Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to help improve social mobility in higher education for students in Nottingham South constituency.

We want to provide a ladder of opportunity so that everyone can get the education and skills they need for job security and prosperity, and to support levelling up across the country, including in Nottingham South constituency

Our access and participation reforms are playing a key role in ensuring that the young people of Nottingham South can get the support they need to make decisions that are right for them, regardless of their socio-economic background, whether that is progressing into higher education (HE), further education, or apprenticeships.

The department wants universities to:

• Work more with schools and colleges to raise standards so that students have more options and can choose the path that is right for them.
• Move away from just getting disadvantaged students through the door, and instead tackle dropout rates and support students through university to graduation and into high skilled and high paid jobs.
• Offer more courses that are linked to skills and flexible learning such as degree apprenticeships, higher technical qualifications, and part-time courses.

Examples of this can already be found in Nottingham, where both local universities offer degree apprenticeships with Nottingham Trent University providing access to alternative routes to higher education at its Mansfield campus.

The majority of providers who submitted requests for variations to their access and participation plans to the Office for Students are carrying out work in line with these priorities.

HE providers are autonomous bodies, independent from government. They are responsible for their own admissions decisions. It is a matter for individual providers to consider whether to use contextual information about applicants, such as their socio-economic background.

Students in Nottingham South, regardless of their background, should feel confident that getting into HE is a fair process. In 2022, a record numbers of students progressed into HE, including those from disadvantaged backgrounds.