Balliol students have raised concern following their JCR meeting this week, where a vote was passed in favour of funding of the Reach Oxford Scholarship.
Members of the JCR will be responsible for financing approximately half of the maintenance grant for recipients of the scholarship through an optional charge on their battels.
This leaves open the possibility that an applicant could be accepted both by the University and by the college, but then be unable to take advantage of the offer because JCR members refuse to pay the optional addition on their battels, set to fund the scholar’s living costs.
Some students left the meeting feeling uncomfortable with this arrangement. Balliol undergraduate Jim Ormiston said, “It’s ridiculous that the future of this applicant is consigned to 40 undergraduates sitting around the JCR, beer in hand!”
Balliol students Max Deacon and Seb Fassam felt that although the motion passed, “many students felt held to ransom by the university, and that we would be ruining someone’s life if it failed to pass”.
Deacon asked, “What if the motion hadn’t passed? Would [the Reach Oxofrd scholar’s] dreams have been smashed?
“The general feeling seems to be that we were left little choice but to pass the money. What would happen if, in future, lots of people decline to pay or future students choose to vote the motion down?”
Further concerns were raised over the anonymity of the scholar. Deacon and Fassam said, “It will be quite apparent who the Reach Oxford scholar is and they will know that other students are directly paying for the maintenance grant. They will be able to read the minutes from the GM when they arrive!
“It would only take one drunk moron in freshers’ week to make this person feel miserable. Somewhere along the line there has been an obcene violation of privacy. Why should anybody know the financial staus of any other student, especially one we are funding ourselves?
One student at the meeting told Cherwell, “everybody in the JCR Committee and later the GM was allowed to find out who this person was, including their nationality. Armed with just this piece of information it would not be particularly difficult to discern which of the new freshers we’ll be funding.”
Deacon and Fassam emphasized that “nobody at the GM had a problem funding this scheme – it’s a fantastic idea that will mean some really great people come to Oxford. However, we really felt the University should have confirmed that the JCR was willing to pay before accepting this person. Not to have done so was irresponsible and just downright rude.”
The Reach Oxford Scholarship is offered by a number of colleges to students from developing countries.The scholarship pays for university and college fees, as well as flights to and from the United Kingdom at the beginning and end of the course.
The University said, “in funding these scholarships, the University remits most of its fee, the JCR of the college provides at least half of the student’s living costs, and the college provides the rest of the funds. Understandably then, all these parties – University, college and JCR – need to agree to this to be able to provide a scholarship at the college in question.”
The University regulations for the scholarship indicate that it will only fund the scheme if JCR members agree to the funding.
However, by the end of the scholar’s degree, most of the students who voted on the JCR motion will no longer be at Balliol, and their successors may choose to vote differently on funding.
