Higher education targets leaving poor behind

28 Apr 05
The government's higher education targets are misguided and not benefiting the most disadvantaged youngsters, according to a leading educational charity.

29 April 2005

The government's higher education targets are misguided and not benefiting the most disadvantaged youngsters, according to a leading educational charity.

The Sutton Trust this week said that rather than focusing on getting 50% of young people into higher education, efforts should be directed on improving university participation rates among low-income groups.

The trust's chair Sir Peter Lampl said: 'The vast growth in higher education has come from the top end of the social scale. The real challenge is getting kids from the lowest 20% into higher education.'

Lampl's comments came on the back of a report commissioned by the trust which revealed that Britain, along with the US, had poor rates of social mobility compared with countries such as Canada, Germany and Sweden.

The April 25 report, produced by researchers at the Centre for Economic Performance at the London School of Economics, concluded that while educational opportunities had improved, this had disproportionately benefited the more affluent.

'The strength of the relationship between educational attainment and family income, especially for access to higher education, is at the heart of Britain's low mobility culture,' the researchers said.

Lampl said the conclusions were 'shocking'.

'I don't think there's enough urgency to try and do something about it,' he said.

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