For the first time since records began, there has been a decline in the number of the poorest students who end up going to university.
A sudden decline in poor students going to university
Young people from free school meals (FSM) backgrounds fell further behind their peers in England in progressing to higher education from 2021/2022 to 2022/23, with the gap in terms of numbers progressing increasing to over 210,000.
The areas with less than one in five FSM learners go onto higher education are drawn mainly from rural and coastal communities. The Access to Higher Education and Regional Inequality: who is missing out? report looks in-depth at progression to higher education for young people from FSM backgrounds across regions and local areas in England from 2005/06 to 2022/23. Key findings in the report include:
- The percentage of state school pupils in receipt of FSM progressing to higher education by age 19 declined for the first time year on year since records began, from 29.2% in 2021/22 to 29% in 2022/23.
- The number of FSM state school pupils progressing to…
