EDINBURGH University — in common with most Russell Group institutions — prides itself on its efforts to help underprivileged young people gain access to the hallowed halls where Robert Louis Stevenson once rubbed shoulders with Arthur Conan Doyle.

A glance at its website reveals a plethora of “widening participation” (WP) initiatives aimed at making it possible for those without wealth or privilege to overcome the “social, financial, cultural or geographical” barriers that may hinder their academic aspirations and life trajectory.

They include outreach programmes in primaries and secondaries, contextualised admissions (typically a grade or two lower than advertised in the entry requirements), summer camps, as well as ongoing support throughout their time in university and on into the workplace.

As a result of these initiatives, according to the university’s statistics, more than 10% of Edinburgh’s 2022 intake of new undergraduates came from one of Scotland’s 20% most deprived areas.

The university also increased its offer rate to applicants from those areas from 24% in 2016 to 47.7 % in 2022.

All this is laudable but it’s not the whole story. Because that 10 % is far outweighed by the 40% of Edinburgh University students who were privately educated, and the 70% who are from England, the rest of the UK, and abroad.

“What’s wrong with that?” you might ask. “Isn’t diversity a good thing?” And, up to a point, you would be right. No-one wants universities to be a homogeneous slice of Scottish life. The whole point of going there is to have your world expanded.

But what if all of that opening yourself up to other lifestyles and ideas only operates in one direction? What if the WP students, eager to absorb new perspectives, are met with condescension and derision?

Edinburgh University

Noses turned up

This seems to be what is happening at Edinburgh, with working-class Scots reporting an obsession with their accents and intense questioning over........

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