Follow you, Follow me: role models and ivory towers

It's not been a good week for Oxford University. A damming response to a freedom of information request by Labour MP David Lammy revealed a shocking and growing lack of social and ethnic diversity in their undergraduate intake, suggesting that an institution that has always been seen as a bastion of the privileged establishment is becoming increasingly just that. The university, along with its counterpart Cambridge, and indeed other top universities, appears to be helping those already in the upper echelons of society to tighten their grip on the top jobs, to the exclusion of those less fortunate than themselves. Click here for the story.

Of course this is nothing new. Reports condemning Oxbridge and its self-evident lack of social and ethnic diversity appear with depressing regularity, giving ammunition to those who wish to snipe at these ancient universities, so admired and respected throughout the world, yet so often the subject of criticism or ridicule at home. This saddens me: I am a proud Oxford graduate, yet feel that I earned the right to that status rather than being born to it, and I am also proud that a small number of students whom I taught over a 36 year career followed in my footsteps, not because they were privileged and educated at a good school, but because they were highly intelligent and well-motivated students who were encouraged and, I hope, inspired by a teacher who believed that they would enjoy and benefit from such a uniquely challenging education. More of that later.

Now of course I am biased, so if you think that Oxbridge is a self-serving ivory tower, perpetuating the injustices and inequalities of society, you might as well stop reading here and resent me.

My alma mater: Exeter College Oxford

But if you can bear with me, let me defend my alma mater. (“There he goes, spouting Latin, point proved....”)

I honestly believe that to attack Oxbridge is to miss the point. Oxford and Cambridge are elite universities, now more than ever. They compete at an international level with other leading universities and can only sustain their position and reputation if they recruit the best students from the UK and beyond. And if the best students (albeit judged on narrow academic criteria) come from a very limited sector of society, arguably that's society's fault, not Oxbridge’s. They can only select from those who apply, and it is a self-evident truth that high achievers are more likely to come from well-to-do families, top schools, and very often both.

That doesn't make it right, and it doesn't mean there isn't a problem, which could, to an extent, be tackled - for example by continued investment in imaginative outreach work. However, I feel that to criticise Oxbridge is easy but unfair. They are academically highly selective, and there are far more applicants than places. So they choose the best applicants, wherever they come from. But in my view, they do so without prejudice or favouritism: they pick the best, who all-too-often are not from lower socio-economic groups or ethnic minorities. Therein lies the real problem, and we shouldn't blame Oxbridge for that.

My feeling - and it's no more than a feeling, so I will willingly stand corrected if others want to counter with hard facts – is that Oxford has become far more socially exclusive than it was in the 1970s when I was there. I was at Exeter College, one of the university's oldest, a college which visually fulfils every cliché: the honey coloured walls, the manicured quadrangle, the ornate chapel, the hogwartsesque dining hall. Yet in the 70s it was a pretty down-to-earth place, and for this lad from “oop North” it was challenging, mind-broadening but not intimidating. My friends and fellow undergraduates there spoke with accents from places like Bradford, Manchester, Oldham, Devon, Wiltshire, London, and Wolverhampton and were mainly state educated. Posh public schoolboys were there, but seemed like an endangered species, a harmless source of amusement to those of us who were of the real world.

So if I am right, why has this happened over the past forty years? Why has Oxford become more socially exclusive over a period in which, to some extent at least, society at large has quite rightly become more meritocratic and egalitarian and less deferential to the old school tie?

I fear that the answer lies much further back in the educational system. Oxbridge is not recruiting young people from less privileged backgrounds because those young people are left behind way before they get near applying to university. The fault lies in a system which does not support and inspire young people from all backgrounds to aim high and reach for the glittering prizes. The quest to raise standards for the many over recent decades has arguably meant that the interests of the most talented get neglected. For all their faults, the free state grammar schools which flourished in the mid twentieth century, not least in the industrial North, gave some children from all backgrounds a ladder and the encouragement to climb it.

No, I am not calling for a return to grammar schools. They had many faults, serving only a relative few based on a harsh and imperfect selection method and left many on the scrapheap. However, one of the great features of the grammar school that I and many others attended was the influence of the many talented, charismatic and inspirational teachers who served as role models for the likes of me. And guess what, many of them were Oxbridge educated: I recently came across a staff list from the early seventies from my old school, and was struck by how many of my teachers were Oxbridge graduates. Highly intelligent yet grounded men, who taught entertainingly and intuitively, each in his own style, free from the need to follow detailed schemes of work, to meet aims and objectives and to meet performance criteria. The best lessons were the ones that digressed wildly from the matter in hand, stretching the mind and arousing true intellectual curiosity. I applied to Oxford for a lot of reasons, but strongest among them was that I had a really good and inspirational French teacher at my (free, state) grammar school who was an Oxford graduate. He was clearly very clever, but also very funny, and he used to regale us with stories of his university days. I wanted to be like him, and was lucky enough to be able to fulfil that ambition. I know several of my friends from those days who applied to university for the same sort of reason. 

I fear that such people do not come into teaching these days, and if they do their talent is subjugated to the need to tick boxes in pursuit of Ofsted criteria. Why would an Oxbridge graduate come into teaching, where pay is capped, professional freedom and common sense is constantly undermined by policy and bureaucracy, when they could earn far more for less intellectual effort in another profession?

Perhaps instead of demanding that Oxbridge fiddle with their selection procedures and entry requirements, we should look at ways of encouraging more Oxbridge and other high-calibre graduates into teaching, where perhaps they can demystify Oxbridge life and act as mentors and role models. And when they become teachers, perhaps we could allow them rather more freedom and respect. If we must have academies, how about an Oxbridge sponsored academy?

Follow You, Follow Me, as Genesis said in 1978. Role models can be very powerful. 

"My future in the system was talked about and planned" - musings on university open days

I enjoy finding suitable titles for my blog posts from song lyrics. This one comes from a 1973 song "Free Electric Band" by Albert Hammond, an under-rated English singer-songwriter best known as the writer of "When I need you", a UK No1 for Leo Sayer in 1977, and "The Air that I breathe", a UK No2 for The Hollies in 1974.

 

Albert Hammond, although English, moved to America, and some of his songs reflect that. "Free Electric Band" is a (rather late) manifesto of hippy-trippy dropout values in conflict with what used to be called "the system". It describes the writer's rebellious rejection of his parents' American middle-class values, and of their plans for a prosperous, conventional future.

 

This song came into my head yesterday when I spent a day in Oxford, as I always do at this time of the year, with  a small group of Sixth Form students from my school. At a university Open Day, especially at places like Oxford, young peoples' "future in the system" is indeed being "talked about and planned" Sometimes, I suspect, without their full cooperation.

I am very proud of the fact that, as a Higher Education Advisor, I have always made a point of taking a group of high-achieving students to the Open Day at my former university. I enjoy taking them to see my own college, showing them where I was lucky enough to live and study for three years, and hopefully inspiring and encouraging them to try applying if they are good enough.
 

 

When I first started doing this, over twenty years ago, Open Days were very different. On the way down to Oxford, one would see many school minibuses on the motorway, each carrying a dozen or so Sixth Formers, driven by relaxed-looking teachers enjoying a day away from the classroom at the end of term. Once in Oxford, groups were shepherded around by those teachers in much the way that I still do. They took their groups to a college Open Day, left them to meet tutors and current undergraduates, and went off to wander round Oxford for a couple of hours in the sunshine. That is precisely what I did yesterday, and do every year.

 

Sadly, the nature of the Open Day, and of those who attend it, has changed out of all recognition in recent years. Instead of groups of Sixth Formers enjoying the chance to chat informally with a teacher as they walk amidst the dreaming spires, the city is now crammed with embarrassed and mildly resentful-looking teenagers each with one, and often two, over-bearing parents looking for all the world like those who accompany their primary aged children to the now ubiquitous school open days. 

 

It's like what you see at any touristy cultural hotspot in summer: middle-class parents attempting to interest a slightly bored teenager in a cathedral/museum/stately home/visitor centre, with the said teenager actually wishing that s/he was lying on a beach listening to music on their headphones whilst catching up with Facebook, or riding a roller coaster at a theme park.

 

But at a university open day, it's worse than that. The childrens' future in the system is indeed being talked about and planned, and I have a terrible feeling that in many cases, the parents' desire to secure Oxbridge entry for their child is rather stronger than the child's desire to be there. I feel so sorry for the university tutors who are desperate to engage with these undoubtedly fine and capable young people and encourage them to ask the questions that they want to ask. Instead, they find themselves having to fend off questions from over-enthusiastic, vicarious parents. Fortunately, colleges and Departments have the sense to exclude parents from the subject sessions with tutors, and in some cases they put on a separate talk for parents.

 

Of course it's not quite as bad as I am painting it. It is perfectly reasonable for parents to take a teenager to an Open Day, and see for themselves what university life and work is all about, especially when there is a £30000 - £50000 price tag attached. However, I really do mourn the decline  of the school-led visit. Back in the 1970's, I applied to Oxford for a lot of reasons, but strongest among them was that I had a really good and inspirational French teacher at my (free, state) grammar school who was an Oxford graduate. He was clearly very clever, but also very funny, and he used to regale us with stories of his university days. I wanted to be like him, and was lucky enough to be able to fulfil that ambition. I know several of my friends from those days who applied to university for the same sort of reason.

 

Sadly, Oxbridge graduates don't seem to go into teaching as much as they used to. Small wonder, when they can command massive salaries in the world of business or commerce. With fewer Oxbridge educated teachers to inspire them, it is increasingly left to parents to push bright teenagers towards the glittering prize of a place at the top universities. Add to that the fact that school trips are now so hard to organise in terms of bureaucracy (did I remember to do a risk assessment before taking four seventeen year olds out on a punt yesterday?) that teachers understandably pass the task of open day visits over to only-too-keen parents. But what happened to the idea of sending a seventeen-year old off on the train, alone or with some friends, to a university visit. Surely that small step towards independence is a good thing?

 

I know, we can't rewind the clock. Times have changed. Universities, even Oxford, have to sell themselves, and that includes to anxious parents. They do a damn good job too - the Oxford Open Day is a masterpiece of logistical organisation and teamwork across a very devolved institution. But maybe, just maybe, parents should learn to take a step back. Take your kids to the Open Day by all means, but why not drive your son/daughter and a couple of mates, drop them off somewhere, go and do a bit of shopping, sightseeing or chilling, and arrange to meet up with the kids a few hours later for a good meal and a de-brief. That's exactly what I did yesterday, but as a teacher.

I bet, indeed I know, that university tutors would prefer it that way too.