NIACE, the National Organisation for Adult Learning, welcomes the commitment of the
Government to improving access to Higher Education for young students from poorer
backgrounds.
NIACE has long-standing experience of working to widen participation in education for
adults, and connecting closely with support for the education of young people in
disadvantaged communities. In 1999, NIACE submitted to HEFCE the final evaluation report
on the Non Award-Bearing Continuing Education Projects in higher education, the vast
majority of which related to widening access and participation. NIACE is a joint partner
in the management of HEFCE’s current widening participation strategy, which ranges
across initiatives with both adults and young people.
The vision
The vision set out in the document aims to identify and channel the aspirations of
‘bright young people’ from their mid-teenage years. The vision is one of
inclusiveness, and is set firmly within the context of the Government’s drive to
challenge social exclusion. However, this vision builds on an approach which sees
individual selection as the means to enhancingparticipation, through mechanisms
which are as yet unclear and untested. There is no discussion of this mechanism in the
paper, yet this is a process which is already causing enormous problems at local level.
Targeting is presumably seen as a relatively straightforward technique to enable
‘bright’ young people to be identified and appropriate intervention mechanisms
put in place.
Potentially, this will constitute yet another mechanism of exclusion for the remaining
50% who are not deemed to be HE potential. The message that ‘higher education is not
for us’ is one which has been absorbed by many pupils in previous generations and one
which is regularly reported in research with students from similar backgrounds who have
entered higher education as mature students through Access courses. This limit on
aspirations is passed on through generations and forms one of the key obstacles which this
policy is seeking to challenge. NIACE believes that this approach will quite possibly
serve to reinforce these divisions, albeit at a different point along the social
continuum.
The common framework
NIACE commends the intentions to develop a common framework to co-ordinate and focus
local and national efforts to engage more young people in higher education. However, there
are two key concerns:
The first concern is the failure of the common framework to take account of the broader
intentions of the policy as expressed at the beginning of the document. It is stated that
the Government’s intention is that, by 2010, 50% of young people should have the
opportunity of benefiting from HE by the time they are 30. Furthermore, ‘if this is
to happen, it is critical that more of our young people who come from families with no HE
in their backgrounds are able to enter universities and other HEIs, not necessarily
straight from school, but some in their twenties, if that suits them better.’
However, the bulk of the strategies put forward in the consultation document relate to
work with young people in schools who, it is assumed, with appropriate interventions will
progress directly into higher education. The document contains no proposals for strategies
which will target and support the older age group; nor does it make any connecting
reference to recent policy initiatives, for example the Foundation Degree, which seem to
be targeting this age group.
To achieve the Government’s objectives, it is important that equivalent
consideration be given to the most effective ways for stimulating and sustaining an
interest in higher education in young adults in work or unemployed. This will entail
working closely with the FE sector and with agencies such as NIACE promoting and
supporting learning opportunities for this age group.
Secondly, while recognising the urgency of the task, we believe that its long-term
nature is substantially under-estimated. Many young people have already, by the time they
reach secondary school, effectively made, (or closed down) choices in relation to higher
education. Efforts need to concentrated across a much wider age range, beginning with Year
5/6, or even earlier. In recognition of this, increasing numbers of universities are
focusing their efforts at primary school level where aspirations of both pupils and their
parents are easier to develop and influence.
The real challenge in widening participation is to radically narrow the gap between
universities and their communities. This cannot be achieved through working with cohorts
of learners in isolation, but must embrace learning across all age groups and build on the
substantial strengths of family and adult learning programmes as well as work in school
with young people.
Framework strands
There are a number of comments we would like to make on the four strands proposed.
These comments do not in all cases tie in with the specific questions framed in the
consultation document.
Strand One : Excellence in City Partnerships
NIACE believes that the objectives of the policy will best be achieved through linking
with a far wider range of initiatives than Excellence in Cities. In particular, it will be
important to connect with both Education Action Zones and the new strategies proposed by
the Government for neighbourhood renewal.
The proposal specifically excludes those not included in an Excellence in Cities area,
in particular young people from rural backgrounds with no family experience of higher
education. We welcome measures which we believe are to be introduced to extend EiC to
rural areas.
It will be important to work with those people in HEIs who have experience of acting as
honest brokers between their institutions and local communities and are already working to
develop relationships with communities and schools in areas of low participation. This
will not always be recruitment staff, whose brief relates to promotion and recruitment in
a competitive climate and often at national level, rather than the long-term building of
trust and partnership between HEIs and their local communities. It will be important to
build relationships with admissions staff, both administrative and academic. Finally, it
will be critical to work with senior mangement who have responsibility for leading the
planning process in HEIs, which must ideally connect with the planning process proposed as
part of this strand.
Strand 2: Action by HEIs
The proposals in this strand reflect practice that is already being undertaken in many
HEIs. It is important that this work should be supported on an equal basis across the
sector, with extended work supported in universities which are already committed to
initiatives of this kind.
One of the major challenges now recognised by those committed to widening participation
in higher education is the need for HEIs to modify their practices to enable the retention
as well recruitment of students from diverse backgrounds. The distinction between
mechanisms which sustain academic excellence and those which stand in the way of
universities being able to offer genuine value-added experience is often confused. In
order that support for non-traditional students may be embedded within the teaching and
learning context as a whole, it is important for a wide cross-section of staff to engage
in and understand these processes of development.
HEIs must be prepared to work with a wide range of partners and providers who are not
necessarily direct providers of young people ready for HE. Key partners must include
primary schools as well as secondary schools, and those working with adult learners who
are in positions of influence in targeted communities.
Strand 3: Extra information for young people
The paper is right to draw a distinction between choice based on ‘inspiration’
and choice based on factual information. Both elements are important, and should be
incorporated within initiatives aimed at encouraging young people into higher education.
Information on finance is currently expressed in a manner which is technical clear but
socially ‘neutral’ and does not assist possible students relate it to their own
background. More use should be made of case-studies and of student mentoring schemes which
give voice to students themselves who are from similar backgrounds.
The confidence to seek information is a skill which cannot be developed in isolation
from the range of other skills and confidences which comprise the development of a
learning ‘culture’. A more active engagement in the process of
information-seeking will emerge from people who are learning already and beginning to
understand the processes and channels of communication through which educational
information is made available. This process must include parents and carers, who will not
be reached by the standard secondary-school meeting with parents of young people already
aspiring to HE.
Universities need to develop a pro-active approach to working alongside communities to
develop the basis of learning from which choice is exercised. This means becoming actively
involved in supporting educational providers in the post-16 sector working with parents
and peer-groups and developing learning opportunities, such as taster programmes, which
enable adults as well as young people to connect with higher education and to share their
experience with those they influence.
Many universities have already developed these processes outside of the institution, but
practitioners are struggling to sustain them in the face of pressure to focus on
credit-bearing programmes of learning.
Strand 4: Individual Financial Support
Evidence from many countries suggests that extra financial help is a pre-requisite to
enabling more young people from disadvantaged backgrounds to participate in higher
education.
