Dear Student,

Thank you for your application to this world-leading university. We appreciate the time that you took to apply to us. Unfortunately, however, we regret to inform you that you have not been offered a place at our institution on this occasion. The field, this year, was particularly competitive, but perhaps not for the reasons you would expect. We understand that you might wish for some feedback on your application, and as one of the academics on the admissions panel, I am pleased to tell you the true reasons as to why you were unsuccessful.

First, as we were reading your application, we realised that you had attended an independent school. Indeed, by every measurement we have to hand, one of the best in the country. Immediately, your application was lowered on our priority list. We assumed that having attended such a school, you were from an economically well-off back-ground. As such, you are not the type of candidate whom we can claim fulfils the poorly-executed fad of widening access to universities. The fact that you may have been on a bursary or scholarship, or that your parents placed their life savings into your education, did not even cross our minds. Still less do your actual, individual merits: your background is wrong. We do hope you understand.

In another unfortunate circumstance, we must also inform you that, alas, you were also not of the correct gender. Every year, varying numbers of male and female students apply to different universities to study different degrees. This year, however, we decided to blind ourselves to this lived reality. Even before we had discussed the applications, a senior academic decried how there were too many male applicants. Admitting you — and others like you — would not conform with the supposed desire that our intake of students ought to match ideals of societal gender equality. Irrespective of your academic prowess and potential, we concluded that there are, quite simply, too many of you at our institution.

Your examination grades were outstanding; your school teachers lauded how you would be an exceptional university student. Yes, we — at least I — agree that you would certainly succeed at our respective institution. But being academically-gifted is insufficient to be admitted to our world-leading university in these insouciant times: your sex is wrong, and for reasons too. I am being forthright in this letter about why you have failed to gain admission, but I trust you shall not put me on the spot and ask what those reasons actually are. Senior colleagues have clearly expressed their feelings. They feel your sex is wrong.

Moreover, in your application, you demonstrated sound knowledge of canonical thinkers. To be honest, however, your application would have been aided by conforming more with the ideological zeitgeist. By inserting the words “race”, “colonialism”, or even “violence”, your application would have met the expectations of at least some academics on the panel, one of whom explicitly made a list of candidates from particular ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds, and whether their application contained such used and abused buzzwords.

We hope this feedback will not detract you from re-applying to this university in the future, even if the views of some individuals on the admissions panel look set to harden. Although you may not have secured a place at our university on this occasion, we have every confidence that you will nonetheless go to another university. That it is our university which you had prioritised — instead of others — and where you so desperately wanted to study, seems, unfortunately, to be beside the point.

As a member of the admissions panel, I openly admit to you that I am utterly ashamed of the practice of my colleagues. I know that we have committed an act of positive discrimination in rejecting you. I know that what our university has done is dishonest, fraudulent, and morally wrong. I have seen it from the inside; how global-ly-renowned universities are slowly being beaten into conformity by the ideologically-driven Leviathan of institutional politics. I know, however, that there is little I can do about it. Much to my chagrin, what you see in the mainstream media is, to a large extent, far from untrue. A member of the Admissions Panel

The University Admissions Team