A child’s fate is often decided very early on in its development. That is why government intervention must happen early. Liberal coalition policies such as parenting classes and the pupil premium will help us move away from what Nick Clegg calls a “closed society” where people’s circumstances at birth haunt them for the rest of their life.
The most effective intervention happens before the age of 11, but this mustn’t be where it ends. A lack of decent careers advice and university guidance at some secondary state schools means that many talented pupils are failing to meet their potential.
Just as worrying are signs that those who do meet their potential – i.e. get top A-level grades – are poorly placed to make good decisions. According to the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), 9,000 pupils in 2009/10 achieved grades of AAB or above, but attended universities where less than 10% of students achieved such grades.
This doesn’t tell us everything. Some of these students will have applied to specialist courses that are offered only at a small number of places. But many more of them may simply have been unaware that the experience and benefits of going to university differs greatly from one institution to the next.
The government is already looking at ways to make information on universities more widely available. From September 2012, English institutions will be required to place standard sets of information known as KIS (Key Information Sets) on their websites to help applicants “find quickly and compare easily, the headline items which students consider most important”.
While we welcome this development, we fear that the KIS won’t be enough to get people interested, or be looked at by those who need information the most. These concerns are addressed in a new CentreForum report ‘Informed decisions: tackling information inequalities in higher education’.
Our proposals include a national awareness campaign, cash incentives for schools that are successful in getting pupils to look at the KIS, and personalised information on fee, maintenance loan and grant eligibility on child tax credit statements (QR codes and the like).
We urge the government’s access to education advocate Simon Hughes to take a look at these proposals. The Liberal Democrats took a big hit over tuition fees and have so far struggled to explain the merits of the new system. An information awareness campaign, which among other things tells people that no one pays any upfront fees, is surely an attractive proposition?
Gill Wyness is an education researcher at CentreForum, the liberal think tank, and LSE. Tom Frostick is head of press and communications at CentreForum.
‘The Independent View‘ is a slot on Lib Dem Voice which allows those from beyond the party to contribute to debates we believe are of interest to LDV’s readers. Please email [email protected] if you are interested in contributing.
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11 Comments
Nobody pays up front fees, but if you do your education will cost you less in the longterm, ie it helps to be rich.
All excellent stuff. Much better than the discrimination against middle class children which seems to be the government’s preffered option.
This blog and the comments which follow it may interest those who are concerned about why our high achieving students from the most disadvantaged backgrounds are not accessing Oxbridge.
http://mathseducationandallthat.blogspot.co.uk/2012_02_01_archive.html
In my experience, which is substantial, our students from the most disadvantaged backgrounds (low income and no graduate parent) are failing at interview. In the comments which follow the blog I end up suggesting that a system of advocacy, whereby interviewers and teachers correspond to discuss the ways in which interviewers could engage with that student at interview which should make them demonstrate their full potential and what to expect if they do that. I still believe this would be a constructive way forward.
I’d be interested to know if you feel my suggestion would represent discrimination against the middle classes Simon? I’m talking about a very small group of students and my practical experience in watching how the clam up at interviews which seems to be both because they lack the belief that they belong at Oxbridge.
@Rebecca. I can understand why students need to interview universities – looking around gives a reasonable idea of what university life will be like at different places – but why do universities need to interview students? I can’t imagine they get any relevant information at all.
It’s important to give everyone the best possible chance of winning a place at their university of choice (whether Oxbridge or elsewhere). Most important is early intervention…the #1 reason disadvantaged students are not going to university in greater numbers is that too few are achieving the exam results they need to apply.
@ Richard Dean
The Oxbridge interview process is important, I think. Certainly our students seem to come on a lot as we prepare them for it. I remember my own interviews well – I loved the challenging questions and the dialogue and I enjoyed the challenge of the tutorial interview where I was asked which bill I would put through parliament if I could put any through tomorrow and was then told to cost it!
One of the most important things they’re trying to do is to work out which students will thrive in the one to one or one to two tutorials which are a substantial part of Oxbridge life.
The main problems for the most disadvantaged students seem to be two-way problems:
I think it’s often the case that those conducting interviews fail to recognise and respond to the differences in the ways they need to interact with two students from the same state school – in the case that one student has university educated professional parents and has had all the advantages of extra-curricular stimulation and wider academic stretching such a home life if likely to bring and the other is from a seriously disadvantaged background. I know that’s not true for all interviewers but I strongly suspect it is for many.
I think it’s also often the case that students from seriously disadvantaged backgrounds fail to present themselves well in these interview situations both because of their lack of experience in public speaking and their lack of role models for themselves in succeeding in this kind of interview.
What I’m suggesting is that there is a system for communication between the school and on of the interviewers for such students which is designed to ensure that part of the interview is tailored to do its best to ensure such students present themselves well for at least some of the time. I would still expect the student involved to be put out of their comfort zone and seriously stretched at other times during their series of interviews.
This suggestion comes from my experience in preparing students for Oxbridge interviews over the last 13 years. I often need to step out of role to help the students from disadvantaged backgrounds cope and when I do they flourish. But they never get offers and I strongly suspect it’s because they don’t end up showing their interviewers what they show me.
@Tom Frostick – in all relevant cases the students have received exceptional grades and have gone on to achieve amazing things at their second choice universities.
@Rebecca. I don’t think they are trying to work out tutiorial performance, and I don’t think they could work it out anyway. Things sem to have changed since I went to Cambridge, experienced an unmemorable interview, attended few tutorials, and came joint first in the third year exams in my subject. I think I was scheduled one tutorial every two to four weeks. Even if this has increased, I doubt that tutorials are a substantial part of Oxbridge life.
I think that the best way of improving people’s interview performance is probably to go to Oxbridge and ask someone what they aim to find out at interviews. Lecturer’s teaching perfoance can vary from appaling to wondeerful, including at Oxbridge, but their career progression depends on their success or otherwise in attracting research funding. Some lecturers might believe they can spot good research student potential at entry level interviews.
I have been involve d in a substantial Oxbridge Access program which I helped to found for a long time Richard and many of our students have got in . I’ve been extremely grateful for all the advice and support we’ve received from Oxbridge tutors and colleges which has been of great value to us.
However the problem remains – it is our middle class students who are getting in, not our truly working class student or or seriously disadvantaged students even the the abilities and exam results of the latter groups have often been higher than those of the first group.
Probably the most talented student I did a mock interview with this year had applied to do law at Oxford. She was from a single parent family where mum is one of the local teaching assistants who’s trying to cope with the imposed 20% pay cuts. But, as ever, she didn’t get past the interview stage an at the stage of mock interview it was very clear to me that this would probably be the case. It was the middle class students who got offers yet again.
I remember the first year we ran an Oxbridge trip. When we took our students out for a walk around Cambridge they were all dressed in their best clothes (with killer heels for the girls) because they had no conception of student life and what students wear. When we were driving home all the motorways were blocked and we didn’t get home till 1am so we ended up having to drive the students home one by one so we saw exactly where they all lived and it wasn’t pretty. There was one exception in that group – one student who was dressed like a student. He was also the one that had a professional parent and siblings who’d been to university and he was the only one who got an offer.
Thirteen year later that precedent has never been broken despite all our best efforts. Not a single child from a properly working class or disadvantaged background has got an offer. Not one. An it’s not because they haven’t got the grades or the ability.
Don’t you find that even just a little bit sad Richard?
It’s so easy to blame us – the schools – but we also need to face the reality that many state schools are not as organised as the ones I work with. Is my commentary and suggestion not reasonable?
@Rebecca. I do remember from 20 to 30 years ago that the issue of bias was actively discussed in Cambridge. Everyone seemed to agree things needed to change. Oxbridge retain their place as leading universities primarily through the high quaity of their graduates. It’s how they survive, so it’s in their strong interest to get the most telented entrants. Background is irrelevant, and some Oxbridge acedemics are themselves from disadvantaged backgrounds.
I do suggest that you might need to look again at how you apporoach the interview training. Some things you should absolutely not do is (a) tell the people you expect to fail that they will fail – this expectation will alter their performance and can be self-fulfilling as a result, and (b) attempt special pleading on grounds of social circumstance – becuase such pleading would demonstrate to the university that the applicant does not understand that talent is key.
Good luck.
@Rebecca. Here are some relevant links
http://www.study.cam.ac.uk/undergraduate/apply/interviews/why.html
http://www.ox.ac.uk/admissions/undergraduate_courses/how_to_apply/interviews/index.html