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Author Archives: Jonathan Clifton

The Independent View: Coalition’s social mobility strategy failing

By Jonathan Clifton | Fri 28th October 2011 - 9:54 am

The government’s plan to improve social mobility has been dealt a series of blows over the past week. New education data show that trends towards a more ‘socially mobile’ Britain are pointing in the wrong direction.

Nick Clegg launched the government’s social mobility strategy last April, promising to ‘open the doors of opportunity’ to children from disadvantaged homes as they move into adulthood. Children from poor homes are half as likely to achieve five good GCSEs as their better off peers, and they account for less than one in a hundred Oxbridge students. Clegg rightly pointed out that …

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Posted in Op-eds and The Independent View | Tagged education, higher education, nick clegg, pupil premium, social mobility, tuition fees and universities | 8 Comments

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