Discussions will take place at
OUSU council this Friday to review the number of schools invited to Open Days and Regional Events through the Target Schools Scheme.The Target Schools programme
currently aims to increase the number of students from state schools and
colleges applying to Oxford.
This is done by inviting students from all state schools to Open Days and
Regional events organised by the Target Schools scheme. The open days are
hosted by Oxford colleges whereas the regional
events are held further away, including Northern Ireland.The scheme has come under
criticism as some schools which are being invited to the open days already send
students to Oxford
University on a regular
basis. The agenda for the council meeting states that this is an inefficient
use of resources.OUSU Vice-President (Access and
Academic Affairs), Charlynne Pullen, said, “As [colleges and departments] run
their own well-attended open days, Target Schools felt it was inappropriate to
use its own resources to duplicate this work. Target Schools aims to encourage
applicants from state schools and we felt the best use of our resources would
be to focus on schools which have no Oxbridge tradition.” The agenda defines a
school with an “Oxbridge tradition” as one “which has had four or more students
accepted to study at Oxford
annually, taking an average of the previous three years”.Pullen also added that the
proposed motion “wouldn’t stop us sending [invitations] to grammar schools,”
reasserting the equality between schools that Target Schools is trying to
achieve. The decision of what schools are invited to Target Schools open days
is not affected by whether they are grammar schools.The aim of the motion is to
change the role of Target Schools from one of increasing applicants from state
schools to one of increasing applicants from state schools specifically without
an “Oxbridge tradition”. The motion does not specifically address the issue of
private schools that do not have an “Oxbridge tradition” yet are still not
invited by Target Schools to open days and regional events. Such schools are
not currently actively aided by the scheme.Pullen said that encouraging
applications from private schools without an Oxbridge tradition is “not an
access initiative, that’s normal recruitment and the University does it already”.ARCHIVE: 5th week MT 2005
OUSU to review Target Schools
