An expansion of the Crankstart Scholarships will extend initiatives across a wider group, including graduates and students from disadvantaged and underprivileged backgrounds from the age of 14, Oxford University announced in a press release.
The Crankstart Scholarships currently support 17% of the University’s full-time UK undergraduate students. It is offered to students across the whole university who are completing their first undergraduate degree and have a household income under £32,500.
This funding will be extended to graduates through supporting the University’s pre-existing Academic Future scholarships which support students to graduate courses applying from under-represented backgrounds and aim to help improve equality, diversity and inclusion in the graduate student body. Academic Futures is currently aimed at refugees and those with care experience.
New support is to include “outreach to schools, engaging with students from the age of 14; transition support for students starting university or moving into graduate study; additional graduate scholarships’ and careers support.”
“The University relies on bringing the very best minds from across the world together, whatever their race, gender, religion or background to create new ideas, insights and innovations to change the world for the better.”
The Crankstart Scholarship provides one of the most generous undergraduate bursaries in the UK. Established in 2012 through a donation from Christ Church alumnus Sir Michael Moritz and his wife Harriet Heyman, it has supported over 1,000 students since its launch.
Up to 50 full awards are already available across Academic Futures’s three streams: Black Academic Futures, Refugee Academic Futures, and Care-Experienced Academic Futures. Each scholarship offers eligible students a grant for living costs and covers the full course fees for the duration of the course and the students fee liability. While the undergraduate scholarships are only available to full-time students, these graduate scholarships are open to both part-time and full-time students.
Undergraduate access is still developing with new initiatives such as BeUNIQ, a programme for 14 to 16-year-olds in UK state schools who are under-represented among Oxford undergraduates. Students from Bangladeshi and Pakistani backgrounds in schools within Birmingham, Bradford, and Oldham are the focus of the first programme which aims to “foster academic confidence and support educational aspirations”. Currently, this group make up 3% of students at highly selective universities, despite making up 5% of those achieving top grades.
Other existing programmes are also receiving increased funding. UNIQ, the University’s flagship programme offers around 1,300 places each year to UK state school students in their first year of higher education, including the opportunity to stay in Oxford on a residential. A similar programme, UNIQ+, gives around 130 interns from disadvantaged backgrounds the opportunity to experience postgraduate student life and support in the transition to graduate study.
