The Higher Education Policy Institute has published a new paper on student non-continuation rates.
‘Dropouts or stopouts or comebackers or potential completers?’: Non-continuation of students in the UK (HEPI Policy Note 53) by HEPI Director, Nick Hillman, finds:
- the UK has had the lowest drop-out rate among developed countries, with Ireland in second place;
- the UK’s strong performance arises in part from the historic levels of academic selection at the point of entry to higher education as well as the relatively short length of undergraduate degrees, which provides less scope for life events to intervene and disrupt study;
- non-continuation fell somewhat during the worst of COVID and rose immediately afterwards while the latest (experimental) data suggest it is now falling again, though it has yet to fall back to pre-COVID levels;
