'Barriers to university education still exist for working-class people'

RECENTLY at a Higher Horizons event at Keele University, a medical student who was helping on the day told us that she had been part of the Higher Horizons and Keele Steps2Medicine access scheme.

- Ant Sutcliffe - Associate Director, Higher Horizons, Keele University.

In her wonderful Potteries accent she said she wouldn't have made it if it wasn’t for the contextual offer completing the programme gave her.

She is one of many great examples. But there is more to do.

The UPP Foundation have released the last in a trilogy of reports asking why young people from working-class communities like ours - are still underrepresented in higher education.

The report landed around the time the new Labour government marked its first year in power.

There’s been no shortage of warm words about ‘access to university’ being the top priority in higher education policy.

But clarity and strategy haven't quite followed yet.

We're still waiting to see what that ambition looks like in practice - and crucially - how it’s going to be funded.

The report doesn’t hold back. It calls for big moves - closing the higher education participation gap of the most well off and least well off to 10%, reinstating the 50% target for 18 to 19-year-olds partaking in higher education, and aiming for 70% of the UK population to hold a Level 4 qualification by 2030.