Report by Glen Owen and Andrew Sutton, The Times , 22nd December 2001
PLACES at Oxford can still be the "bought" by offering donations to college funds, a professor at the university has claimed.
The allegations by Valentine Cunningham, an English Fellow at Corpus Christi and a former Booker Prize judge, follow the resignation of an Oxford fundraiser after his old college rejected his son. Philip Keevil, a prominent City banker, withdrew a pledge of £100,000 to Trinity College, saying that there should be a "slight bias" towards the offspring of donors.
Professor Cunningham said that wealthy families could still secure places for their children. "Places are being bought, there is no doubt about that. Sometimes places precede a big donation, and sometimes they follow it." He said that an "old boy network" existed which thought that donors' children should be given preferential treatment because of the benefits other students received from improved college facilities. "I could name names but I am not going to. Colleges are in a fix because they need the money. Every year, when admissions time comes around, everyone knows which candidates are well connected."
He also claims that "the Foreign Office routinely finds places for children of its political clients", and he believes that admission tutors are swayed by the prospect of having a well-known student in the college. Citing the case of Chelsea Clinton, who is studying international relations at University College, he said: "There is probably no college who would turn down the daughter of a prestigious family, even if there is no hint of a benefaction." He emphasised that he was not questioning Miss Clinton's academic abilities.
The university denied Professor Cunningham's claims. "The only consideration for admissions tutors is choosing the candidates with the best potential," it said.
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