In its third monitoring report published today (Thursday 5 August), OFFA finds that English universities and colleges spent a total of £344 million on access measures in 2008-09 including £304 million on bursaries and scholarships for students from lower income and other under-represented groups.  Over 346,000 such students received a bursary or scholarship in this period.

Nearly three-quarters (74 per cent) of bursary and scholarship expenditure was spent on the very poorest students, helping more than 230,000 students in receipt of a full state maintenance grant. On average, students in this group received a bursary of £980 a year.

OFFA also reports that bursary take-up among students from the lowest income group has again improved significantly – up from 92 per cent in 2007-08 to 96 per cent in 2008-09. Some 96 per cent of HEIs are now reporting a take-up rate of 90 per cent or more.

Commenting on the findings, Sir Martin Harris, Director of Fair Access, said: “This continued level of expenditure demonstrates universities and colleges’ strong ongoing commitment to widening access.

“In today’s changed climate, it is imperative that universities maintain their commitment and continue to spend appropriate proportions of their additional fee income on access measures.

“Clearly, with applications at a record high and restrictions on fully funded places, not everyone who applies to university will get a place. But we must continue to make sure that disadvantaged students get into the applications pool and are not disproportionately among those affected by this increased competition for places.”

Other key findings in OFFA’s report are that:

• universities and colleges spent £36.7 million on additional outreach and widening participation activities – up from just under £27 million in 2007-08
• more than three-quarters of universities and colleges charging the maximum fee spent between 15 to 30 per cent of their additional fee income on bursaries and scholarships
• 97 per cent of universities and colleges reported that they had either made progress towards or met their key statistical milestones relating to the number of applicants or entrants from under-represented groups
• to OFFA’s knowledge, all eligible students who applied for a bursary through the correct channels, have received one.

ends

For more information, please contact Zita Adamson, Communications Manager on 0117 931 7272/931 7171 or press@offa.org.uk.

Notes to editors

• The Office for Fair Access (OFFA) was established under the Higher Education Act 2004. Our role is to help safeguard and promote fair access to higher education by regulating the charging of higher fees. The main way we do this is by approving and monitoring access agreements.
• All publicly funded universities and colleges in England that wish to charge tuition fees above the basic level have to submit an access agreement to us for approval and complete an annual monitoring return. Access agreements show the fees that an institution intends to charge, its plans for bursaries and other financial support for lower income and other under-represented groups and, in some cases, additional outreach work.
• In 2008-09 the basic fee was £1,255 and the maximum higher fee £3,145. The minimum bursary (payable by all institutions charging the maximum fee to full-time undergraduates receiving the full maintenance grant) was £310.
• The threshold for full state maintenance grants for new entrants increased from £17,910 in 2007-08 to £25,000 in 2008-09.
• Our monitoring report only covers expenditure directed at our target groups – students from lower income and other under-represented groups. We know that HEIs spent at least a further £15 million on bursaries and scholarships for students who are not in OFFA countable groups. Similarly, many institutions invested in outreach work that fell outside their access agreements.
• As stated in our report, we define ‘lower income’ as students with assessed household incomes below £49,305. This is £10,000 above the threshold for state support for continuing students in recognition of the fact that some institutions were concerned that students who just missed out on state support might be deterred from HE on financial grounds.
• The headline figures for bursaries and outreach expenditure relate to higher education institutions only as the figures for further education colleges and school-centred initial teacher training providers are very small and can distort the data.
• Widening Participation Strategic Assessments (WPSAs) bring together institutions’ widening participation and fair access commitments into a single document. Later this year OFFA and the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) will issue joint guidance on both access agreement monitoring returns for 2009-10 and institutions’ first return against their WPSA.

Commenting on the figures, Sir Martin Harris, Director of Fair Access, said: “Applications have levelled off significantly compared to earlier in the cycle but are still up substantially compared to the same point last year – demonstrating the value that students see in continuing their education, particularly in these uncertain times.

“However, my delight at the continued appetite for a higher education is tempered by concern that disadvantaged youngsters will be disproportionately affected by pressure for places. Last year, thanks to hard work by universities and colleges, this fear did not in fact materialise. I would urge universities and colleges to make all possible efforts to ensure that the same is true for 2010 applicants.

“In the meantime, if they have not already done so, I would urge all applicants to apply for financial support as soon as possible so that any loans, grants and bursaries to which they are entitled are in place when they start their studies. “In most cases, students who are eligible for a bursary simply need to agree to share their information when they apply for state support. However, some students will need to apply directly to their particular university or college.”

In 2010-11 annual bursaries for students on full state support will range from £329 to £3,400. The average bursary for a student on full state support is around £900, so representing an important element in the overall support available to lower income and other under-represented students.

1. The Office for Fair Access (OFFA) is an independent, non departmental public body established under the Higher Education Act 2004 to help promote and safeguard fair access to higher education. Our main remit is to regulate the charging of higher tuition fees by English universities and colleges offering higher education courses.

2. For further information, please contact OFFA on 0117 931 7171 or email press@offa.org.uk.

In his report ‘What more can be done to widen access to highly selective universities?’ commissioned by the Government in November 2009[2] to inform the Independent Review of Higher Education Funding and Student Finance, Sir Martin says it is both socially unacceptable and economically wasteful that too few talented people from disadvantaged backgrounds realise their full potential.

While widening participation as a whole has been very successful, particularly over the last five years, the report contains new analysis showing that participation at the top third of selective universities from the least advantaged 40 per cent of young people has remained almost flat since the mid-1990s. Able young people from disadvantaged backgrounds are less likely to attain high grades at school than their advantaged peers of comparable ability and less likely to choose GCSE and A level subjects that keep their options open to apply to selective universities. This ‘attainment gap’ accounts for most of disadvantaged students’  under-representation, with disadvantage affecting a young person’s educational attainment from an early age. What is more, even when they are highly qualified, students from disadvantaged backgrounds are less likely to apply to the most selective universities than their advantaged peers.[3]

Sir Martin warmly acknowledges that highly selective universities are already making considerable efforts to widen participation among disadvantaged young people and points out that without these efforts, in a period of increasing competition for places, participation among this group could well have been significantly worse.

But he argues that closer collaboration between selective universities, schools and colleges is needed to identify talented young people from poorer families who are ‘most able but least likely’[4] to apply to highly selective universities and courses, and recommends that selective universities should increase the coverage and volume of successful extended outreach programmes[5] targeted at the most able students.

The report also identifies the importance of giving comprehensive and impartial advice and guidance over a period of years in order to increase aspiration and attainment and guide students in choosing the right subjects to meet the entry requirements of highly selective universities and courses.

“Right at the heart of the matter is the need to ensure that those young people with the potential to succeed in a research-intensive university, but who do not currently choose to apply, are identified as early as possible. This must certainly not be later than the end of year 9[6],” says Sir Martin.

Sir Martin also recommends[7] that selective universities should:

• employ peripatetic staff to raise aspirations and encourage pupils to consider applying to highly selective universities, supplementing the academic and financial advice and guidance provided by schools and further education colleges, particularly at the ages of 14 and 16 when GCSE and A level subject choices are made
• provide summer schools targeted at the ‘most able least likely’ students, along the lines of Sutton Trust summer schools
• review and evaluate their expenditure on bursaries, scholarships and additional outreach to improve the way they target talented disadvantaged students and ensure money is spent on the most effective methods of widening access to highly selective universities
• make public how well they have met their own widening participation targets in respect of actual entrants as well as applications to their particular university

He also recommends that the Department for Children, Schools and Families (now the Department for Education) should consider introducing a measure relating to students progression at age 18+ by which all schools, including 11-16 schools, can be publicly evaluated.

Recognising the considerable existing efforts of selective universities to widen access to disadvantaged young people, Sir Martin says: “Evaluation to date provides convincing evidence… that the outreach programmes of these universities have had a positive effect on their target groups (disadvantaged students). It would therefore be fair to conclude that without these efforts we would have seen a decline in both the absolute and relative participation rates of such students in the most selective third of institutions.”

As it is, analysis commissioned by OFFA and published alongside this report[8], shows that although there has been a significant rise in participation among disadvantaged young people in HE as a whole since the mid-1990s, participation among the least advantaged 40 per cent of young people at the top third of selective institutions has not changed over the same period. The most advantaged 20 per cent of the young population are now around seven times more likely than the most disadvantaged 40% to attend the most selective institutions. This ratio has increased from six times more likely in the mid-1990s but has not increased further since the mid-2000s. Significantly, this ratio has not increased under the current fee and support arrangements introduced in 2006, supporting the argument that the efforts of the most selective universities have at least maintained participation from the least advantaged groups in recent years.

Sir Martin is clear that his recommendations are ‘not without resource implications’ and recommends that selective universities should re-examine their current additional fee expenditure on bursaries and outreach activities to see whether some of this money, where it is not tightly targeted, could be more usefully spent on extended, co-ordinated outreach targeted at the most able, disadvantaged students.

He also calls on the Independent Review of Higher Education Funding and Student Finance led by Lord Browne of Madingley to consider whether, in the event that the fee cap is raised, there should be any broad conditions requiring the most selective institutions to maintain the appropriate proportions of additional fee income invested in ensuring fair access to their institutions.

“The goal of fair access is too important for the opportunity to be missed at this crucial time” he concludes.

Ends

Notes to editors

• For Sir Martin’s full report, see http://www.offa.org.uk/publications/
• The Office for Fair Access (OFFA) is an independent, non departmental public body established under the Higher Education Act 2004 to help promote and safeguard fair access to higher education. Our main remit is to regulate the charging of higher tuition fees by English universities and colleges offering higher education courses.
• For further information, contact Zita Adamson, Communications Manager at OFFA, on 0117 931 7272 or 0117 931 7171.

[1] For the purposes of the Report we consider the most selective institutions or courses to be those for which both the entry requirements and the demand for places are high. We have used a number of measures to capture this characteristic. Most frequently we use the most selective third of universities by entry tariff points – see Annex C on page 94

[2] The Government commissioned the report from Sir Martin when it published its HE framework Higher Ambitions – see http://www.bis.gov.uk/policies/higher-education/shape-and-structure/higher-ambitions

[3] Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (2009) Applications, Offers and Admissions to Research Led Universities: a joint report by the Sutton Trust and BIS. Research Paper No. 5. This research shows that if students from state schools and further education providers were to apply to selective universities in proportion to their attainment, we should expect to see around 4,500 additional pupils from the state sector entering the top 500 courses each year

[4] Young people of high ability who have the potential to do well at the most selective universities but who, because of their disadvantaged background, are the least likely among high ability students to realise that potential

[5] Such schemes incorporate a range of outreach activities such as summer schools, master classes, mentoring etc within a coherent progressive programme of co-ordinated support and events

[6] The age at which students make their GCSE subject choices

[7] See page 87 of Sir Martin’s report for the full recommendations

[8] See Annex C for OFFA-commissioned analysis from the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) on ‘Trends in young participation by selectivity of institution’

Commenting on the announcement, Sir Martin Harris, Director of Fair Access said:

“I am delighted that the latest provisional initial participation rates for 17-30 year olds have shown this significant increase. These figures are consistent with recent analysis from HEFCE showing that young participation has increased significantly since the mid-2000s. What is encouraging is that the HEFCE analysis showed that this was also a period during which most of the additional entrants to higher education came from disadvantaged neighbourhoods.

“There is likely to be unprecedented high demand for places this year and universities will want to continue to ensure that this does not disproportionately affect applicants from disadvantaged students. The 20,000 new places for 2010-11 recently announced in the Budget will help to relieve some of this pressure and better allow the recent upward momentum of widening participation to continue.”

Ends

Notes to editors

[1] The Office for Fair Access (OFFA) is an independent, non departmental public body established under the Higher Education Act 2004 to help promote and safeguard fair access to higher education. Our main remit is to regulate the charging of higher tuition fees by English universities and colleges offering higher education courses.

[2] The HEIPR can be found at http://stats.berr.gov.uk/UKSA/he/sa20100331.htm

[3] The HEIPR is the national statistic that the Government uses to measure progress in participation in higher education. It roughly equates to the probability that a seventeen year old will participate in higher education by age thirty given the age specific participation rates.

[4] The HEFCE report, ‘Trends in young participation in higher education: core results for England’, was published in January 2010 and can be found at www.hefce.ac.uk/pubs/hefce/2010/10_03/

 Commenting on the figures, Sir Martin Harris, Director of Fair Access, said: “As UCAS points out, there are a number of underlying reasons for this dramatic increase, such as changes to the deadline for some art and design courses and the phasing out of the Nursing Diploma. However, even allowing for these changes, there is no doubt that applications are up significantly, a very welcome increase that can be attributed in part to rising aspirations and attainment.

  “Nevertheless, with a cap on funded places and universities who over-recruit facing fines, many applicants are going to be disappointed. Last year, fears that the demand for places would affect widening participation did not materialise. In fact, the numbers and share of accepted applicants from the most disadvantaged areas for 2009 entry actually increased.

 “However, this does not necessarily mean we will see the same happen for 2010 entry. I would therefore urge all universities to continue to make sure that this unprecedented demand for places does not disproportionately affect disadvantaged students.

 “I would also urge all students to investigate fully the bursary support on offer before selecting which offers to accept. There is a large variance in the financial support offered – even within groups of similar universities – and recent research commissioned by OFFA  showed that many students are not factoring this into their UCAS decision-making.”

 Notes to editors

1. The Office for Fair Access (OFFA) is an independent, non departmental public body established under the Higher Education Act 2004 to help promote and safeguard fair access to higher education. Our main remit is to regulate the charging of higher tuition fees by English universities and colleges offering higher education courses.
2. For further information, please contact Zita Adamson, Communications Manager, on 0117 931 7272 or email press@offa.org.uk.

Commenting on the report, ‘Trends in young participation in higher education’, published by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), the Director of Fair Access Sir Martin Harris says:

“I am hugely heartened by this latest analysis from HEFCE  – it is evidence of a significant step change in the participation of young people from disadvantaged neighbourhoods.  What is particularly pleasing is that the sharp rise in participation among disadvantaged youngsters continues after the introduction of variable tuition fees, indicating that they have not proved a barrier to widening participation. This is really good news.

“Over the same period the chances of advantaged young people entering higher education have also risen but by much less. This means the gap between the chances of advantaged and disadvantaged young people entering higher education is finally starting to close. Indeed, most of the additional entrants to higher education since the mid-2000s have come from disadvantaged neighbourhoods.

“It is impossible to prove exactly what has led to this improvement in participation rates but there are clear parallels with increased investment in schools, improved GCSE attainment, and increased university outreach activity.

“However, I would caution against complacency. This report is about participation in higher education as a whole and so does not show participation rates at particular groups of university. HEFCE have shown previously that patterns of participation at highly selective universities can be quite different from the sector as a whole and we will therefore be undertaking further work with HEFCE to assess participation trends by university groups.”

Ends

Notes to editors

The HEFCE report, ‘Trends in young participation in higher education: core results for England’, finds that:

• • there have been substantial and sustained increases in the chances of young people living in the most disadvantaged areas entering higher education since the mid-2000s
  • this finding holds whether neighbourhood disadvantage is defined by participation rates themselves or by measures of parental education, occupation or income
  • young people living in the most disadvantaged areas have increased their chances of entering higher education by +30 per cent over the past five years and by +50 per cent over the past 15 years.
  • young people from the most advantaged backgrounds have also increased their chances of entering higher education, typically by +5 per cent over the past 5 years and +15 per cent over the past 15 years.
  • In the mid-1990s one in eight young people in the most disadvantaged areas entered higher education. This has increased to one in five today – still far lower than the more than one in two of young people from the most advantaged areas entering higher education.

• For the full report, see http://www.hefce.ac.uk/pubs/hefce/2010/
• The Office for Fair Access (OFFA) is an independent, non departmental public body established under the Higher Education Act 2004 to help promote and safeguard fair access to higher education. Our main remit is to regulate the charging of higher tuition fees by English universities and colleges offering higher education courses.
• For further information, contact Zita Adamson, Communications Manager at OFFA, on 0117 931 7272 or 0117 931 7171.

Commenting on the figures, Director of Fair Access to Higher Education, Sir Martin Harris, said: “These figures are excellent news. They confirm that, despite unprecedented demand for places and fears that this might affect access, the numbers and share of accepted applicants from the most disadvantaged areas have increased.

“We very much look forward to the forthcoming HEFCE report ‘Trends in young participation in higher education’ to see how these increases have affected the higher education participation rates of young people from the most disadvantaged backgrounds.

“However, despite this success, we cannot be complacent. Demand for places is likely to be even stronger in 2010, so it remains important for universities and colleges to ensure that applicants from disadvantaged backgrounds are not disproportionately affected by this increased competition.”

ends

Notes to editors

1. The Office for Fair Access (OFFA) is an independent, non departmental public body established under the Higher Education Act 2004 to help promote and safeguard fair access to higher education. Our main remit is to regulate the charging of higher tuition fees by English universities and colleges offering higher education courses.
2. For further information, please contact Zita Adamson, Communications Manager, on 0117 931 7272 or email press@offa.org.uk.

The first major national research study systematically to examine the impact, awareness and take-up of university bursaries and scholarships finds that they are helping to overcome financial barriers to higher education (HE)[i] but that more needs to be done to improve awareness and understanding, particularly at key decision-making stages.

Commissioned by OFFA, and carried out by Professor Claire Callender of Birkbeck, University of London and the National Institute of Economic and Social Research, the study explores the impact, awareness and take-up of institutional bursaries and scholarships in England from the perspective of students, their parents, HE advisors in schools and further education colleges, and universities and colleges themselves.

The study’s summary report, ‘Awareness, take-up and impact of institutional bursaries and scholarships in England: Summary and recommendations’, finds that bursaries and scholarships are proving an effective recruitment tool for a significant minority of students[ii] – especially the highest value ones – and are successfully encouraging high-achieving lower-income students to opt for more selective universities and colleges.[iii]

But it concludes that the overall success of bursaries and scholarships as a financial incentive is being limited by:

• the lack of knowledge, awareness and understanding of bursaries on the part of many students, parents, and HE advisors in schools and colleges – a quarter of the students and parents surveyed had not heard of bursaries. Furthermore, among those who had heard of bursaries, there were large gaps in their knowledge[iv]
• the information-seeking behaviour of students, parents and HE advisors, particularly the timing of their information search – only two-fifths of the students surveyed said they had looked for information on bursaries before submitting their UCAS application form. Consequently, many  students did not take bursaries into account when choosing which university to apply to
• the scope, clarity and accessibility of information provided by universities and colleges and others  – almost half of students (44%) thought there was too little information on how to apply for a bursary although universities and colleges thought they had covered this.[v]  This risked confusing some students.

OFFA has used the research findings to create new good practice guidance for universities and colleges on how they can help improve awareness and understanding of bursaries, particularly at key decision-making stages in the UCAS process. Working together with the Student Loans Company, OFFA will also use the research findings to help improve the information given to HE advisors working in schools and further education colleges.

Professor Claire Callender says: “Universities and colleges have responded positively and generously to the call to introduce bursaries, spending £192m on bursaries and scholarships for lower-income and other under-represented students in 2007-08. Together with the Student Loans Company, they have also worked hard to improve take-up of bursaries. From 2008-09, OFFA expects take-up to be 96% or higher.

“However, what this research shows is that, despite great efforts by universities and colleges to give students information, bursary messages are not always getting through. In many cases, bursaries are not helping to shape students’ choices about which universities to apply to at key decision-making stages.”

Commenting on the research findings, Sir Martin Harris, Director of Fair Access, says: “Clearly, if we are to maximise the impact of bursaries on students’ HE decision-making, then awareness and understanding of bursaries among both students and those who advise them, must improve. Going forward, the new challenge for universities and colleges is to review and evaluate their bursary information and awareness-raising activities so that they know what works well and what doesn’t work as well. Students must know whether they qualify for a bursary, how to apply for one, and when and how much they will receive.

“We are particularly keen for universities and colleges to concentrate greater effort on awareness-raising activities at the pre-entry stage when students are researching their options. We would also urge them to target more information and awareness-raising activities specifically at parents and HE advisors in schools and colleges.

“The new Student Finance Calculator service from Student Finance England should help considerably – this will give students a comprehensive source of comparable bursary and scholarship information.”

Ends

[i] The research found that bursaries had the largest impact on the HE decisions of students who were anxious about the costs of going to university. Some 37% of students who said that the costs of university influenced their decision about whether to go to university a lot, thought bursaries were important compared to 22% of students who were unconcerned about the costs of going to university.

[ii] Nearly three out of ten students surveyed (28%) believed bursaries were important when deciding where to go to university and a quarter of students who had heard of bursaries reported that the amount of bursary available had influenced their choice of university.

[iii] Some 32% of students studying at a Russell Group university rated bursaries as important in their decision-making compared with 30% at other pre-1992 HEIs and 26% at 1994 universities and post-1992 HEIs.  The research suggests that this is probably because Russell Group students have better access to bursary information and are better informed.

[iv] Three quarters of students and two-thirds of parents did not realise that universities and colleges must give a minimum bursary to students receiving the full state maintenance grant. Almost half the students surveyed (47%) thought bursaries were one-off payments given to students in their first year. And the majority of students (56%) and 39% of their parents did not realise that bursaries were paid for by universities and colleges themselves.

[v] The majority of students (58%) who had looked at some HEI information on bursaries thought there was insufficient information on when they would receive a bursary while 44% thought there was too little on how to apply for a bursary. Almost half of students could not work out whether receiving a bursary would affect their eligibility for government grants and loans. However, 97% of the HEIs surveyed gave information on how to apply for their bursary, 85% on when students would receive a bursary and 77% explained that the receipt of a bursary did not affect students’ eligibility for government-funded support.

 Notes to editors

1. The research programme consisted of interviews with key stakeholders; a telephone survey of 74 HEIs conducted between October and December 2008; an online survey in October 2008 of a nationally representative sample of just under 5,000 full-time undergraduate students attending HEIs in receipt of a full or partial grant; a telephone survey of 114 of the students’ parents carried out in December 2008; a telephone survey of 150 HE advisors in schools and further education colleges carried out between November 2008 and January 2009.
2. The Office for Fair Access (OFFA) is an independent, non departmental public body established under the Higher Education Act 2004 to help promote and safeguard fair access to higher education. Our main remit is to regulate the charging of higher tuition fees by institutions offering higher education courses.
3. All the research reports will be available on the OFFA website from Thursday 3 December 2009 at http://www.offa.org.uk/publications/
4. For more information, please contact Zita Adamson, OFFA’s Communications Manager, on 0117 931 7272 or 0117 931 7171 or Simon Watts, Media & Publicity Officer at Birkbeck, University of London, on 020 7380 3133.

Responding today (Monday 9 November  2009) to the launch of the independent review of higher education funding and student finance, Sir Martin Harris, Director of Fair Access, said:  “I warmly welcome the appointment of Lord Browne of Madingley to lead the Review assessing the first three years of higher tuition fees and look forward to working with him.

“As set out in the Higher Education Act 2004, my role will be to report to the Review on whether the introduction of higher fees has deterred students in general from accessing higher education and, in particular, whether it has deterred students from under represented groups. I now welcome the additional task of reporting to the Review the conclusions of my report on access to highly selective universities.

“I will also be happy to advise on and help evaluate any proposals the Review wishes to consider in respect of future fees and provision for student support.

“Clearly, whatever the outcome of the Review, it will be important to safeguard access to higher education for students from under represented groups and ensure that no one is deterred from accessing higher education on financial grounds.”

Ends

For more information, please contact Zita Adamson, OFFA Communications Manager, on 0117 931 7272 or 0117 931 7171.

Note to editors

• The Office for Fair Access (OFFA) is an independent, non departmental public body established under the Higher Education Act 2004 to help promote and safeguard fair access to higher education. Our main remit is to regulate the charging of higher tuition fees by institutions offering higher education courses.
• As set out in the new framework for higher education published last week, ‘Higher Ambitions – the Future of Universities in  Knowledge Economy’, Sir Martin Harris has been asked to ‘consult Vice Chancellors and advise the Government by Spring 2010 on further action that could be taken to widen access to highly selective universities for those from under privileged backgrounds – and to ensure that measures for wider access are prioritised most effectively and do not suffer in a time of greater fiscal constraints.’

The new Higher Education framework announced today (Tuesday, November 3) asks Sir Martin Harris, Director of Fair Access, to ‘consult Vice Chancellors and advise the Government by Spring 2010 on further action that could be taken to widen access to highly selective universities for those from under privileged backgrounds – and to ensure that measures for wider access are prioritised most effectively and do not suffer in a time of greater fiscal constraints.’ Responding to this announcement, Sir Martin says:

“I am encouraged by the importance that the new framework continues to place on wider and fairer access to higher education. Far from downgrading its efforts in this area, the Government is instead stepping up the momentum to reinvigorate social mobility in this country. I am pleased it has maintained its resolve in such a difficult fiscal environment. As the framework rightly argues, the question of access to higher education is one of both social justice and economic success – in other words, it is in all our interests to make sure that those with the talent and motivation to benefit from going to university are able to do so.

“Ensuring that appropriately qualified children from under privileged backgrounds have the opportunity to access highly selective institutions is an important part of the fair access agenda. I am therefore happy to work with vice chancellors at such institutions to seek to find further ways – particularly in partnership with schools and colleges – to achieve this.”

Ends

For more information, please contact Zita Adamson, OFFA communications manager on 0117 9317272 or 0117 9317171.

Note to editors:

•  The request to Sir Martin Harris is described in Chapter 1 of the HE framework – ‘Wider and Fairer Access to Higher Education’ (paragraph 32). The full description is as follows:

“We are asking Sir Martin Harris, the Director of Fair Access, to consult Vice Chancellors and advise the Government by Spring 2010 on further action that could be taken to widen access to highly selective universities for those from under privileged backgrounds – and to ensure that measures for wider access are prioritised most effectively and do not suffer in a time of greater fiscal constraints. His report will be available in time to influence the conclusions of the Fees Review.

“Working with universities, he will look at how best individual universities can set and achieve targets for themselves. He will advise on how best to promote the partnership of schools and universities to identify and mentor the most talented young people from an early age. He will also advise on whether the money currently used by universities under access agreements, mainly spent on bursaries for their students, can be better targeted in order to give more effective support to fair access.”

• The Office for Fair Access (OFFA) is an independent, non departmental public body established under the Higher Education Act 2004 to help promote and safeguard fair access to higher education. Our main remit is to regulate the charging of higher tuition fees by institutions offering higher education courses.