State school pupils only for Cambridge college essay prize

A CAMBRIDGE University college has limited its essay prize to state school students in the wake of a row over Oxbridge access.

Newnham College runs an annual contest for all-female year 12 pupils in their first year of A-levels to get a taste of Cambridge-style essays, but this year only the state sector is eligible.

The prize allows university applications to stand out to admissions tutors.

It comes as Cambridge’s vice-chancellor Prof Stephen Toope provoked a backlash this month by saying it was “very, very clear we are intending to reduce over time the number of people from independent school backgrounds into places like Oxford or Cambridge”.

Classicist Mary Beard, an alumna of the college,said: “I have some anxieties about this, but the issues are more complicated than a simple ‘educational culture wars’.”

Nick Weaver, headmaster of the independent Ipswich School in Suffolk, said: “It seems odd for such a revered institution to be barring any pupils from an opportunity for scholarly research based on the type of school they go to”.