Beardsworthy

The British media love to paint Oxford as a glowing beacon of inequality and dickishness.

Just look at the youth that study there: wealthy and well-mannered grandchildren of present and former lords and barons. Have our future leaders no shame? Come sneer at these photos of hungover students in dinner jackets….in a punt! Don’t they know the value of money?

And bingo. The negative image of Oxford is accepted throughout the country. Not helped by articles like this one by Tom Beardsworth, editor of the esteemed Cherwell.

Beardsworth’s article legitimises the prevalent false accusations, cements negative images and does a disservice to the access programmes throughout the university.

He writes: “The British media remains hyper sensitive to stories insinuating Oxford elitism. Rightly so, in one important regard: 42.5 per cent of undergraduates arrive from private schools, in contrast to the seven per cent of students nationwide who attend them.”

Elitism is usually inferred to mean that an institution is reserved for those who possess characteristics other than natural talent. Not surprisingly we see in the UK, a correlation between quality of education and wealth. Thus when Oxford accepts the most ambitious and ‘intelligent’ young people that apply, there is a disproportionately large cohort of white, middle-class, private school kids. No shit Sherlock.

The problem is societal, and not simply Oxford’s.

It is surely great that Oxford runs access programmes to try and reach out to schools where teachers and parents have completely misinformed ideas of Oxbridge, tainted by such scathing articles.

Inequality? What inequality?

Does using the term ‘outreach’ really imply “its victims are targets” and that children from state schools are all treated “as a homogenous victimized group”? Do access schemes consequently “fall victim to the sort of satire, irony and cynicism that leads to these ugly outbursts”? Please. Who are you kidding.

State-school kids are, compared to their privately educated peers, disadvantaged. This is why access schemes are needed.

“Oxford University provides the most generous system of undergraduate support for low-income students in the UK”…yet apparently we can only conclude that there is something “subtle and insidious” at play here. Obviously.

What’s really subtle and insidious is the image of Oxford that the media portray. It’s created an artificial mental image of a university that doesn’t even exist.

A friend working at an access event was asked by secondary-school girl, “Do you have to know someone at Oxford to get in?” Because so few people go to Oxbridge, most people only know the assumptions they make, based on the media’s insidious portrayal.

“It would be interesting to know how much the university would need to spend to compensate for the reputational damage caused by the most recent flare-up” The cost comes from countering the media’s obsession with these stories. An obsession that allows articles like Mr Beardsworth’s to be published. No wonder so few people from lower-income backgrounds apply here.

Elitism is wrong, sure. But Oxbridge is far more the victim of an elitist education system and aggressive media than it is socially elitist itself. Tom Beardsworth’s cynical article is a disservice to himself and the admirable access programmes which he appears to have to little grasp of.