Stormzy launches scholarship fund for Cambridge University

The grime rapper and South Londoner has launched the Stormzy Scholarship Fund at his old school in South London on the same day as students were picking up their A-Level results.

The scholarship aims to help Black And Minority Ethnic (BAME) students to get into Cambridge University.

Stormzy's Scholarship Fund is aiming to diversify the elite university, as up until 2016, Cambridge and other colleges and universities hardly accepted BAME students at all.

Speaking to the BBC, Stormzy explained, "It's so important for black students, especially, to be aware that it can 100% be an option to attend a university of this calibre. We're a minority, the playing ground isn't level for us and it's vital that all potential students are given the same opportunity."

His new scholarship will pay for tuition fees, and provide a maintenance loan for up to four years for undergraduate students.

‘There are so many young black kids all over the country who have the level of academic excellence to study at a university such as Cambridge," Stormzy explains on the site, "however, we are still under-represented at leading universities. We, as a minority, have so many examples of black students who have excelled at every level of education throughout the years. I hope this scholarship serves as a small reminder that if young black students wish to study at one of the best universities in the world, then the opportunity is yours for the taking - and if funding is one of the barriers, then we can work towards breaking that barrier down."

I am very very very proud to announce the launch of my new scholarship “The Stormzy Scholarship” in partnership with Cambridge University. With this scholarship we will be funding and covering the full tuition and maintenance for 2 black students this year and 2 black students in 2019 to study at Cambridge University. We as a minority are still heavily under represented at the top universities and I pray this scholarship serves as a reminder that we are more than capable of studying at places of this caliber. Congratulations to all the A-Level students getting their results today, be proud of yourselves despite what you got and overstand that this is only the tip of the iceberg for what’s to come! This is my proudest venture thus far and I look forward to seeing some young black geniuses go on to achieve at Cambridge via this scholarship. @cambridgeuniversity www.cam.ac.uk/stormzyscholarship for all info. Applications close on Thursday 30th August! #StormzyScholarship

A post shared by Gang Signs & Prayer (@stormzyofficial) on Aug 16, 2018 at 2:18am PDT

The scholarship is kicking off this year with Stormzy set to fund two students, and two more in 2019.

Stormzy has shown great effort in providing younger generations with opportunity. Earlier this year he launched his #Merky books Penguin collaboration to help aspiring writers.