An investigation conducted by The Times has revealed that Oxford students have been found to have cheated over 20 times more than Cambridge students in University examinations or submitted work.

In the period 2012 to 2015, 109 Oxford students were found to have committed 109 offences, data released by the University shows after a Times Freedom of Information request. In comparison, only five such cases were uncovered at Cambridge.

The most common offences nationwide were continuing to write after time was up, and reading the question paper before the examination had begun.

Nationally, nearly 50,000 students were found to have cheated, in the investigation published last month, with Oxford Brookes ranked fifth for highest cheating rate, with 1,711 reported offences in the last three years.

The University of Kent’s incidence of academic misconduct is the highest nationally, with 1,947 cases, with the revelations raising questions as to possible large disparities between the rigour in detecting cheating across different universities.

In a statement to The Times, a spokesperson for the University of Oxford stated, “The close supervision of students through Oxford’s intensive teaching system makes it particularly difficult for students to cheat by, for example, passing off the work of others as their own.”

She added that the University is “confident its processes for identifying, investigating and holding students to account for academic misconduct are thorough and rigorous.”

Universities aside from Oxford and Cambridge reported more cases of plagiarism in the form of using essay-writing services, with more submitted work and coursework counting towards the final degree than at Oxbridge.

Professor Geoffrey Alderman at the University of Buckingham told The Times that “type-1 plagiarism,” copying and pasting, is decreasing because it’s “so easy to detect,” adding, “My impression is that type-2 cheating, using a bespoke essay-writing service, is increasing.” These services can reportedly charge hundreds of pounds for dissertations, essays and model exam answers written by professional lecturers up to doctorate level.

The investigation also found that non-EU students cheated disproportionately, with 35 per cent of all cases being from students from outside the EU, despite representing 12 per cent of the UK student population.

Across the country, there were five detected cases of students arranging for someone else to sit their exam in their place.

A significant number of incidents involved students going to the lavatory during examinations, with one University of Exeter student being investigated after a “long toilet break where student did not use most convenient toilet”.

Of the nearly 50,000 academic cheating incidences in the UK from 2012, one per cent resulted in the dismissal of a student from the institution.

Responding to the Cambridge Student’s article on this story, OUSU Vice-President for Graduates Nick Cooper commented, “Unlike Oxford’s excellent student journalism, the Cambridge Student headline raises some questions – comparing our 109 reports of plagiarism with Cambridge’s five convictions may be a little naughty. But it may also be an issue of definitions: until recently, plagiarism in Oxford’s rules was very broad (ranging from an accidental failure to cite one study, to full-blown copying) and we’re pleased that with OUSU support, Oxford updated its procedure last year to reflect this sliding scale.

“However we remain concerned that colleges and departments aren’t doing enough to ensure students are aware of good academic practice and what constitutes ‘plagiarism’. This is especially the case for graduate students who have studied elsewhere with more emphasis on collaborative work, who may end up breaking plagiarism rules entirely unknowingly.”

The University of Cambridge has not replied to media requests for comment.

This week, doctors on strike, alongside other protestors, gathered outside of the Sheldonian Theatre on Broad Street. The gathering was in conjunction with the national strike of Junior Doctors, which was called by the British Medical Association (BMA).

The strike in Oxford began with a picket line outside of the John Radcliffe Hospital, before moving onto the more visible Broad Street location.

Placards reading ‘Save our NHS’ and ‘NOT SAFE, NOT FAIR’ were displayed in relation to Jeremy Hunt’s proposed changes to junior doctors’ contracts, which the BMA has argued are unfair on doctors and compromise patient safety. Amongst the crowd were dozens of striking doctors wearing white scrubs and stethoscopes.

Two foundation doctors in their second year, Steph White and Rachael Fleming, told Cherwell, “Junior doctors did not want it to come to industrial action, but we are worried about the proposed plans for patients, us, and the NHS.”

NHS staffs were joined in their demonstration by sympathetic students and members of the public, including demonstrators from the Oxford University Labour Club.

Momentum Oxford, a successor organisation to Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour leadership campaign, also showed solidarity with today’s junior doctors taking industrial action in Oxford with about a dozen members present to show their support.

A spokesperson from Momentum Oxford told Cherwell, “we stood in solidarity with the junior doctors today because we believe this Tory government is trying to bully them into accepting a contract that is both unfair and unsafe.”

They added, “The overwhelming support for the strike amongst BMA members (98%) shows that Jeremy Hunt is unambiguously in the wrong: these are people committed to serving those in need, and they would not strike unless forced to do so. With Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour Party, we call on Hunt to change his position, and end his attacks on the NHS.”

Dr. Mark Toynbee, also in attendance, told Cherwell, “We are very pleased by the overwhelming public support by the picket and on broad street and hope that will be a basis for constructive progress.” 

Dr Samina Khan, head of undergraduate admissions at Oxford University, has told the Times Education Supplement that applicants from poor backgrounds are more likely to be given interviews. Dr Khan was referring to the use of contextual data in the undergraduate admissions process.

Oxford currently uses the performance of an applicant’s school, their postcode and care background to judge their full potential. If a flagged candidate is not shortlisted for interview, despite a prediction of AAA+ and high subject scores, an explanation must be provided to the department.

The Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission, appointed by the government, recently criticised Oxford and Cambridge for failure to admit enough state-school pupils. In 2014, 56.3 per cent of Oxbridge students were state-educated.

Oxford University officially maintains that the state/independent school division is a misleading proxy for disadvantage. In its Access Agreement with the Office for Fair Access, the University has no set target regarding the state/ independent split.

The University also claims that, even if they were to use the state/independent school binary, it is “unclear how ‘disproportionate’ the state/ independent picture at Oxford actually [would be] – it’s often argued that only seven per cent of school pupils are at independent schools (while they make up over 40% of Oxford’s UK undergraduate intake). But more than one-third of students getting AAA or A*AA at A level (which is the bare minimum needed to apply for a place at Oxford) come from the independent sector – and things like subject choice and degree course choice narrow the picture further.”

Barnaby Lenon, Chairman of the Independent Schools Council and former headmaster of Harrow School, advised caution regarding Dr. Khan’s statement, saying, “admissions tutors at Oxford simply want the best students. A student with quite good grades from a school whose results are generally poor may well be as able as a student with higher grades from a high-achieving school.

“However, admissions tutors do not want to send the wrong signal to high-achieving schools (who provide a large proportion of the best undergraduates). So care is needed in terms of the messages which are sent out.”

Benjamin Peacock, Co-chair of Target Schools (the OUSU-sponsored access program), stated that he “fully supports the use of comparative data to level the playing field for students from state-educated backgrounds, as well as those who are young carers or have other extenuating circumstances.

“Application of such data accounts for the correlation between wealth and quality of education that is inherent in the UK, as well as many other disadvantages applicants face.”

A group of Oxford academics has translated essays about free speech and then published them as free e-books in order to mark the first anniversary of the Charlie Hebdo attack in Paris.

Lecturers and students have translated the works of Voltaire and other figures renowned for defending free speech to mark the murders of 12 Charlie Hebdo journalists last year.

Dr Caroline Warman, associate professor in French at Jesus College, has led a group of more than 102 students and staff at Oxford who sought Oxford academics to produce their own version in English of the collection of essays called Tolérance: le combat des Lumières, produced by French academics after the attack by Islamic extremists.

The professors and students translated the works of 18th Century writers and philosophers including Diderot, Montesquieu and Rousseau,
as well as Voltaire, who all discuss topics including slavery, religious intolerance and the rights of individuals. The collection also includes Italian writer Cesare Beccaria.

Dr Warman wrote on the ‘Adventures on the Bookshelf’ blog how “posters of Voltaire” and some of his polemical slogans about the importance of religious tolerance appeared “in the vigils and marches that followed the Charlie Hebdo assassinations”.

She said, “Dozens of university lecturers in France who teach Voltaire and other 18th century writers, and who were all as distressed by the events and by the increasingly polarised politics that followed as anyone else, decided to put together an anthology of texts from the Enlightenment. This anthology would make available to everyone what writers of the time said about liberty, equality, and fraternity, about the importance of religious tolerance, about the rights of women, about the abomination of slavery, about the exploitation created by a system of global capitalism, and so on.

“We in the UK wanted to support and applaud this initiative, and we wanted to extend its readership. So we decided to translate it. And we thought, who better to translate this texts than our students? They are the citizens, female and male, of today and tomorrow, they are deeply engaged in our world, and they are brilliant at languages.”

On the subject of translating the works, Warman added, “Translation is a particularly intense way of reading, because to translate something you really have to get inside the text. It’s incredibly stimulating, because you’re both reading and writing at the same time.

“102 of us – tutors and their second-year students (who don’t have any exams) from lots of different colleges – translated the anthology this past summer term.’’


The anthology was published on 7th January 2016 to mark the first anniversary of the shootings. It was launched at the annual conference of the British Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies, which supported the project, and it has received positive coverage in the press and online.


The e-books are free to download, including links to the original French texts and in some cases, the original eighteenth-century edition.

Dr Warman appealed to the “open-minded thinkers” of the future to read the texts.

Flora Hudson, a second year French and Russian student, commented, “I think it’s a very effective and moving way for Oxford to mark the anniversary. Instead of focusing on the pain and grief following the attacks, it promotes tolerance in society, which is so important for multiculturalism in French culture.”


Jake Smales, who studies French and Spanish at Pembroke College, told Cherwell, “I think it’s brilliant that everyone can access texts that are so important to the idea of free speech in France and across the world. Translation is in itself one step of bridging the barriers between nations and cultures, uniting all under the common values we share, both past and present.

“It reminds us all of the importance of the power of speech, ideas and freedom over violence, which it seems we need to remember now more than ever. I hope people are aware of the e-books and have a read a few; especially as they’re free! They should start everyone talking and thinking about very relevant issues.”