Brampton Manor, an academy in Newham has taken over Eton College and other private schools in competition for Oxbridge offers this year.
The school has reported that 55 of its students had received conditional offers from either Oxford and Cambridge to study. Brampton Manor wrote in a statement on Twitter: “Despite the Covid pandemic, a record number of students have shown resilience and determination to secure offers from two of the most prestigious universities in the world.”
According to Evening Standard, “The Newham school set up its sixth form in 2012 in the hope of getting more disadvantaged pupils into leading universities. In 2014, one Brampton student received an Oxbridge offer. 25 had received an offer by 2018 and 41 by 2019. From 2015 to this year, state school intake has increased from 62.3 percent to 70 per cent at Cambridge and from 55.6 percent to 68.7 percent at Oxford.” Newham is known as one of the most deprived London boroughs. According to the charity Trust For London, some 52 per cent of its children deemed to be living in poverty.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s alma mater Eton College managed to secure 48 positions and was put in a spotlight to explain this year’s performance.Defending its performance, as Eton’s offers stood at 48, down from 99 five years ago, Deputy head Tom Hawkins wrote to parents: “Each year we see very strong Etonian applicants disappointed, and unfortunately there have been more boys in this position this year.”
The latest Ofsted report described Brampton Manor as having “relentless ambition and high expectations”. It said that the sixth-form, which has 580 pupils, is a centre of excellence. Stormzy, the grime music star who set up Cambridge scholarships, said that he wanted to send his children to the school.
