Diversity

I knew it was Pride before I cycled into town today but I didn't know it was also a graduation day. So the city was heaving with people in costume.

I happened to read a few days ago that Louise Richardson, Vice Chancellor of Oxford University since 2016, had been made a dame in the Jubilee Honours. Neither Damery nor Jubilation interest me but today's ceremony was an opportunity to check out something in the article.

Several years ago she argued that universities need more 'ideological diversity' and warned that the 'culture wars' and the perception that universities were 'bastions of snowflakes' were deliberately being fanned by populists and some politicians. 'People are seeing that they haven’t gone to university and yet their taxes are paying for these utterly over-privileged students who want all kinds of protections that they never had and I think we have to take this seriously'. She launched the university’s new access initiative.

As a result, by 2020 16% of British undergraduates admitted to Oxford were from socio-economically disadvantaged areas (8.2% in 2016). She has pledged that at least a quarter of 2023's intake will come from non-traditional, poorer backgrounds. Over the same period Oxford's British undergraduate intake identifying as 'Black and Minority Ethnic' rose from 15.8% to 23.6%.

Obviously neither of those cohorts were graduating today but today's graduates joined the university on her watch and from a look round those emerging from the Sheldonian Theatre I certainly got the impression that they were more ethnically diverse than when I first moved to Oxford 30 years ago.

Like the university, I was selective, so my photos lie. But do note the flag in the cupola at the very top of the Sheldonian, where all graduation ceremonies still take place in Latin. Despite it all, despite it all, there is change.

What I was actually in town for was a concert at the Holywell Music Room (Europe's oldest concert hall where Handel once conducted) by children learning singing, recorder and piano with the very wonderful person who leads our choir. She is completely committed to access to music for everyone and believes her students deserve to perform in a prestigious place. I wanted to hear the debut of a child from a refugee family I'd asked her to listen to about three months ago because I thought he has talent. She now teaches him free of charge.