Social Mobility and Scholarships

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It was with great awe and a little trepidation that I entered the Leathersellers’ Hall in London last week. Having arrived sweating after my usual wrangle with Google Maps (why is it so hard? WHY?!!) and being tempted to simply offer my phone to the next person who sped by on an e-scooter rather than waiting for it to be nicked (I think I give off ‘this phone is utter sh*t’ vibes), I used my eyes to locate what was an absolute jewel of a building with the kind of carpeting that you just know Prince would have had on his Paisley Park staircase and instantly felt the kind of zen that comes in being in rarified surroundings. Was this really the kind of organisation that knew stuff about social mobility?

600+ years of social mobility

If you aren’t aware of the Livery Companies like The Worshipful Company of Leathersellers then be prepared to enter a wild world of white gloves, charters on parchment, Royal Seals (made of wax, not the cute-faced mammal kind) and incredible generosity. If you’re interested in history and finding out exactly what a Horner or a Scrivener is, you can check out the full directory here: Database of Companies and Guilds – Livery Committee). Given the name, you’ll have an idea of what the Leathersellers do, and boy does the interior of the building live up to their name!

ANYWAY, enough of the wall coverings and door plates (did I mention they were leather?) this organisation has been committed to enabling social mobility for centuries. Having offered their first scholarship hundreds of years ago, invested seriously in elevating the education prospects of thousands of young people, and now committed 80% of their funds to prevent and tackle the disadvantages faced by children living with Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), Leathersellers has used its not insignificant resources to positively influence issues that are very close to my heart. Watch their video below about the work they do with Valley Kids to see just how vital community projects that support local families are.

I would also like to take a moment to say that I thoroughly enjoyed the absolute bougieness of the place and the fact that those of us who were less accustomed to standing under actual works of art felt no shame in gawping at absolutely everything (and getting their photos taken – who doesn’t love a pic in front of a stained glass window?).

Should we have scholarships?

The event itself was led by Blackbullion, an organisation that helps university students to gain financial literacy and works with corporate organisations to provide scholarships to talented students from disadvantaged backgrounds. Having met with Jon before (check out this post) I had a good idea of what Blackbullion is about and why he personally was such a scholarship advocate – without one, his life would have been very different indeed.

What I hadn’t expected from this joint endeavour with Leathersellers, and what struck me most, was the positive juxtaposition of an organisation that’s been providing scholarships since forever with a disruptive new entrant that wants to make them mainstream.

It was a good environment for me to challenge my own thinking too. If I’m honest, the idea of scholarships at scale instinctively made me shrink – partly because it feels like it focuses too much on academic attainment, where only those young people who are academically exceptional (and let’s be honest, if you’re from a poorer background you have to be exceptional) will get through. There is also the challenge around how equally these can be distributed – what happens when you don’t live in London?

Alongside this, there’s the idea that corporate organisations fixing issues within the UK education system could stop us from holding UK Government’s feet to the fire (something the brilliant team at Class Divide* are doing in actually changing policies that further deepened educational inequalities in Brighton & Hove). Have I got a point or is it a massive chip on my shoulder?

Chucking that chip off

Of course, one thing that’s guaranteed to knock that chip off is hearing current and former recipients of scholarships take centre stage to speak about their experiences. These things change lives and would you really begrudge an academically gifted young person the opportunity to have a seat at a table that they would financially otherwise be locked out of? Because you don’t like the idea of Big Ass Corporate helping to pay someone’s way? Of course not.

And would you want to see a talented teenager leave Higher Education because they can’t afford to travel to uni or the costs associated with living away from home? Again, no. Did I turn down the corporate money that I got paid even though one of my relatives said I worked for a “Mickey Mouse company” or because people thought I was turning my back on where I came from? Did I ****!

The testimonials these young people gave about being able to participate in a life they wanted, but would have been excluded from under ordinary circumstances demonstrated that money invested in scholarships most certainly doesn’t go to waste.

No ‘silver bullet’

Unlike what the literature said (and I get when you’re marketing a solution, you’ve got to have a hook) there is no ‘silver bullet’. If there was, the challenge of social mobility would have been solved way back when Leathersellers’ awarded their first scholarship.

To me, it feels like scholarships sit within all the other things that we need to do to give curious, ambitious young people from under-resourced, poorer, less-advantaged (or whatever else you want to call it) backgrounds the opportunity to live their lives in the way they want to. And to explore and grow in a way that people with greater access to networks and money naturally can. And if corporates want to combine scholarships alongside offering the following then I’m all for it:

apprenticeships
paid internships
paid work experience
training schemes
entry-level roles

We’ve come a long way baby

Overall, I LOVED seeing so many big-name organisations and institutions in the room who were ready to open their minds (and their budgets) to investing in scholarships as part of their social mobility mix. It was refreshing to hear so many conversations based around the fact we’ve come a long way in getting social mobility higher up the agenda. Refreshing too that so many of us were comfortable sharing our stories and comparing what we’d do to address some of the ever-present classism and bias that exists. I like to think that – in the corporate space at least – we’ve come a long baby. But there’s still a long way to go.

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