Which are the most suitable contextual indicators for use in widening participation to HE?

Abstract

The full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that:• a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in DRO • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders.Please consult the full DRO policy for further details. AbstractUK universities are increasingly making decisions about undergraduate admissions with reference to various contextual indicators which are intended to identify whether or not an applicant comes from a disadvantaged family, neighbourhood or school environment. However, the indicators used are often chosen because they are readily available, without much consideration of the possible alternatives and their comparative quality. This paper is part of a larger scoping review of existing research literature used to compile a list of potential contextual indicators, and assess these with respect to their quality, availability, and their relationship to outcomes in UK higher education. A search was made of relevant electronic databases, yielding around 120,000 reports initially, and 28 categories of indicators. Each indicator was assessed on the basis of existing evidence concerning its relevance, reach, availability, accuracy, reliability, and completeness -and in terms of whether its use might inadvertently create a different kind of injustice or lower the student outcomes for HEIs.Many possible indicators are not readily available, or not accurate enough for use in policy and practice. In general, indicators concerning individual circumstances are more relevant than area-based or school characteristics. As expected, there is no ideal single indicator. And it is not clear that combining indicators leads to the advantages rather than the deficits of all. Here we list the best available.There are some indicators for very small categories that can be used relatively un-problematically as long as the data can be made available at time of candidate selection, and these include being a recent refugee or asylum-seeker and having spent time living in care. However, neither of these is a solution to the more general issue of contextualised admissions. School type attended (private or state-funded) could also be used relatively safely, but requires clear definition, could lead to inadvertent injustice, and might not be necessary if good individual data on relative advantage is available instead. The category of mature applicant is also relatively unproblematic, but it is not clear that simply being older than traditional age is a disadvantage. The two most general indicators, most suitable for use, are considered to be eligibility for (or receipt of) free school meals, and having a disability or special educational need. However, like school type, both need care and some adjustment from how th...

The use of access thresholds to widen participation at Scottish universities

“…But what are the best indicators of socioeconomic disadvantage to use to ensure that contextual offers and other widening access interventions reach their intended beneficiaries? The Scottish Government's access targets are all set in terms of SIMD, despite the fact that, as an area-level measure, it is acknowledged to be a poor proxy for the circumstances of individuals (Scottish Government 2016; CoWA 2016b; Gorard et al 2017). Put simply, not all disadvantaged people live in disadvantaged areas, and not all people who live in disadvantaged areas are disadvantaged.…”

“…CoWA has urged universities to continually refine their access thresholds for contextually disadvantaged learners in line with emerging evidence (CoWA 2016a: 38). CoWA also urged the Scottish Government and Scottish Funding Council to work with various stakeholders to develop more robust indicators of contextual disadvantage in light of the inevitable inaccuracies that occur when trying to identify socioeconomically disadvantaged individuals using the area-level measure SIMD (CoWA 2016a: 66; Gorard et al 2017). In this article we report on the findings of research commissioned by the Scottish Funding Council (SFC) entitled Mapping and Evaluating the Use of Contextual Data in Undergraduate Admissions in Scotland which set out to contribute to the evidence base in both of these regards (Boliver et al 2017b).…”

How does a vocational qualification (BTEC) prepare students for a degree in Biosciences at a research intensive university?

“…However, given that colleges appear to teach materials at different depths this strategy may be limited and may actually become a barrier to BTEC entry. It is essential to have clear admissions criteria for BTEC students entering universities to ensure transparency and clarity to students and college staff (Banerjee, 2018;Gicheva & Petrie, 2018;Gorard et al, 2017). It enables college staff to make more informed decisions about the BTEC curriculum they deliver and enables students to not only have more confidence in applying to university but also to make more informed choices about their post-16 education (Kelly, 2017).…”

Negotiating a Sense of Fit in Elite Higher Education: Exploring the Identity Work of “Widening Participation” Students

“…Higher education is seen as an important vehicle for improving social mobility (Jerrim & Vignoles, 2015;Sutton Trust, 2019), and credentials from elite universities are often a prerequisite for entry into high-paying professions (Ashley Duberley, Sommerlad & Scholarios, 2015;Chetty, Friedman, Saez, Turner & Yagan, 2017;Moore et al, 2016). While a significant cohort of young people from low socioeconomic backgrounds do enter higher education in the UK, relatively few attend elite institutions (Gorard, Boliver, Sidduqui & Banerjee, 2019). For example, recent figures reveal that only 6.2% of students at the 24 highly selective Russell Group universities come from the most disadvantaged local areas of the UK, and this figure drops to 3.5% for some Russell group institutions (Hazell, 2018).…”