Gender gap on first-class degrees ‘baked into Oxbridge system’

Gender inequality in first-class student grades is “baked into the system” at the universities of Oxford and Cambridge and is in sharp contrast to the rest of the sector, research warns.

The institutions’ “combative and confrontational” tutorial system, final-year exams to determine overall grades and gender imbalances among students and staff in some courses were all found to contribute to the awarding gap.

The Higher Education Policy Institute (Hepi) says that women outperform men across most of the UK sector, but that “two significant institutional outliers” buck the national trend where “clear systemic inequality” exists.

The University of Cambridge averaged a 9.2 percentage point gap favouring men in all first-class undergraduate examination results in 2023-24. And at the University of Oxford, there was an 8.5 percentage point gap between men and women in 2021-22 – the latest available year.

Not all courses had awarding gaps in favour of men, but in some it is particularly pronounced. There is a 43 percentage point gap towards men in theology at Cambridge and a 29 percentage point gap in Classics at Oxford.

Author Famke Veenstra-Ashmore, a parliamentary researcher, found that the tutorial system at these institutions is seen as “combative and confrontational” and disadvantages certain groups.

Previous studies concluded that women were “frequently thwarted by the domineering practices of male students” in these discussions, while one Cambridge college president described them as “particularly stressful for young women”.

The report also found that women were disadvantaged by final-year exams determining their overall grade because they are more likely to work evenly across the three years of study.

In addition, the report warns, menstruation and premenstrual syndrome can exacerbate the challenge of tight exam windows and contribute to unexpectedly poor academic performance.

And the paper suggests that large gender imbalances towards men in both the student cohort and the teaching staff of some departments, particularly in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), can have a “knock-on effect” in awarding gaps.

Gender equality in higher education: how to overcome key challenges

“Women still face significant institutional barriers to the highest levels of academic achievement at Oxford and Cambridge,” Ms Veenstra-Ashmore said.

“The slow pace of change is deeply unfair and means female students are not getting the most out of their experience of higher education.”

Although it is not a recent phenomenon, the gender awarding gaps have negative ramifications for female graduates’ employment prospects, especially if they want to work in academia, the report warns.

It also says the entire UK higher education sector might learn from the failures and the progress that Oxford and Cambridge have made.

Rose Stephenson, director of policy and advocacy at Hepi, said Oxford and Cambridge have historically been “bastions of male privilege”.

“It is disappointing to see gender inequality is still baked into the system. I urge colleagues at these institutions to read this report and take urgent action,” she said.

The report urges both institutions to “avoid catch-all solutions and implement bold reforms”, including an overhaul of assessment methods, and to consider rebalancing the importance of coursework.

It says all changes should be course-specific, and also calls for all awarding gap data to be made publicly available.

In response, Bhaskar Vira, Cambridge’s pro vice-chancellor for education, said the university was investigating possible causes for the awarding gaps, and would set up an action plan to address the issue.

“Our findings so far suggest that there is no single cause, and while there are examples of progress in some parts of the university, more remains to be done,” said Professor Vira.

Martin Williams, pro-vice-chancellor for education at Oxford, said the reasons for the inequality are "varied and highly complex", and that the university has set a target to eliminate the current gap between male and female undergraduate students by 2030.

"We are working hard to understand this issue through extensive engagement with students, and are introducing measures including flexible teaching, mixed assessment methods, study skills support, as well as enhanced data provision to enable us to better target support," he added.

patrick.jack@timeshighereducation.com