UK: 'Dearth of blacks at Oxford and Cambridge'

David Lammy, a former higher education minister and Labour Member of Parliament, has used figures obtained under Britain's Freedom of Information Law to reveal a dearth of black and other minority students at either of the country's two oldest universities, reports DD Guttenplan for The New York Times.

According to Lammy, last year the whole of Oxford University admitted just one black Caribbean student, and Cambridge University does not have a single black faculty member. "We're talking about universities which receive £560 million of British taxpayers' money," or US$885 million, Lammy said in an interview.

Both universities challenged Lammy's arguments; Oxford said it had admitted 27 British black students of African, Caribbean and "other" descent in 2009. A spokeswoman for Cambridge said Lammy was mistaken to claim the university had no black academics, although when asked for a precise figure she replied: "We don't know, because we have no way of knowing."
Full report on The New York Times site