Read: Breaking the care ceiling
As young people across the country get ready to start university, new evidence of a care ceiling has emerged with a warning that if you are a care leaver you are more likely to end up in a prison cell than in a lecture hall.
A new report published this week by Civitas found that in 2021-22 while 47% of children from state-funded schools progressed into higher education by the age of 19, just 14 per cent of care leavers did the same. It also showed that care leavers are only half as likely to go to university than a child growing up in the poorest fifth of households or a child entitled to Free School Meals. Department for Education figures in the report show that 550 care leavers under the age of 19 went on to higher education in 2021-22, representing just 0.2 per cent of students starting undergraduate courses. In the same period, only 90 care leavers under the age of 19 went to one of the top 32 universities in England, 0.1 per cent of new entrants. That figure has barely changed in the last ten years. The report calculates that it would take more than 107 years to close the gap between care leavers and non-care leavers at the current rate of progress.
Care leavers make up a quarter of the homeless population and are far less likely to be in education, employment or training than other people of their age. In 2022 the Independent Review of Children’s Social Care estimated the lifetime cost of poor outcomes for children with experience of our care system was over £1 million per child. A third of care leavers have children who themselves end up in care, creating a generational cycle of disadvantage.
The positive impact of supporting young people in care into higher education, however, is marked. Civitas’ analysis of official earnings data found that going to university shrinks the pay gap between care-experienced people and others. Eighteen months after graduation, graduates who grew up in care earn just 2.5% a year less than those who didn’t, compared to a difference of a third for those who had not been to university.
The league table in the report is the first ever to compare universities based on the number of care leavers they take. The Purpose Universities Coalition works with many purpose-led university partners who are already working hard to break the cycle of disadvantage that underrepresented groups experience when it comes to higher education, highlighting the message that university can be for them.
Northumbria University is second in the table and one of only two universities where at least one in every 50 undergraduate students has care experience. It is a signatory of the Care Leavers Covenant and provides access to support for care leavers around entry, admissions, finance and targeted advice. It is also a Partner of the North East Raising Aspiration Partnership (NERAP), a long-standing collaboration of the five universities in the region who fund pre-16 outreach activity. The flexible nature of admissions there, including the offer of foundation year courses, means it can offer more opportunities to applicants from a wider range of backgrounds.
Solent University, also in the league table’s top ten, works in partnership with local councils, schools, colleges and other universities regionally through the ‘We Care’ Partnership. It offers support packages to care leavers which include bursaries, all-year round accommodation and a designated staff member for support.
Young people from care backgrounds leaving education have some of the worst outcomes of any groups in society. Like many groups from disadvantaged backgrounds, that doesn’t mean that they don’t have talent or potential. Effective outreach work can help to inspire them to think of university as a real option for them as well as advise them on what they need to do to get there. Support before they start their course and as undergraduates can help to ensure that they flourish while they are there.
Going to university can be life-changing. There is no reason why it shouldn’t change care leavers lives’ too.
