The leader of Our Grade, Our Choice has spoken of her struggle to persuade the University not to publish her consistently high grades.
Emily Milton, a third year English student at King’s, is head of the campaign which demands students have more choice in whether their grades are made public.
In an exclusive interview with The Porter’s Log, along with Varsity, TCS and The Tab, she said: “Getting a first doesn’t define me. I am more than just a number one on a piece of paper.”
As she unfurled her academic certificates and passed round a giant cheque showing her College Exhibition prize money, she told reporters: “The mere fact that I came top of my year with one of the most critically acclaimed essays ever written on Paradise Lost doesn’t mean that I want my grade to be displayed outside the Senate House. It is absolutely disgusting that the University is making that public.”
Continuing the interview through a loudhailer on Trumpington Street, she said: “If it were up to me, nobody would know that I got a starred first but that’s exactly the problem; whether you do really well, which I did, or don’t get the grades you were hoping for, everyone knows. It’s an awful stain on the University’s reputation”.
Milton has dedicated hundreds of hours to the campaign and has given a talk at every college in Cambridge.
“I’m not going to stop until the University listens. I mean, it’s been hard enough having people know I got a first, can you imagine what it must be like to get a 2:1? It would be mortifying.”