HE participation by 25 hits new high

Our glorious English higher education regulator doesn’t really seem to care much about the nuts and bolts of widening access these days.

Sure, the focus on participation – things like continuation, completion, attainment and progression – or, as it is frequently vocalised “getting on, not just getting in” is a good thing. And the repositioning of funded work on access to a kind of cheerleading squad focused on the schools sector and the decision to apply isn’t exactly harmful.

But the days of performance indicators and “access missions” feel like they have passed, so it is left to the Department for Education to cater for those who think that rates of entry – both overall and by demographic characteristics – are important.

And the number of young people from the 2014-15 cohort entering higher education before the age of 25 is the highest on record: 51.3 per cent.

This slightly rejigged dataset combines the old “participation measures” series with the old “widening participation” series. It’s a bit of administrative tidying up that feels like it may have been spurred by outgoing Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s new participation target – and tracks the educational progression of each cohort of 15 year olds as they leave secondary school.

While the headline rates are key, much of the release deals with the impact that a small number of characteristics (ethnicity, FSM background, sex, region of residence) have on someone’s chances of participation either in all higher education or just at high tariff providers. Seasoned participation data-watchers will note the absence of prior attainment here – and there are a few other measures at a top level: I even spotted that just 358 young people with an EHC plan had attended a high tariff provider by the age of 25.

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The intersections address the perennial questions around ethnicity and participation. In London (the part of the UK with the highest proportion of black male students at school), just 9 per cent of this group got to a high tariff provider by the time they reached 25, compared to 15 per cent of their white peers.

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There are very slight changes to the methodology. We are looking at cohorts based on age 15 rather than age 19 now,  a choice that means that the figures now include the progress of the small number of pupils who enter higher education in England before the age of 18. Data on FE students has been improved, and the early participation marker is by someone’s 19th birthday (rather than a version that included only the chunk of the year before the summer) which helps to include non-standard and January start dates. It all makes a very small positive difference – a couple of fractions of a percentage point) – and a tidier release overall.

Fans of DfE action on access may recall the HE Access and Participation Task and Finish Group (can one ever really “finish” access and participation work?) It is due to report, via the work Derby vice chancellor Kathryn Mitchell as chair and a collection of sector luminaries and experts, in 2027. In the meantime, today brings an exchange of letters between Mitchell and skills minister Jacqui Smith that sets out the likely findings.

In May of this year, Mitchell summarised the emerging proposals as follows:

• A need to increase the overall number of entrants via the “expansion and normalisation of level 4 and level 5 pathways
• … alongside a strengthening of existing pathways to address the “conversion gap” (learners who are qualified to access HE and would benefit from it but do not)
• … and recognising that an absence of young participation may – in this lifelong learning focused future – legitimately be a delay rather than an endpoint

She also highlights an enhanced focus on place, driven by stronger collaboration and an increase in locally accessible pathways (or franchise and partnership provision, as OfS might call it) bringing together national and local skills priorities. On that, she does ask the question as to how well regulatory responsibilities are aligned across and beyond the education and skills system.