Tag: awarding

  • Social capital and the degree awarding gap: spaces, places and relationships

    Social capital and the degree awarding gap: spaces, places and relationships

    • Amira Asantewa is Director of Programmes, Grit Breakthrough Programmes
    • Reuel Blair is Lead Diversity Programmes Coordinator at the Centre for Student and Community Engagement, Nottingham Trent University

    Progress on the Black-white degree awarding gap has gone into reverse.  Figures published by Higher Education Student Data (HESA) in autumn 2024 show that in 2022/23 the difference in the percentage of Black students and white students getting a first- or upper-second-class degree went up to 21.4 percentage points (pps) – from 19pps in 2021/22 and 17.6pps in 2020/21.

    Across the sector, institutions are responding. Access and Participation Plans have been signed off.  Work towards achieving Race Equality Charter marks is underway. Faculties and departments are decolonising curricula, diversifying assessment modes, tackling the lack of Black representation in the staff body and the postgraduate community.

    While there are debates about the way the sector analyses and addresses the awarding gap, what we do know is there is, as yet, little to say about what works in UK universities. However, evidence from our work with students of Black Heritage that suggests social capital is key.

    Black leaders

    It was back in 2019 that Nottingham Trent University and Grit Breakthrough Programmes co-designed with students the Black Leadership Programme (BLP) – a mix of community-building activities, mentoring, inspirational speakers and work with both employers and global institutions. Centrepiece workshops are delivered by Grit: breakthrough programmes.

    Six years on and an independent TASO-funded evaluation found strong statistical evidence of impact on final year grades and that these higher grades were likely to have been caused, not by increased academic engagement, but instead by increased motivation, social capital and sense of belonging. 

    This reinforced the findings of the independent evaluation of Grit’s Black Leaders and Students of Colour programme across seven universities, which suggested that students were able to apply skills and confidence from having expanded networks and engagement in new experiences, to their academic lives. And the students tell us what this looks like.

    Spaces for Black students

    Students talk about the importance of access to Black spaces. This space, this community, is a place where Black students are not, as Anike from Liverpool John Moores University puts it, ‘self-censoring to make myself palatable to white people.’ Instead, it is where ‘I can get into the conversations I always wanted to have, feel free to talk about what’s important to me.’

    Research describes how Black-affirming campus spaces are vital for Black student academic success and supporting Black student inclusion and well-being. Kwaku from Nottingham Trent University describes the value of ‘a space where there isn’t the weight of always being different. I want a space to connect with people, people who I can talk to about how I am feeling, what I am going though, and who I know would understand.’

    So social capital is also about belonging. Zelena from Bath Spa University describes wanting ‘to belong to a community of people we can all turn to, to draw strength from, to look up to and connect with.’

    Identity and representation

    It is about identity. Students tell us about the importance of ‘realising the value of my own upbringing, my heritage, my culture… that it is not something to be left behind or discarded… I want to explore and appreciate who I am and what I am.’ As Gemma from the University of Greenwich says, it’s about ‘finally claiming my identity. Becoming proud of being Black.’ University is a time for building a new independent life, figuring out who you really are and how your evolving identity fits in this new space. And there is a strong correlation between identities and deeper approaches to learning.

    It is about representation, both in the messaging about opportunities and in the ability of those delivering them to relate to the racial identity and cultural backgrounds of the students. Or, as Kane from Nottingham Trent University says, ‘it’s about how we have the right to be noticed, feel heard, to see that my voice, my opinion matters.’

    And social capital is also about wanting to make a difference, making a contribution. Afreya from the University of Manchester describes ‘helping other people who are feeling the same as I was. Going out of my way to be visible, showing how anyone just like me, can be successful.’

    Students are very clear about social capital: ‘I made friends from the programme. I’ve joined societies… I’ve been a course rep and a Student Ambassador… I’ve been part of a project supporting young Black learners in schools in the city…’

    They are very clear about its value: ‘It gave me strength… I’ve been relentless in seizing every opportunity available… I work more efficiently… harder and smarter… I feel that the university has an interest in nurturing Black talent and my growth and development.’

    So, alongside all the institutional plans, strategies and initiatives, there also have to be the spaces, places and relationships for Black students to be their full, authentic, very best selves and, just like their white peers, grow the social capital to thrive and succeed in their time at university and beyond.

    On 5th June at Nottingham Trent University, Grit Unleashed will take a deep dive into the university experience for Black students and Students of Colour across the UK in a day co-designed and co-delivered by student participants. For more details email [email protected]

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  • Hiding in plain sight? A simple statistical effect may largely explain the ethnicity degree awarding gap

    Hiding in plain sight? A simple statistical effect may largely explain the ethnicity degree awarding gap

    • By Sean Brophy (@seanbrofee), Senior Lecturer at the Centre for Decent Work and Productivity, Manchester Metropolitan University.

    A persistent challenge in UK higher education is the ethnicity degree awarding gap – the difference between White and ethnic minority students receiving top degrees (firsts or 2:1s). The Office for Students (OfS) aims to entirely eliminate this gap by 2030/31, but what if most of this gap reflects success in widening participation rather than systemic barriers?

    Between 2005/6 and 2021/22, university participation grew 21% faster for Asian students and 17% faster for Black students compared to White students. This remarkable success in widening access might paradoxically explain one of the UK’s most persistent higher education challenges.

    Figure 1 presents ethnicity gaps over time compared to a White baseline (the grey line constant at zero). The data for 2021/22 shows significant gaps: 21 percentage points for Black students, 9 for Asian students, and 4 for Mixed ethnicity students compared to their White peers. Traditional explanations focus on structural barriers, cultural differences, and potential discrimination, and much of the awarding gap remains unexplained after adjusting for prior attainment and background characteristics. However, a simpler explanation might be hiding in plain sight: the gap may also reflect a statistical effect created by varying participation rates across ethnic groups.

    Ethnicity Degree Awarding Gap (2014/15 – 2021/22)

    Figure 1. Source: HESA

    Here is the key insight: ethnic minority groups now participate in higher education at remarkably higher rates than White students, which likely then drives some of the observed ethnicity awarding gaps. Figure 2 presents the over-representation of ethnic groups in UK higher education relative to the White reference group (again, the constant grey line). The participation gap has grown substantially – Asian students were 22 percentage points more likely to attend university than White students in 2021/22, with Black students 18 points higher.

    Over-representation of ethnic groups in HE compared to White baseline (2005/6-2021/22)

    Figure 2. Source: UCAS End Of Cycle Report 2022

    This difference in participation rates creates an important statistical effect, what economists call ‘compositional effects’. When a much larger proportion of any group enters university, that group may naturally include a broader range of academic ability. Think of it like this: if mainly the top third of White students attend university, but nearly half of ethnic minority students do, we would expect to see differences in degree outcomes – even with completely fair teaching and assessment.

    This principle can be illustrated using stylized ability-participation curves for representative ethnic groups in Figure 3. These curves show the theoretical distribution of academic ability for Asian, Black, and White groups, with the red shaded area representing the proportion of students from each group accepted into higher education in 2021/22. It would be surprising if there was no degree awarding gap under these conditions!

    Stylized ability-participation curves by ethnic group

    This hypothesis suggests the degree awarding gap might largely reflect the success of widening participation policies. Compositional effects like these are difficult to control for in studies, and it is noteworthy that, to date, no studies on the ethnicity awarding gap have adequately controlled for these effects (including one of my recent studies).

    While this theory may offer a compelling statistical explanation, future research pursuing this line of inquiry needs to go beyond simply controlling for prior achievement. We need to examine both how individual attainment evolves from early education to university, using richer measures than previous studies, and how the expansion of university participation has changed the composition of student ability over time. This analysis must also account for differences within broad ethnic categories (British Indian students, for example, show different patterns from other Asian groups) and consider how university and subject choices vary across groups.

    My argument is not that compositional effects explain everything — rather, understanding their magnitude is crucial for correctly attributing how much of the gap is driven by traditional explanations, such as prior attainment, background characteristics, structural barriers, or discrimination. Only with this fuller picture can we properly target resources and interventions where they’re most needed.

    If this hypothesis is proven correct, however, it underscores why the current policy focus on entirely eliminating gaps through teaching quality or support services, while well-intentioned, may be misguided. If gaps are the statistically inevitable result of differing participation patterns among ethnic groups, then institutional interventions cannot entirely eliminate them. This doesn’t mean universities shouldn’t strive to support all students effectively – but it does require us to fundamentally rethink how we measure and address educational disparities.

    Rather than treating all gaps as problems to be eliminated, we should:

    1. Fund research which better accounts for these compositional effects.
    2. Develop benchmarks that account for participation rates when measuring degree outcomes.
    3. Contextualize the success of widening participation with acknowledging awarding gaps as an inevitable statistical consequence.
    4. Focus resources on early academic support for students from all backgrounds who might need additional help, particularly in early childhood.
    5. Explore barriers in other post-16 or post-18 pathways that may be contributing to the over-representation of some groups in higher education.

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  • It’s time to decolonise the awarding gap

    It’s time to decolonise the awarding gap

    Universities and academics working towards racial justice and inclusion education focus their efforts on closing ethnicity awarding gaps, a measure of systematic inequality in student outcomes.

    While addressing these inequalities are essential, the concept of the awarding gap itself — particularly when it relates to race — carries problematic assumptions that undermine the broader efforts to address systemic inequities.

    Before going forward, It is important to acknowledge that decolonisation is a controversial concept in its own right. I write from the perspective of UK HE, where decolonisation is a commonly used term. My perspective is therefore through the lens of the coloniser, not the colonised, and informed primarily by the legacy of historical British colonial activity. The issues may differ in the context of colonial expansion by other European powers.

    Many contemporary global conflicts are colonial in nature, so I also recognised that for many these issues represent lived experience and ongoing trauma. However, the language of decolonisation is widespread in contemporary HE, so I use this term while acknowledging its limitations and tensions.

    The awarding gap explained

    The awarding gap measures the disparity in first class and upper second class degree outcomes, typically expressed as the percentage difference between the groups. For example, if 75 per cent of white students and only 60 per cent of Asian students earn a first or a 2:1, the Asian awarding gap is 15 per cent. In the UK the global majority awarding gap is widespread and stubbornly persistent. At sector level, there is a 18.5 per cent Black awarding gap and 5.7 per cent Asian awarding gap, and progress on the issue is notoriously slow.

    The awarding gap can have a significant impact on student futures. If employers require at least a 2:1 then there will be an inevitable bias against Black and Asian graduates in the workplace. Inequity in undergraduate degree outcomes also restricts access to postgraduate education, reinforcing the loss of global majority talent. Addressing the awarding gap is therefore essential not only for equity of student outcomes, but also for increasing diversity within HE and the graduate workforce.

    The colonial origins of awarding gap language

    While the awarding gap metric is crucial for highlighting disparities, it is also fraught with issues. The terminology used to describe racial disparities in HE, such as “BAME” (Black, Asian, and minority ethnic), is highly contested. The UK government has abandoned “BAME” in favour of more nuanced categories, and HE should do the same. I prefer the term “global majority students,” following Rosemary Campbell-Stephens, but acknowledge that even this term may be problematic.

    The racial categories used in HE such as “Black” and “Asian,” also have deeply problematic origins that many may be unaware of. These can be traced back to the groundbreaking work on biological classification of Carl Linneas, who as well as classifying plants and animals proposed “scientific” groupings of humans along racial lines. His 1735 work ‘Systema naturae’ classified humans into Europaeus albus (European white), Americanus rubescens (American reddish), Asiaticus fuscus (Asian tawny) and Africanus niger (African black). These were placed into a racial hierarchy, with “Africanus niger” at the bottom.

    These groupings were accompanied with highly offensive descriptions; Africanus niger was described as “lazy … sly, sluggish,” while Asiaticus fucus were considered “stern, haughty, greedy.” These categories, based on pseudoscientific ideas of race, underpinned centuries of discrimination and oppression. Although modern genetics has debunked the notion of biological races, HE institutions continue to use similar categories, perpetuating a colonial mindset.

    Contemporary issues with the awarding gap

    The contemporary use of these terms also creates significant issues both practically and philosophically. For instance, the term “Asian” in the UK awarding gap context as defined by the Office for Students refers to UK-born or educated students of Asian heritage, not international students from Asia. This exclusion of international students from the awarding gap is justified by linking the metric to home undergraduate tuition fees, but it also reflects a colonial mindset where non-UK students’ outcomes are disregarded, despite their financial contributions.

    Within home student data, crude categorisation also causes issues. For instance, Chinese students have higher outcomes than Pakistani and Bangladeshi students, yet they are all grouped under “Asian” in many HE metrics (although some institutions have started to disaggregate this data). Similarly, the term “white” encompasses diverse groups, including Gypsy, Roma, and Traveller communities, who are among the most excluded from education in the UK but are aggregated into “white”. These administrative categories erase the nuances and intersections of race, culture, and socio-economic background, which may compromise the effectiveness of interventions.

    The grouping inherent in the awarding gap model often reinforces deficit thinking, where students from underrepresented racial groups are viewed as lacking in some way. The assumption is that global majority students are underperforming, but we should also question whether it is white students that are systematically over-rewarded by HE institutions. While the language shift from “attainment gap” to “awarding gap” is a step towards acknowledging institutional bias, much more needs to be done.

    A 2021 analysis of UK Access and Participation Plans found that most interventions focused on student finance or study skills support, rather than examining institutional processes like assessment and grading. This approach perpetuates the idea that the problem lies with the students, not the institutions.

    Decolonising the awarding gap

    To address these issues, I propose six strategies for decolonising the awarding gap:

    1. Be critical of the metric itself: We need to question the construction of the awarding gap metric, particularly its use of crude categories and hierarchical assumptions. The current framework oversimplifies the complexities of race and ethnicity, leading to ineffective solutions.
    2. Disaggregate data: Institutions should disaggregate ethnicity data into the most nuanced categories possible while maintaining statistical validity. Intersectional analysis should be incorporated to capture the full scope of students’ experiences and identities.
    3. Move beyond “gap gazing”: Simply identifying the gap is not enough. We need a qualitative understanding of why these gaps exist, grounded in the lived experiences of students. And more importantly to act with urgency, not to wait for more data.
    4. Avoid deficit models: Interventions should focus on changing university processes, pedagogies, and assessment methods to be more inclusive for all students, rather than assuming that certain groups are inherently deficient.
    5. Involve students: Students must be integral to efforts to address the awarding gap. Institutions should work “with” students, not “for” them, ensuring that their voices are central in both understanding the gap and designing solutions.
    6. Engage senior leaders: Institutional leaders must take an active role in addressing the awarding gap. This work cannot be seen as a box-ticking exercise; it requires a deep understanding of the issues and a commitment to systemic change.

    The awarding gap, as currently constructed, is a flawed and crude tool for addressing racial disparities in HE. Its colonial underpinnings and reliance on outdated racial categories reinforce the very inequalities we aim to dismantle. To make meaningful progress towards racial justice in education, we must critically engage with the metrics we use and adopt more nuanced, inclusive approaches.

    Only by decolonising the awarding gap can we begin to address the deep-seated inequities in HE and create a more just educational system for all.

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