Poor and black students are finding their route to success barred as elite universities are closing their doors to minority students.
Figures published today show that wealthy students are up to 16 times more likely to be offered a place at leading universities than teenagers from deprived backgrounds.
And black students are half as likely as their white classmates to be accepted into a top university, even when they have similar qualifications.
The figures, covering 132 U.K. universities, show that some of the most prestigious universities have some of the worst records in recruiting poor and black students.
Previous research has highlighted the gap between the most and least advantaged students in terms of university access, but this is the first time comparable data has been published for individual universities.
Cambridge University offered places to 1,260 students from the most privileged areas in 2015, compared with 65 from the most disadvantaged areas.
That works out at 4.6 students per 10,000 population offered places in the least advantaged areas, and 75.2 per 10,000 population in the most advantaged areas, 16 times as many.
Oxford’s record is similar. Just 70 student from the least advantaged areas were offered a place, compared with 1,205 from the most advantaged, rates of 5.1 and 71.9 per 10,000 respectively
At both universities, the number of students recruited from the most privileged fifth of the population outweighed those from all other households put together.
The figures, published by university admissions body Ucas, also found that black students were less likely to receive an offer of a place at a leading university, even after taking into account their grades and choice of degree.
Cambridge offered places to 30 black students, a rate of 8.8 per 10,000 population, considerably lower than any other ethnic group. A total of 1,785 white students were offered places, 28.6 per 10,000 population
At Oxford, 35 black students were offered places, 11.0 per 10,000 population, compared with 1,875 white students, a rate of 30.1 per 10,000.
Publication of the figures comes after mounting concern over access to higher education for minority and disadvantaged students, with interventions by both the U.K.’s current prime minister and his immediate predecessor Gordon Brown.
Les Ebdon, director of the Office for Fair Access, which regulates fair access to higher education, welcomed publication of the figures as a major step forward in improving transparency over university admissions.
The data will help universities evaluate what they do so they can work out which attempts to improve access have the most impact, he said.
“Some universities will clearly be very challenged by this data, and I expect them to work hard to understand the discrepancies between applications and offers made for certain groups,” he added. “I do not accept that an applicant’s ethnicity or where they come from should be a barrier to attending university.”
He said he would focus the most elite institutions in his efforts to support universities to make faster progress on improving access.
Sir Peter Lampl, chairman of the Sutton Trust which campaigns to improve social mobility through education, described the figures as worrying. |