Private schools may have been included in Cambridge University scheme for deprived teens

Cambridge University

Private school pupils may have been flagged for inclusion in a Cambridge University scheme designed to help deprived teenagers, an investigation has found.

Applicants from schools that have sent fewer than five pupils to Oxbridge in the past five years are identified as part of the university’s “widening participation” system.

An investigation by Varsity, the student newspaper found that schools flagged up under the policy included Gordonstoun, the King’s alma mater, and an online school set up by Harrow.

Freedom of Information requests showed that the university flagged at least 289 private schools for “low participation in Oxbridge” when assessing applications.

Widening participation is designed to aid applicants from under-represented backgrounds, which includes those “from the lowest socioeconomic groups”, Cambridge University has said.

The scheme means that a candidate’s application is considered in the context of their school and geographic background.

The university’s admission guidance states that it flags applicants from schools where fewer than five pupils have been made an offer by Oxford or Cambridge over the past five years.

Planning to scrap target

“This isn’t a measure of the quality of the school/college or the relative performance of an applicant,” the guidance states. “Instead it makes our assessors aware that the applicant’s school/college may be less able to advise them on applying to Cambridge and to prepare them for the interview process.”

Cambridge is planning to scrap its state school target, introduced for the five academic years leading up to 2024-25, with the ambition of increasing the proportion of state-educated undergraduates from 63.4 per cent to 69.1 per cent.

The university has beaten its target, with the proportion of new students from state schools increasing to 72.9 per cent in 2022-23, compared with 68.1 per cent at Oxford.

Cambridge’s next access and participation plan (APP), which is being drawn up for the years 2025-26 to 2028-29, will focus on how to increase the number of students from deprived socio-economic backgrounds, under-represented regions of the country, and under-represented ethnicities.

A spokesperson for the university said: “All applicants to the university are considered holistically and no one piece of data is considered in isolation, in line with the admissions policy.

“An applicant’s schooling is taken into account, particularly if they come from a school which has not seen many applications to Cambridge, alongside other socio-economic factors to indicate disadvantage of opportunity.

“The new APP is being drafted now in line with Office for Student guidelines and is subject to further discussion around the collegiate university. It will continue to reflect the university’s commitment to widening participation.”

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