Mansfield and Somerville Colleges were founded to widen access to those historically excluded from Oxford, and we remain committed to ensuring that ability and promise, not birthplace or background, determine who has access to education here.
In 2021, our colleges became the first two Colleges of Sanctuary in Oxford. Since then, both our colleges have awarded places, through a highly competitive process, to many brilliant scholars from war-torn corners of the world, supported by the generosity of alumni and partners such as the Mastercard Foundation, the Weidenfeld-Hoffmann Trust and the Carnegie Foundation.
Preventing the brightest and most talented scholars from travelling to the UK on legitimate student visas will do nothing to address the complex causes of irregular migration. Those who come here as students do so lawfully, to study and to contribute. Conflating them with wider migration challenges is both unfair and misguided.
It seems wrong to deny individuals of extraordinary talent and potential the opportunity of an Oxford education, and to exclude them because of circumstances beyond their control. Mansfield and Somerville have always stood against exclusion, and that commitment continues today.