Raising teenagers' aspirations

The 38 teenagers, all aged 14 and 15, are taking a two-day break from their GCSE studies to attend university-style lectures on property law and chemical engineering, as well as going punting, meeting current undergraduates and admissions staff and enjoying a tour of the University and city of Cambridge.

The trip has been organised by Magdalene - whose alumni include the diarist Samuel Pepys and the novelist CS Lewis - and Blackpool Local Education Authority to encourage bright teenagers from the town to raise their aspirations in life and to give them an idea of the options available to them after school.

The participating students come from four different state schools and have all been identified as being gifted and talented, with the potential to excel at university.

Magdalene works closely with a number of North West LEAs and has organised similar aspiration-raising visits this year for students from Merseyside and the Wirral.

Dr Brendan Burchell, the Magdalene College Admissions Tutor who has organised this event, said:

"Too many students with the potential to excel at Cambridge wrongly assume that we wouldn’t be interested in someone like them and they don’t apply here. The truth is that it doesn’t matter what sort of background you come from - if you’re very bright, hard-working and passionate about your subject, then Cambridge could be for you.

"The teenagers who come on these aspiration-raising trips are all gifted students who might never have thought about applying to Cambridge. Spending time in Magdalene and meeting current undergraduates has a dramatic effect on their perceptions and shows them that studying somewhere like Cambridge could be a realistic option for them."