Its not Just About Oxbridge
The High Master of St Pauls has mentioned the elephant in the room in the Times this week. Many more of our best students are heading off across the pond towards tertiary education in the States. He writes’The globalisation of tertiary education and, in particular, increased knowledge of and access to North American universities led to 34 pupils from St Paul’s studying there in 2016. The pull factors towards the US include the liberal arts degree, which enables students to pursue wider academic study, and generous scholarships. The push factors from Oxbridge are the cost of student loans and a perception that they have become too focused on access and research.’ One Wellington College student a few years ago, who chose Harvard ,over Oxford, in explaining his choice said that in the interview Harvard asked “what can we do for you..Oxford asked what can you do for us? ”. Twenty one Wellington students went to the States (and three to Canada) last year ,Among the beneficiaries Brown, Stanford, Columbia and the University of Southern California . On the other hand, eighteen went to Oxbridge.
The media here (and the Sutton Trust) seem obsessed with Oxbridge ,paying little attention to our other world class universities. University College London and Imperial College, to name just two. Although Oxbridge is investing heavily in outreach it is not to everyone’s tastes , and, of course, often doesn’t offer the range of courses, including in the liberal arts , that many students here are now looking for. Interestingly, Julian Thomas, the Master of Wellington College, is trying to get his students to take an even broader view of what options are available to them when they leave , including taking Degree Apprenticeships. Interesting times. It would help, of course, if there were more high quality Degree Apprenticeships available.
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