Poor pupils 'two years behind wealthier classmates at 15'

Teenagers from the most deprived backgrounds are lagging dramatically behind wealthy peers in the race for university places because of failure at school, according to major research published today.
Academics warned that the gulf in entry rates between rich and poor students was driven by exam results at secondary school – and not discrimination from admissions tutors.

Figures show that the highest-performing pupils from disadvantaged families lag around two-and-a-half years behind bright children brought up in wealthy homes by the age of 15.

The achievement gap in England is around twice as wide as that seen in some other developed countries, it was revealed. Despite an extensive Labour drive to boost access to higher education, it emerged that the richest schoolchildren were around six times more likely to go on top Russell Group universities than the poorest fifth.

Pupils from affluent homes have also benefited the most from the huge expansion of university places over the last 30 years, claiming an increasing number of available places on degree courses as social mobility effectively grinds to a halt, researchers suggested.

The disclosure – in a series of studies published by the Institute for Fiscal Studies – will be seen as a blow to the Government, which has repeatedly criticised leading research universities for failing to admit more students from poor backgrounds and state schools.

Last year, Nick Clegg, the Deputy Prime Minister, warned that they had a duty to ensure "British society is better reflected" in their admissions to justify state funding.

They are now required to set tough new targets to widen access to justify tuition fees of up to £9,000-a-year. But a series of academic studies released today suggest that failure at an early age remains the biggest hurdle to university for the vast majority of poor pupils.

Jake Anders, a researcher from the University of London’s Institute of Education, who wrote one of the studies, said: “Policymakers interested in narrowing the gap in higher education participation between young people from rich and poor families should focus their attention on ensuring that students from poorer backgrounds have the necessary qualification to apply to university.”

The IFS published five studies as part of a new journal aimed at investigating the role education plays in boosting the life chances of children from disadvantaged areas.

Together, the reports suggest that levels of social mobility have actually worsened in the last 30 years as rich pupils pull increasingly ahead of those born into poor families.

In a series of key findings:

• One study from the IoE reveals that the highest-achieving children from affluent backgrounds are two-and-half-years ahead of peers from poor homes in reading skills by the age of 15 – twice that seen in other western nations;

• Another IoE report exposes “substantial” differences in university entry by family income, with children from the richest fifth of families being almost three times more likely to go into higher education – and six times more likely to attend a Russell Group university – as those from the poorest fifth;

• A study by University College London and Surrey University found that the rise in academic achievement over the last 30 years was more marked among wealthy students, with the proportion of children from the poorest fifth of households going on to get a degree increasing from just nine to 10 per cent, while attainment among the richest fifth increased from 28 to 37 per cent.

Steve Machin, professor of economics at UCL, said "There has been a meteoric rise in education acquisition in Great Britain over the past 30 years, which has occurred most rapidly amongst those from richer families.

“When coupled with evidence of increasing wage returns to all levels of education, this suggests that the expansion of educational opportunities may have hindered rather than helped social mobility.

“For the Government to have any hope of using education as a means of increasing social mobility in future, it will need to learn from the lessons of the past 30 years."

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