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Enrolling on a degree course looks like a ¡°bad bet¡± to students growing up in England¡¯s higher education ¡°cold spots¡±, who fear it is unlikely that any job they got post-graduation would pay enough to clear their debts, according to a new study.

As part of its inquiry into widening participation, the UPP Foundation conducted focus groups in Doncaster, where barely a third (36.5 per cent) of young people progressed to higher education by age 19 in 2022-23, 11.4 percentage points lower than the progression rate for England as a whole. For teenagers in receipt of free school meals, Doncaster¡¯s progression rate is just 16.5 per cent.

Across the 65 individuals in the focus groups ¨C conducted with 16- to 18-year-olds and with parents of school-age children from professional and skilled backgrounds ¨C there was a keen awareness of the lack of graduate jobs available locally and a ¡°widespread expectation¡± that people should seek employment after leaving school.

There was also a strong sense of place and family, with people of all ages wanting to stay near their relatives, and a general feeling of dissatisfaction with schools¡¯ attempts to equip pupils to make informed choices about their post-16 options.

UPP launched its inquiry last month with a report which found that three-quarters of teachers in London expected at least half of their class to go to university, compared?with only 47 per cent in the Midlands, and 45 per cent in the north-west, Yorkshire and the north-east.

In the latest study¡¯s parent focus group, none of the eight participants selected university as their favoured destination for their children, with all preferring apprenticeships, and half of the group said that they would actively discourage their offspring from enrolling in higher education.

A key concern was the relevance of degrees to the local job market. As a 48-year-old mother-of-two put it: ¡°My friend did a history degree and she¡¯s working booking people into a paediatrician thing at Rotherham hospital¡­so her degree was just this waste of time¡­she¡¯s just done the degree and gone to parties for three years.¡±

This was weighed against the cost of tuition fees, student accommodation and living expenses, with many feeling that accruing so much debt was unjustifiable.

¡°I think the debt that you get in is definitely something that no one really wants when you come out of university. And I think also not having a guarantee of, like, getting a job after it ¨C that¡¯s also a disadvantage, right?¡± said a 17-year-old female, a prospective finance undergraduate.

As such, the perceived risks of going to university were seen as being less preferable than the stability of immediate employment, even if this offered poorer long-term earning prospects.

The study underlines the challenges facing the Westminster government as it seeks to deliver on its opportunity ¡°mission¡± and as it seeks to respond to the political threat posed by Reform UK in post-industrial communities. All five of Doncaster¡¯s parliamentary seats are currently held by Labour, but Reform seized control of the local council earlier this month and polling suggests that it would win all but one of the House of Commons constituencies were a general election?to be held today.

The UPP report concludes that young people growing up in cold spots were caught in an ¡°intergenerational trap¡±.

¡°In university cold spots, where successive generations are shut out of graduate jobs, parents who want the best for their children do not see university as supporting this ambition, because it will take their children away from them and keep them in distant locations¡­Thus the only sources of influence towards higher education that the young people we spoke to encountered are schools, colleges and universities. However, these are of inconsistent quality, struggle to offer well-aligned and timely guidance to young people, and exist (in the case of universities) at both a geographical and psychological distance from communities like Doncaster,¡± the report concludes.

¡°It can therefore be difficult for the young people we spoke to to feel like advice to go to university is reliable. This adds a psychological burden to the already considerable cost of the ¡®bet¡¯ that investment in a university degree represents. Furthermore, this bet seems to have very poor odds of paying off for those who wish to maintain their close community ties by settling down in the place that raised them, where graduate jobs are few and far between.

¡°With all this in mind, they opt against an undergraduate degree; eventually, these children become parents themselves, and the cycle begins again.¡±

chris.havergal@timeshighereducation.com