Mind The Gap!: The Reality Of Higher Education

To introduce this piece, I would like to introduce myself. I am a non-binary black academic, who has completed their BA in History, their MA in Black British History and currently undertaking their DPhil at Oxford. Through my five consecutive years in higher education, I have faced an abundance of racial discrimination, prejudices and dismisses. The majority of which were on the grounds of my blackness. This has all resulted in my interest of blackness in academia, or more aptly put, the lack of blackness in the academy.

I worry that this article will paint a very grim picture for readers who hope to enter higher education. I have been relatively successful myself, as mentioned previously, and I am not the first black person to reach these milestones. Colleges and universities are also very conducive environments amongst the student body. With the ability to join and create societies, attend clubs and groups, as well as network with a whole new community of individuals, higher education can be empowering. But it is important to be aware of the environment these institutions nurture.

Firstly, reader, how many black teachers have you had? How many black students do you know at university, either for undergraduate or postgraduate? How many black students do you see on university websites? How often do you hear about new scholarships, courses, and opportunities for black students? I think the answer to those questions for the majority of people is ‘not enough’.

 The pipeline for black academic progression is incredibly leaky. Academy loses more and more black students through this gap in the framework every year. We see this from GSCE to A-Levels, from A-Levels to Undergraduate, from Undergraduate to Postgraduate. Finally, we see a miniscule number of Black academics at PhD level and in research positions. This does not only apply to academic progression, but also academic achievement.

In the UK, 155 out of 23,000 university Professors are black (BBC, 2021). Of these 155, only an average of 25 of them are black women (Dr. Nicola Rollock, 2018). In 2019, 82% of white students achieved a first or a 2:1 in their undergraduate, compared with 61% of black students. 34% of white students achieved a first, compared to just 14% their black counterparts (HESA, 2019). And why is this? Professor Meleisa Ono-George has answered this question for us: “The university is not a site of neutrality … it has played a central role historically within the colonial project and still today in creating and shoring up social inequalities” (Ono-George, 2019).

So, how can we change this?

This is an incredibly difficult question to answer. Our current government works against developments into black attainment in higher education. And so, most developments are coming from individual institutions or charities, places such as The Black Curriculum and the Sutton Trust. But ultimately, all of the biggest changes need to come from us. From our schools, libraries, community projects, outreach programs. These changes need to become a part of our everyday, from representation to funding opportunities.

However, I want to refrain from putting all the pressure on to individuals and individual contributions. The UK education system is broken. It is a system that is unable to accept the wrongdoings of its past and unwilling to make any meaningful change. One example of this is comes from Goldsmiths, University of London. In 2020, Goldsmiths announced the nation’s first Masters of Arts (MA) in Black British History. It promised to cultivate a space for black students to come together and learn their history and best practice in academia. At the beginning of the MA’s second year, Goldsmiths Senior Management Team sent out potential redundancy letters to every History and English lecturer across the university, including those on the MA. These programmes and spaces are tools of performative activism for the white elitist scholastic classes.

 Unfortunately, we cannot force the national curriculum to teach our children their histories (although Wales is making meaningful changes in this aspect). We cannot force universities to take their marginalised courses seriously. We can continue to hold the academy accountable and do our best to inspire our communities and those closest to us.