Where, and to whom, we are born are among the strongest forces affecting our life expectancy, our work careers, health outcomes, and the amount of taxes we pay over a lifetime.
What do we mean by ‘disadvantaged’? We refer to specific student characteristics, which make it less likely those pupils will consider higher education. These include eligibility for free school meals, gender, ethnicity, special educational needs, first language and the area they live in. This Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD) paints a grim picture of the UK’s inequalities. Here are some figures which illustrate the magnitude of the task facing the University of Wolverhampton and similar institutions that admit these students. At secondary school, by the time they take their GCSEs, those pupils who have been eligible for free school meals at any point in the last 6 years are 18.1 months of learning behind their peers. This gap has remained unchanged in the last five years. Those who have had free school meals 80 per cent of their time at school have a 22.7 month gap behind their peers. These are the students we endeavour to support.[1]
In our part of the West Midlands, 18–25-year-olds in the most deprived postcodes historically had just over 19 per cent probability of gaining access and completing three years of higher education. Between 2017 and 2021, ‘Aspire to HE’, based at the University of Wolverhampton, raised that participation rate from 19 to over 46 per cent, working with over 60,000 students from disadvantaged backgrounds to empower them to make informed and ambitious choices about entering and progressing through higher education, including non-traditional routes, such as into degree apprenticeships.
