During the 2020/21 academic year, the highest ever proportion of pupils on free school meals entered UK higher education, but the gap between them and their peers has barely changed in a decade, new figures show.
The latest data on school leavers in England reflected steady progress on widening participation, with just over 28 per cent of pupils on free school meals going on to university, the highest ever share.
A gap between these pupils and their peers not on free school meals has decreased slightly for the first time in nearly decade but remains at just under 19 percentage points for 2020-21, one point wider than a decade before.
