Privilege Axed
CENTURIES OF TRADITION face the axe following recommendations from the Quality Assurance Agency that the automatically-awarded Oxbridge MA should be scrapped.
An independent advisory body, the QAA was set up in March 1997 as a result of the Dearing Report, with the task of eliminating variations within the standards of British Higher Education qualifications.
As part of its suggested National Qualifications Framework the QAA has called for an end to the MAs which are traditionally awarded to all Oxbridge graduates 7 years after the start of their course. The Oxbridge MA is awarded without any further postgraduate work. At present Oxbridge graduates can allow their BA degrees to "mature" into an MA and graduate whenever they choose.
Anthony Smith, President of Magdalen College, Oxford attacked the QAA's proposals, calling them "a typically new mood of interference by government." He added that as the MA was essentially an organisational tool, there would have to be a replacement for it, "and the government will have achieved nothing but a change in the words. It seems to be a wave of control freakery that is going on."
Cambridge University has also hit back at the recommendations, denying that the present system is unfair or misleading and claiming that the proposals will only put an end to diversity, and quality that Dr Tim Mead, Registrar of Cambridge University, sees as one of British Higher Education's "greatest strengths."
A spokesman for the QAA said that their aim was to ensure that "the same qualification framework was in place for everybody" so that nobody could obtain a qualification "unless they had worked for it."
One of the arguments in favour of the abolition of Oxbridge MAs is that for those not familiar with the intricacies of the British Higher Education system they could be misleading. Dr Mead, however, is quick to point out that the Cambridge M.A. "stems from the historical tradition of full membership of the University" rather than from any attempt at academic deception.
MA's were originally awarded in the Middle Ages when students studied for seven years. In answer to allegations that the automatic awarding of MAs is unfair, Dr Mead stresses that they are known "not to be awarded on the basis of postgraduate work."
Oxford University maintains that there should be no confusion between its MA and those awarded at other universities for postgraduate work because of the use of the title MA (Oxon) which clearly distinguishes the two. Within the University there is a great reluctance among academic staff to speak out against the QAA's proposals, with the general mood being that more time was needed to consider what these proposals would mean to the university as a whole.
Alongside its proposals to ditch the Oxbridge MA, the QAA has also called for an end to the awarding of MPhil qualifications as a "consolation prize" for PhD students who have failed to reach the required standard.
The review body has no power to implement the suggested changes itself, and even if its proposals were accepted immediately sceptics claim it could be ten years before they are put into place. Despite this, the QAA's recommendations have been seen as an attack on elitism in Oxford and Cambridge. Defenders of the award claim that although Oxbridge graduates do not have to undertake any postgraduate work, the MA reflects the rigorous and intensive nature of an Oxbridge degree.
14th Oct 1999