guess were are just “storming and norming” here to find a way forward.

I think we’ll find the best result if state schools respond to Oxbridge requirements rather than the other way around. The vast majority of students at Oxbridge are state students. I don’t think there is any bias against them.

Oxbridge will continue to teach classics and theology and so on because it’s been the foundation of education for centuries. Universities that have been running for 800 flipping years do not have jump to whatever supposedly modish subjects are required….

Im not sure law and computer science are ‘modish’. I do think there is very limited appeal to 18 year olds to study classics. As the entry levels show (from any school).

Oxford has not had its 1000th anniversary and Bologna will get there first. They are an ancient seat of learning and offer the courses they wish, like every other university. A different offering from Oxbridge is good. No one is asking Imperial to offer Ancient History.

Universities aren’t just here to teach 18 year olds - they are research institutions too, and Oxbridge is working on a global level.

No one fancied economics much when I was an undergraduate 30 years ago. Sociology had been the hot subject in the 60s and 70s. These trends come and go - it’s not a bad thing for scholarship to be independent of that.

Not that many girls doing comp sci anywhere.

(I'll be the only woman in my office tomorrow, too.)

Classics, theology and MFL are important but I think in terms of Oxbridge does anything need to be done to give state school pupils a chance of competitive entry when state schools don't teach Latin or classics at a significant level and MFL is restricted or deprioritised.

I can see for some of the Oxbridge curricula there may the temptation for an appeal to elite private schools for more applicants as the college's know these schools can provide the platform for successful degree performance and this will aid maintenance of degree standards. There will be those at elite schools that fail to get into Oxbridge after applying for a very competitive subjects e.g. Economics or Maths who in reality given their general academic ability and knowledge would have had a. Very good chance of being accepted into say classics. One could ask is there anything wrong with colleges reaching out to elite schools with these alternatives?

as for state schools I feel there must be more focus on gifted and talented pupils and to have funding in place to extend the curricula for these pupils so they have access to the breadth of Oxbridge and other elite university offering. We should be aiming for equality of opportunity.

I think it's up to the state sector to up their game with better resources geared towards the best pupils to take places in the less popular Oxbridge subjects and maybe we shouldn't call out private education simply because they offer the broad curriculum necessary for the discussed subjects.

@mids2019 You are suggesting the tail Wags the dog though. Just because schools don’t see MFL as important but big up media studies and sociology, it doesn’t mean academic universities have to follow suit. In fact they should not. Their academic offering should remain intact at the core but evolve around it. Schools have decided some subjects are not worth much effort and dc won’t put the effort into a broad curriculum. That does not mean dc who get high grade GCSEs but are talented at music or MFLs as an academic subject should not be provided for at an elite level. As too few of those dc are catered for in state schools and are put off the subjects, other dc who can benefit from these subjects should be encouraged to apply. Sadly they tend not to bother because they are continually informed they aren’t really wanted.

It's all down to funding in state schools. DD's school offered drama as an A level option but so few students chose it that they couldn't afford to run it and withdrew it.

Things were different 40 years ago. There were only three of us in my A level French group, but state schools nowadays wouldn't run a class with so few students these days.

I’m not sure anyone can argue that research is needed for classics.

All this talk about some kind of social disconnect between privately educated and state educated at Cambridge is utter nonsense. DS was privately educated (top London day school), but practically everyone he met at his college was state educated. The greatest 'disconnect' in the first few weeks was between students who came from say, a small village or rural place and who thought Cambridge was huge and busy, versus those from London or other cities who thought Cambridge was a quaint village!

Beyond the first week, nobody talks about what school anyone went to anyway.

I think the college DS was at had about 85% state school admission. Sounds great right? BUT nearly all of them were from grammars - this is what the WP stats obfuscate (well, up until this year). The most represented school there was the academy Brampton Manor which was actively targetted by the college. DS did meet the one guy in his year who had been at Eton and said he was a lovely, down-to-earth person.

It's not about private v state so much as selective v comprehensive. Cambridge seems to have realised this now and it's reflected in the way they are recording admissions data.

No they're not right. They are taking an extremely lazy approach to admissions to avoid taking the time, resources and skill to do it well. Of course there are going to be a higher proportion of kids with higher grades at elite private schools - they have entrance exams and entrance interviews so they are doing half the admissions work for them! It takes time, care and work to identify the 1-2 children from each state school who would thrive at Oxbridge. Tit Hall obviously haven't been doing well at that and can't be bothered to work harder on it.

There’s a huge amount to research in the classics (if that’s what you were disagreeing with).

Masses of unread and undeciphered documents that we can use new technology (including AI) to read and interpret.

If you just mean it’s not important, that’s a matter of taste.

But even if scholars are just re-examining old issues that is useful unless you think we’d got all our judgments right by 2000, 1950, 1850, etc pick your year.

I think the government have the responsibility to improve the non selective state schools and fulfill the non selective state school kids potential. It’s not the universities job to clear up the government mess. They can do their bit but really this is bottom up not top down. Or it should be. Guess it’s put in the too difficult box by successive gvts. Grammars did a great job of identifying kids with academic potential - Labour got rid of most of them, limiting social mobility in one fell swoop.

Improving education in state schools is a different issue. There are kids who do extremely well in even poorly performing state schools and get straight As. Trinity Hall need to put in the work to find them. A lot of the reason private schools outperform state schools is that they have entrance exams and are academically selective. The quality/style of education is not necessarily improving outcomes very much.

Also, this argument that students at super-selective independents are 'Tim but dim' types is only trotted out by people who have literally no idea. Obviously, independent schools, like state schools, are not all the same - far from it!

Admission to certain London schools at 11-plus is insane -more competitive than Oxbridge. For some schools, 20 children may be competing via exams and interviews at 11 plus for one place. All of these kids will be among the most academically able at their primary schools. These schools can literally cherry-pick those on a clear trajectory to all 9s and A stars. They will take the ones who are not only the most academic, but who do music, sports or 'something else' to high standards alongside their academics - simply because they can.

Once in these schools, high standards and competition are normal. You could be in the lowest set for maths, believe 'maths is not my thing,' and still come out with a 9 - as my DS did!

DS applied to Cambridge with 10 x 9s at GCSE and 4 A stars predicted and was rejected. He applied again with the 4 A star A levels achieved and got in. He found the work load and expectations at Cambridge easy compared to the workload and expectations his school. At school, he always felt very average - never got a prize or was never stand out in any way. Not surprising really as students with 9s and A stars were not particularly celebrated, just the normal standard expectation.

At Cambridge, DS was in the choir, rowed and very involved in about 3 societies. He was also out most nights, from what I could make out. He came out with a First with Distinction (80% overall and some of his exams were in the 90% range). If he hadn't reapplied, he might have always thought he wasn't up to the mysterious 'Cambridge standard' but actually it's a degree, like any other and they will make if it what they make of it if given the chance.

I would say the vast majority of kids from his school could have got Firsts from Cambridge without breaking too much of a sweat had they applied / got in. A large proportion applied to the US though and went that route. This was a few years ago and still seems to be a growing trend.

It's the same with the super-selective grammars in London where there are 20 applicants per place. Of course more of these kids are going to be applying to Oxbridge than they are from comps and of course they will be less phased by the workload and expectations once there.

DS may have been from an independent school but he is first generation uni and not white / British, unlike the vast majority of 'state school' white British at the uni. The point being, you can't have a chip in your shoulder about any of these things, just apply and do your own thing as best you can. He went to Imperial after Cambridge which is frankly much more 'elitist' (in an international 'elite' sense)!