{"id":972,"date":"2018-02-27T15:17:58","date_gmt":"2018-02-27T15:17:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/?p=972"},"modified":"2018-02-27T15:17:58","modified_gmt":"2018-02-27T15:17:58","slug":"six-ways-to-bridge-the-gap-between-rich-and-poor-at-university","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/2018\/02\/27\/six-ways-to-bridge-the-gap-between-rich-and-poor-at-university\/","title":{"rendered":"Six ways to bridge the gap between rich and poor at university"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dr Michael Donnelly<\/a>\u00a0is Lecturer, and\u00a0Dr Sol Gamsu<\/a>\u00a0is Research Assistant, in the University of Bath's\u00a0Department of Education<\/a>. This post draws on their newly published research<\/a> with The Sutton Trust.<\/em><\/p>\n

Theresa May\u2019s\u00a0year-long review of student funding<\/a>\u00a0offers a real opportunity to solve the big problems around tuition fees and financial support at UK universities.<\/p>\n

As part of our\u00a0research<\/a>\u00a0on how young people from different places and backgrounds transition into university, we spoke with more than 180 young people from across Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales and each region of England, and analysed detailed student records to track the movements of half a million students who entered university for the first time, over recent years.<\/p>\n

Here we present six suggestions, based on our findings, that could help make going to university a real option for students of all backgrounds.<\/p>\n

1. Lower the price of leaving home<\/strong><\/p>\n

We found evidence from talking to young people that the poorest are often highly conscious of the cost of living at university. This can limit their university choices: some will rule out a university because of the high cost of accommodation.<\/p>\n

We found that young people in different parts of the UK had different attitudes towards the costs of study, which influenced their choices about going to university and whether or not to leave home. Our\u00a0recent research for the Sutton Trust<\/a>\u00a0revealed that disadvantaged students across the nation were least likely to leave their parents\u2019 home, and there was some evidence that the rise in tuition fees strengthened this trend.<\/p>\n

The government should consider either regulating accommodation costs, or providing funding that takes differences in cost into account \u2013 for example by weighting support according to the cost of accommodation at the student\u2019s chosen university.<\/p>\n

2. Cater for commuters<\/strong><\/p>\n

The number of students living at home while at university rose from 278,555 in 2007-08 to 328,675 in 2015-16. That means more students are commuting, but these costs aren\u2019t accounted for in current packages of financial support.<\/p>\n

Some institutions have more commuter students than others. London universities including the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) and St Mary\u2019s University College Twickenham have all seen 10% increases in the proportion of their new undergraduate students who commute. Staffordshire University, Stirling University, the University of Cumbria and the University of East Anglia have also seen big increases.<\/p>\n

Clearly, this requires tailored responses from the universities, based on their local geography and the types of courses affected. But there are some changes which could make life better for commuter students across the board. Rescheduling classes to avoid early starts (when commuting may be more difficult or expensive), having greater flexibility about office hours and considering forms of online learning could help.<\/p>\n

These changes need to prioritise the needs of commuter students, without increasing workloads for lecturers, who are often already over-stretched.<\/p>\n

3. Help pay for transport<\/strong><\/p>\n

There\u2019s not enough support for students who commute. First-time students who live in university accommodation often live close by to essential academic and pastoral support services, such as the library, lecturers\u2019 offices, study skills workshops and study spaces and facilities. But it\u2019s harder for commuter students to access these services.<\/p>\n

Transport should be subsidised for students who commute, in the form of petrol vouchers, car sharing schemes or extended subsidised bus services \u2013 whichever is suitable. An extended 18 to 25 student railcard could also offer students who have to commute during peak times the same one third discount, which currently only applies to off-peak fares.<\/p>\n

4. Admit there\u2019s a diversity problem<\/strong><\/p>\n

Universities\u00a0are highly segregated<\/a>\u00a0along the lines of race and ethnicity, and some universities are substantially less diverse than their surrounding areas.<\/p>\n

For instance, the Universities of Birmingham or Leicester are substantially more ethnically mixed than similar institutions. But they are 10% less ethnically mixed than Birmingham City University, Aston University or De Montfort University. London\u2019s elite arts and music colleges and institutes do not reflect the super diverse population of the capital. This stands in direct contrast to universities like the University of East London, London Metropolitan University and City, University of London.<\/p>\n

\n

There is no simple solution for dealing with the ethnic and socio-economic segregation of higher education. Oxford\u2019s intake won\u2019t echo that of Bradford (an institution with an ethnically diverse, working-class intake) any time soon. Too many vested interests mean that the most elite institutions will remain predominantly white and middle-class for the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n

This should not prevent the work needed to make universities more diverse, which includes addressing the content of the curriculum, as well as perceptions about different courses and institutions. But we should not expect that the majority of working-class, ethnic-minority students, coming from families with no or little university experience, will want to move away for university.<\/p>\n

5. Bring back the bursary<\/strong><\/p>\n

The lack of diversity in universities creates serious inequalities in student finance. In particular, it means that the greatest financial support\u00a0is available to<\/a>\u00a0the most academically-able disadvantaged students. In effect, bursaries are concentrated in the wealthiest institutions, with the smallest number of working-class and ethnic minority students.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s time to revisit the idea of a\u00a0national bursary system<\/a>. There\u2019s also a clear desire among students to bring back maintenance grants on a universal basis, alongside additional means-tested support. Given we live in an era of substantial generational inequality, these moves should be seriously considered.<\/p>\n

6. Help universities reach out<\/strong><\/p>\n

Efforts to help students from disadvantaged backgrounds to attend university are unevenly concentrated across the country. In particular, third sector outreach and social mobility charities are overly concentrated on London, despite attempts by some organisations to expand their efforts.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a skew of cultural and economic resources and activities towards the capital, which directly affects outreach and widening participation activities. For example, funding for the National Collaborative Outreach Programme currently stands at\u00a0\u00a360m a year<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 less than the\u00a0\u00a378m a year<\/a>\u00a0given to Aim Higher, which did a similar job on university outreach, just before its closure in 2010-11.<\/p>\n

Government needs to act to address this imbalance. The return of a scheme like Aim Higher would do much to resolve the geographical imbalances in widening participation efforts run by charities which \u2013 despite\u00a0notable successes<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 have failed to fill the gap.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\u00a0This article was first published on<\/em> The Conversation<\/a>.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dr Michael Donnelly\u00a0is Lecturer, and\u00a0Dr Sol Gamsu\u00a0is Research Assistant, in the University of Bath's\u00a0Department of Education. This post draws on their newly published research with The Sutton Trust. Theresa May\u2019s\u00a0year-long review of student funding\u00a0offers a real opportunity to solve the...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":738,"featured_media":973,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[128,113,129],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-972","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-labour-market","category-education","category-uk-politics"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/115\/2018\/02\/highered1-e1548781761473.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/972","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/738"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=972"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/972\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/973"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=972"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=972"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/iprblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=972"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}