With A-Level results being published this week and UK Universities gearing up for clearing, talk in the HE sector has turned, once again, to standard-setting in the ‘elite’ institutions. A report from the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) in collaboration with the social mobility charity Brightside was released yesterday with the recommendation that ‘top’ UK institutions should take the context of applicants more into account, lowering offers from AAA to 3 Cs.Their argument is that students from under-privileged or deprived backgrounds should be given the opportunity to gain access to education, and not be penalised for lower grades that are a product of their social environment rather than ability or intellect.

Do you agree? Here at Newcastle Uni, like many Russell Group institutions, schemes are already in place to help students from disadvantaged backgrounds gain access to degree programmes. Foundation degrees allow students to supplement their grades with a year of study whilst summer programmes provide a route in by providing intense training that guarantees lower entry offers.But the HEPI report argues that this is not enough: A foundation degree is an extra year of fees that not everybody can afford, and lowering grades by 1 or 2 points still may not help.

The issue is perhaps whether we are looking to prevent or cure the barriers. Yes, you can lower grades so that students who wouldn’t otherwise make the standard can get through the doors. But what happens then? If their social and economic backgrounds have posed barriers to them achieving what they’re capable of through school, what is to say anything changes when they become freshers? Perhaps instead of simply lowering the Uni gates, we need to be building a smoother path to get there.

It seems that perhaps a more robust solution might be to target the barriers that exist in the first place. It’s not acceptable that an individual’s social circumstances should prevent them from achieving to their maximum ability. We shouldn’t be living in a world where students are ‘labelled’ by their entitlement to free school meals and then given ‘special’ considerations to get onto courses where the grades are set high for good academic reason. Instead we should be supporting students to achieve their full potential so that they can make the grades. And will enter the Uni gates knowing that they have the same academic talent as all of their peers to succeed on challenging degree courses.

‘Letting people in’ is perhaps not the issue. Allowing people to come in might be more on point…