All Outputs (44)

Mature female learners activating agency after completion of an education foundation degree: professional progression and the teacher shortage crisis (2019)
Journal Article

This paper draws upon questionnaire data from 126 mature, female alumni students and interviews with a subset of 20 participants who completed education foundation degrees in three English universities in the South West. Three illustrative cases from... Read More about Mature female learners activating agency after completion of an education foundation degree: professional progression and the teacher shortage crisis.

Using the lens of 'possible selves' to explore access to higher education: A new conceptual model for practice, policy, and research (2018)
Journal Article

© 2018 by the authors. The concept of 'aspiration-raising' has been ubiquitous in the discussion of differential rates of participation in higher education in England for many years. Potential students from disadvantaged backgrounds are constructed a... Read More about Using the lens of 'possible selves' to explore access to higher education: A new conceptual model for practice, policy, and research.

Students-as-insurers: rethinking ‘risk’ for disadvantaged young people considering higher education in England (2018)
Journal Article

© 2018 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. The conventional view since the early 2000s has been that participation in higher education (HE) is a risky pathway for disadvantaged young people in England; the social risk of entering... Read More about Students-as-insurers: rethinking ‘risk’ for disadvantaged young people considering higher education in England.

Challenging discourses of aspiration: The role of expectations and attainment in access to higher education (2018)
Journal Article

© 2018 British Educational Research Association Raising the proportion of young people from disadvantaged backgrounds progressing to higher education has been a key policy objective for successive governments in the UK since the late 1990s. Often thi... Read More about Challenging discourses of aspiration: The role of expectations and attainment in access to higher education.

Access, participation and capabilities: Theorising the contribution of university bursaries to students’ well-being, flourishing and success (2018)
Journal Article

For the last 10 years, universities in England have been expected to offer financial support to low-income students alongside that provided by government. These bursaries were initially conceived in terms of improving access for under-represented gro... Read More about Access, participation and capabilities: Theorising the contribution of university bursaries to students’ well-being, flourishing and success.

Moving on up: Pathways of care leavers and care-experienced students into and through higher education (2017)
Report

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Success and impact in widening participation policy: What works and how do we know? (2017)
Journal Article

© 2016 International Association of Universities. Efforts to widen the participation in higher education for disadvantaged and under-represented groups are common to many countries. In England, higher education institutions are required by government... Read More about Success and impact in widening participation policy: What works and how do we know?.

Examining the epistemology of impact and success of educational interventions using a reflective case study of university bursaries (2017)
Journal Article

This paper engages with the continuing emphasis given to evidence-based policy and ‘what works’ approaches in educational research, highlighting some of the continuing epistemological challenges from a post-positivist perspective. To illustrate thes... Read More about Examining the epistemology of impact and success of educational interventions using a reflective case study of university bursaries.

Evaluating outreach activities: overcoming challenges through a realist ‘small steps’ approach (2016)
Journal Article

© 2016 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. Practitioners are being placed under increasing pressure to evaluate the success of their outreach activities, both by government and by their own universities. Based in a reductionist d... Read More about Evaluating outreach activities: overcoming challenges through a realist ‘small steps’ approach.

Student choices under uncertainty: Bounded rationality and behavioural economics (2016)
Book Chapter

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Access to higher education: Theoretical perspectives and contemporary challenges (2016)
Book

How do we understand and explain who has access to higher education? How do we make sense of persisting and new forms of inequality? How can global, national and institutional policymakers and practitioners make higher education more inclusive? Acces... Read More about Access to higher education: Theoretical perspectives and contemporary challenges.

Individual and Social Influences on Students’ Attitudes to Debt: a Cross-National Path Analysis Using Data from England and New Zealand (2016)
Journal Article

© 2016 John Wiley & Sons Ltd. This study examines the construction of debt attitudes among 439 first-year undergraduates in England and New Zealand. It works from a conceptual model that predicts that attitudes will be partly determined by a range... Read More about Individual and Social Influences on Students’ Attitudes to Debt: a Cross-National Path Analysis Using Data from England and New Zealand.

Building a culture of participation: Interviews with the former directors of the national Aimhigher programme (2015)
Report

The evaluation of widening participation activities in higher education: A survey of institutional leaders in England (2015)
Report

This paper reports the results of an online survey of senior managers with responsibility for widening participation (WP) in English universities. 57 institutions participated, giving a response rate of 38 percent. The questionnaire primarily focused... Read More about The evaluation of widening participation activities in higher education: A survey of institutional leaders in England.

Practice, problems and power in ‘internationalisation at home’: critical reflections on recent research evidence (2015)
Journal Article

© 2015, © 2015 Taylor & Francis. In a period when international flows of higher education students are rapidly increasing and diversifying, this paper reviews recent research evidence about the experiences of ‘home’ students – those who are not mob... Read More about Practice, problems and power in ‘internationalisation at home’: critical reflections on recent research evidence.

Returning from earning: UK graduates returning to postgraduate study, with particular respect to STEM subjects, gender and ethnicity (2015)
Journal Article

© 2015 Taylor & Francis. It has been argued by some (e.g. the Confederation of British Industry [CBI]) that graduates lack the skills that render them employable. In particular, graduates of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) s... Read More about Returning from earning: UK graduates returning to postgraduate study, with particular respect to STEM subjects, gender and ethnicity.

Attitudes to debt among indebted undergraduates: A cross-national exploratory factor analysis (2015)
Journal Article

© 2014 Elsevier B.V. This paper reports the results of a cross-national study spanning England, New Zealand and the United States. A total of 496 first year undergraduates studying business or social science completed a 20-item questionnaire. This fo... Read More about Attitudes to debt among indebted undergraduates: A cross-national exploratory factor analysis.

An ecological fallacy in higher education policy: the use, overuse and misuse of ‘low participation neighbourhoods’ (2015)
Journal Article

© 2014 UCU. One form of ecological fallacy is found in the dictum that ‘you are where you live’ – otherwise expressed in the idea that you can infer significant information about an individual or their family from the prevailing conditions around the... Read More about An ecological fallacy in higher education policy: the use, overuse and misuse of ‘low participation neighbourhoods’.

Don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it's gone? Skills-led qualifications, secondary school attainment and policy choices (2015)
Journal Article

© 2015 Taylor & Francis. In the name of curriculum breadth and raising standards, recent government policy in England has removed a large number of non-academic qualifications from the list of those that secondary schools can count in league tables... Read More about Don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it's gone? Skills-led qualifications, secondary school attainment and policy choices.

Towards a typology of debt attitudes among contemporary young UK undergraduates (2015)
Journal Article

© 2013, © 2013 UCU. The findings of this study suggest that student attitudes are more complex than assumed in some previous research and journalistic commentary, especially with respect to social class. Counterintuitively, many students from lower s... Read More about Towards a typology of debt attitudes among contemporary young UK undergraduates.