Most of you reading this blog will work in the groves of academia but what is it like just now in an FE college for a higher education adviser who is concerned about widening participation?

UCAS Ramblings

I work at a medium sized FE college in south Lincolnshire which has about 2000 full time students of which about 550 are on the 2^nd year of level 3 programmes and of those about 300 students each year progress on to HE – most of whom go to universities with a few progressing to local FE colleges which offer HE provision. Most of these students take vocational courses such as BTEC, UAL and CACHE but about 95 take A levels. The proportion of students who apply through UCAS each year differs quite markedly by course. Last year between 80% and 90% of students on Performing Arts (Dance) and (Musical Theatre), Fashion and Clothing and Health and Social Care courses applied to HE while under 20% of Sport and Public Service students and under 30% of Business Studies and IT students did. These differences are partly driven by local job opportunities as the unemployment rate locally is very low and there are plenty of jobs in the nearby city for business and IT students. Some of the differences are driven by the course leaders.  The Fashion and Clothing course leader makes it plain from the beginning of the course that to become a successful fashion designer, students will have to go on to HE. In many years all those students have progressed to HE although there is competition in the Art and Design dept and currently the photography course leader is predicting that all his students will progress this year.

WP ramblings

Readers will be aware that the Office for Students’ POLAR4 ratings (shortly to be replaced by TUNDRA) are a measure of the proportion of people in a ward who have progressed on to a higher education programme and thus can be used as a measure when examining widening participation into HE. Every year I also examine the proportion of students from POLAR underrepresented neighbourhoods progress by course. The college recruits students from about a 30 mile radius.  The town in which the college is based is almost all POLAR 4 and 5 neighbourhoods where as many as 60% of young people apply to HE each year, but students travel from a nearby city and from the fens of south Lincolnshire which have many POLAR 1 and 2 areas where as few as 17% of young people progress. In a recent year when the student cohort and applications were lower the overall breakdown was:

As can be seen the numbers of students in POLAR quintiles 1 and 2 is lower than in quintiles 4 and 5 but the percentage of students who apply in each quintile is actually higher for quintiles 1 and 2. However, the average POLAR quintile for each course differs consistently each year. Thus, last year the average quintile for all the students on a particular course ranged from Travel and Tourism which averaged 2.13 to Health and Social Care where the students’ average POLAR quintile score was 3.88. Only 38% of the Travel and Tourism students applied to HE while 88% of Health and Social Care students applied. However, this relationship is not consistent as the cohort of Business Studies student averaged a 3.57 POLAR quintile score but only 27% applied to HE. The students on the Graphic Design course averaged a lower 2.62 quintile score but 69% applied to HE. It therefore appears that factors other than the neighbourhood they live in influence whether students apply to HE or not. However, this town college is partnered with a FE college in a city 12 miles away which has a much higher percentage of students from lower POLAR quintiles. Last year the overall POLAR 4 quintile score for the college was 2.28 with no course higher than 2.86. Just 36% of their students applied to HE. It could be suggested that this is not unsurprising as the lower POLAR scores relate to neighbourhoods where fewer young people progress on to HE.

GCSE ramblings

Another influence on whether a young person can progress on to HE is whether they achieve the GCSE grades, particularly in maths and English to enable them to progress on to a level 3 course at the college.  This year many more students, who applied to come on to level 3 vocational or A level courses did not get the 5 grade 4 GCSEs. Thus, most of them have joined a level 2 vocational course with the intention of getting good grades on those courses and getting the maths and English GCSE grades that will enable them to progress on to Level 3 next year. So many students opted to retake GCSE maths and English this November that all classes were suspended on the exam days. I have identified that students on these level 2 courses are generally from lower POLAR quintile neighbourhoods. You will be aware that very roughly, lower POLAR quintile neighbourhoods equate with neighbourhoods which are more likely to have a higher level of deprivation Many studies have shown that most young people from deprived neighbourhoods perform less well in education all the way through their time in school. Thus, those young people from these neighbourhoods who have gained the qualifications to progress on to a level 3 A level or vocational qualification have done extremely well.

Personal statement ramblings

My job at the college is to help students who are applying though UCAS by checking their personal statements and giving them feedback and helping them with their applications. When checking personal statements, it is clear that the students who come from homes where nobody has progressed to HE before have greater difficulty in writing a suitable statement. Whereas, other students indicate that their parents or siblings have helped them and they are much better written and appropriate. I can assist those who have less support and find it difficult to write a suitable statement but there is a limit – I cannot write the statement for them.  In previous years, course leaders who write the UCAS reference have been able to compensate for those students who have not covered everything they should in their statement by including those points in their reference. However, from this year UCAS have changed the reference writing process and expect reference writers to write much less and allowed them fewer words and in the case of an average student, nothing at all.

T level ramblings

There was an expectation that many of the vocational courses would be replaced this academic year by T levels but the take up has been poor. Moreover, we are reluctant to recruit too well on to the T levels we are offering because we are finding it very difficult to help the students to obtain the work placements they need. The requirements for work placements are gradually being reduced and alternatives allowed but it is still difficult to find employers who are prepared to accept students for placements for a minimum of 315 hours although up to 35 of those hours can be for work taster activities.

Uncertainty ramblings

All of the above is taking place at a time when the government has announced the introduction of a new British Baccalaureate in the future which is designed to replace A levels but will probably impact on vocational qualifications too and thus will impact on the requirements for progression to HE too.

In conclusion, all educational institutions have to face constantly changing expectations and a shortage of funding.  However, further education is often referred to as the ‘Cinderella’ service. All MPs and senior civil servants have been to school and most have been to university, but few have studied at a FE college. We seem to have more regulators and less funding than schools and universities and we never seem to quite get to the ball.