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Is the gap on access to university closing faster in Scotland than the rest...
[Spoiler: not so as to be worth trying to hang an argument on, if at all.] In an interview yesterday on The Sunday Politics, referring to university entry rates between the most and least deprived, the...
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New stats underline how HE in FE masks inequality in university entry
The recent interim report of the Commission on Widening Access noted that Scotland, traditionally, has a high rate of participation in higher education relative to other UK nations. In 2013/14, the...
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Another number that’s not quite what it seems: HE participation rates in...
The graph left shows the Higher Education Initial Participation Rate (HEIPR) for the most disadvantaged 20% of the population in Scotland between 2006-07 and 2013-14. The green bars show the HEIPR...
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FMQs: 10% that’s not 10%
In a discussion of some new figures out today from UCAS (full of interesting things and worth their own separate piece), the First Minister reportedly said earlier (according to the BBC): The more...
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FMQs update: +10% = 1.4% (probably, not -1.7%)
Update 17:15 12 June: Further digging in the newest UCAS numbers suggests that steps have already been taken in those to take into account the “UHI effect”, so that the further adjustment below isn’t...
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HE students in colleges: the net impact of fee and grant policy since 2007
In response to some challenging statistics from UCAS on inequality in access to HE, the Scottish Government has recently been keen to stress the important contribution of college-level HE to widening...
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FM: “We must have a debate based on facts” (although they may need to be...
what I want is, Facts. … Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else, and root out everything else. .. Stick to Facts, sir! (Thomas Gradgrind, Hard Times: Charles Dickens) …I simply pointed out...
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School leaver destinations: HE still popular in 2014, but less “sticky”
The SG’s annual statistics on school leaver destinations were published yesterday. The information is collected via surveys in September and March and, among other things, provides a snap shot of how...
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A picture of education inequality
Here, thanks to the underlying data provided as part of last week’s new version of SIMD, is one picture of what education inequality looks like in modern Scotland. The graph above takes the 6,976...
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Displacing the privileged vs squeezing the middle: a bit more evidence
The discussion in Scotland about widening access to university remains dominated by the idea that any “displacement” will be a problem mainly (or even only) for the most advantaged. As the journalist...
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How far is Scotland from meeting its 2021 widening access targets?
This post looks at what today’s data from the Scottish Funding Council suggests about the scale of change needed to meet the Scottish Government’s targets for widening access to university. The 2021...
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Scottish Government special advisers: a quiet re-jigging round HE, and...
The Scottish Government has quietly re-jigged its Special Advisers. Kate Higgins returns to the education brief for early years, and further and higher education. Ms Higgins had a general education...
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Comparing entry rates to university: the (data) gap that could easily be reduced
The First Minister was interviewed yesterday by Andrew Neil. One journalist reported that “Sturgeon says difference in university access rates for poorer pupils between Scot & Eng down to different...
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Long-term and short-term trends in education spending in Scotland: who’s right?
There was some debate at First Minister’s Questions this week about trends in school spending. This post looks at the claims made (labelled below for ease of reference). In brief, the increase claimed...
View ArticleRethinking the four year degree
There’s a head of steam building in Scotland to make it easier for school leavers to get an honours degree in three years. The most recent intervention is the report of the Scottish Government’s 15-24...
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