CUSU Council voted unanimously this evening to address the difficulty in accessibility of Cambridge applications for international students, through advocating for the expansion of video interviews, as well as an interview centre in Africa. It also voted to address discrepancies between colleges in international student vacation storage and accommodation provision

The motion will see CUSU encourage faculties and colleges to use video interviews during the Cambridge application process. This will also allow for video interview induction training, and lobbying for a video interview room facility for admission officers with technical difficulties.

Currently, video interviews are only offered in limited subjects and colleges, while most science subjects do not offer video interviews due to the test and collaboration environment required. Furthermore, video interviews are also only available in New York. The difficulty of being interviewed abroad is often seen as a barrier to access for international students – as international interviews are only available in Canada, the USA, China, India, Malaysia and Singapore – entailing high costs for those who need to travel.

CUSU will also now lobby the University for overseas interview opportunities in African countries – where there are currently no overseas interviews conducted – and to give at least three-weeks interview notice for international applicants.

As raised during the discussion, some applicants may feel pressured to attend face-to-face interviews for fear of being disadvantaged in the admissions process. Often, even when interviewed face-to-face overseas, applicants cannot be granted an interview with tutors from their chosen college and faculty. An iCUSU representative said that the admissions process may increasingly be “somewhat biased,” as a college’s admissions decision will be based off second-hand information.

The motion highlighted the difficulties of international applicants gaining visas for interviews in short timeframes, and noted that “international and domestic applicants are given similar time of notice (usually two weeks) by most colleges”, in which they must process flight booking, visa application and interview preparation.

With regards to resolving inter-college discrepancy in storage and accommodation, the motion will see CUSU encourage and support the University and colleges in updating the existing scholarship search platform and inform international students regarding potential financing and expense variation across colleges. An amendment added to the motion will also see CUSU encourage the University to provide a centralised facilitation system, and working to facilitate room sharing across colleges.

An iCUSU representative said that the motion was based on results from a survey which found considerable discrepancy amongst the provision of vacation and accommodation, as well as international scholarships and bursaries, across colleges. International students at Trinity, for example, have unlimited luggage storage for winter and the summer holidays, but this is not the case for all colleges.

The iCUSU representative said that applicants don’t have access to information on holiday, accommodation, storage and international scholarships until they are admitted into the college, stating that all colleges should publish this information onto a “centralised platform”.

She also said that while some colleges rent out accommodation over the holidays, some international students are not guaranteed to receive this and could be forced to go back to their home country or rent more expensive accommodation in Cambridge.

Correction on 20th February at 16.28: This article was amended to remove an incorrect claim concerning the cost of luggage storage at Robinson College.