Data obtained by the Financial Times under the Freedom of Information Act shows that six of Cambridge University's colleges admitted fewer than ten black British students in five years, whereas some admitted none at all between 2012 and 2016. The obtained data comes after the revelation last month that one in four of Oxford University's colleges did not admit a single black British student between 2015 and 2017.
The university told the Financial Times that it would not be able to improve diversity "on its own" and needs the "support of schools and parents" to help increase the number of black British students it enrols.
In his criticism of Oxford University for the same, Labour MP David Lammy had previously accused the university of "social apartheid", after an FoI request by him revealed 10 out of 32 Oxford colleges did not award a place to any black British pupil with A-levels in 2015.
In a statement made to FT, Cambridge University has said, “More needs to be done to prepare high-achieving black students for applications to Cambridge and Oxford, which is why we have significantly increased the funding we contribute to programmes like Target Oxbridge”. The programme provides one-to-one training for black students to improve their chances of being admitted to the universities.
In order to promote transparency, Mr Lammy has called for every university in the UK to publish its annual admissions data.
