I, Too, am Oxford

A few days ago, a group of Black and minority ethnic students at Oxford University created a photo campaign that served to expose the racism they encountered on campus. The projects is titled “I, Too, am Oxford,” and is directly inspired by the “I, Too, am Harvard” campaign, created a few weeks ago by black students at the prestigious American university to highlight the prejudice they have experienced.

Posted on Tumblr, an online micro-blogging platform, the campaign consists of photos of Oxford BME students holding up a whiteboard on which they have written about racism they have encountered on campus, as well as their thoughts on the matter.

For example, some of the said things such as: “No, I’m not on scholarship from Africa.” Others quoted comments that had been made to them, like “You do know you were only accepted because you’re Black?” Some students held boards related to the need for more diversity at Oxford, such as “People of colour have been studying here since the 1870s but where are our portraits?” and “Why are only 0.4% of UK professors Black? #institutionalracism.” Many people blame ignorance as the cause of racism, yet this campaign highlights the fact that even in a place concentrated with the highly educated, racism still persists.

Perhaps this is due to the lack of minority ethnicities found at Oxford. In 2010, of 3000 students admitted, only 1 student was UK born from Caribbean descent. Even with Black students from overseas, the number still is only 22 which equates to less than 1%.

An article published by the Guardian last year stated that while BME students applied in greater numbers to more competitive programs (such as medicine), the top-performing Black applicants were still much less likely to be accepted to the programs than white applicants of the same grade level.

This rampant elitism and inequality amongst one of the most prestigious universities in our country, is a significant concern as Oxbridge graduates hold a disproportionate number of the most senior roles within industry and society.

One look at the Prime Minister's current Cabinet will confirm this with more than half of it's members educated at Oxbridge. Unequal representation of BME students in elite education, ultimately translates into unequal representation of the BME community as a whole.

Belinda Schwarz