Impact and effectiveness of widening access to HE in Wales

获得高等教育（HE）已经成为一个极具争议的政策领域，因为历届英国政府都试图在增加学费与确保高等教育向尽可能广泛的社会背景的个人开放之间取得平衡。此外，英国不同的地方政府采取了相对不同的方法。例如，目前，威尔士政府已承诺向学生支付因取消学费上限而增加的费用。然而，评估扩大入学机会的不同方法的证据基础相对薄弱。因此，威尔士社会和经济研究、数据和方法研究所（WISERD）、威尔士高等教育资助委员会（HEFCW）和威尔士政府（WG）正在合作开展这一领域的创新研究。这项拟议中的研究将分析威尔士居民如何从中学、六年级、继续教育学院（16岁以后的教育）到高等教育。它还将探讨决定个人是否通过教育系统进入高等教育的关键因素。个人的社会特征、他们以前的受教育程度和他们在教育系统中的进步有什么相对的影响？这对高等教育入学门槛的影响意味着什么，比如学费水平、入学流程等等？这些问题的答案在英格兰是众所周知的，但在英国的其他地区就没有了。这项分析将以创新地使用三个相互联系的资料来源为基础，每一个资料来源的数据最初都是为行政目的收集的。这些是：威尔士国家学生数据库（NPD）；威尔士终身学习记录（LLWR）；和高等教育统计局（HESA）的数据。通过将这些联系在一起，将有可能追踪个人通过教育系统进入高等教育的轨迹。系统地比较参加高等教育的学生和没有参加高等教育的学生的发展轨迹也将成为可能。此外，利用复杂的统计技术，将有可能确定哪些是影响高等教育参与模式的最重要因素。这里的结果将与英国类似分析得出的结果进行比较。拟议研究的第二部分（由高等教育委员会提供的额外资源资助）将调查自1999年权力下放以来，历届威尔士政府扩大高等教育机会的独特方法的发展情况。这里的关键意义在于确立支撑威尔士所采用的方法的基本原理；并将其与英国和英格兰等其他国家的政策方法进行比较。此外，该研究将考察威尔士大学实施国家政策的方式，特别关注在这里发挥作用的高等教育参与决定因素的假设。研究的这一部分将以实地工作为基础，包括对官方和半官方文件的分析以及对负责扩大准入政策的政治家和高级官员的访谈；大学内部的专业人员负责实施这些政策。研究结果将直接提供给工作小组和高等教育委员会就未来制定扩大高等教育服务的政策进行的审议，这些政策在未来几年将特别密集。此外，它们还将为同负责执行扩大机会政策的大学专业人员合作提供基础，以便将行政数据分析的使用更牢固地纳入其日常做法。

Access to higher education (HE) has become an extremely controversial area of policy, as successive UK administrations have sought to balance increasing student fees with ensuring that HE is open to individuals from as wide a range of social backgrounds as possible. Moreover, relatively distinctive approaches have been adopted in the different devolved administrations of the UK. For example, currently, the Welsh Government has undertaken to pay the increased costs to students arising from the abolition of the fees cap. However, the evidence-base for evaluating different approaches to widening access is relatively weak. Accordingly, the Wales Institute for Social and Economic Research, Data and Methods (WISERD), the Higher Education Funding Council for Wales (HEFCW) and the Welsh Government (WG) are collaborating to develop an innovative research study in this field.The proposed research will analyse how individuals who are resident in Wales progress through secondary school, into sixth forms and further education colleges for post-16 education and on to HE. It will also explore what are the key factors here in determining whether individuals progress through the education system to HE or not. What are the relative impacts of the social characteristics of individuals, their previous educational attainment and their progression through the education system? What does this imply for the effects of barriers at the point of entry to HE, such as fees levels, entry processes and so forth? Answers to these questions are known for England, but not for other parts of the UK.The analysis will be based on the innovative use of three linked sources of information, the data for each of which are collected initially for administrative purposes. These are: the National Pupil Database (NPD) for Wales; the Lifelong Learning Wales Record (LLWR); and Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) data. By linking these together, it will be possible to trace individual trajectories through the education system to entry to HE. It will also be possible to compare systematically the trajectories of those who do participate in HE with those who do not. Moreover, using sophisticated statistical techniques, it will be possible to determine which are the most influential factors in shaping patterns of HE participation. Results here will be compared with those that have been produced by similar analyses in England.A second part of the proposed study (funded by additional resources made available by the HEFCW) will investigate the development of distinctive approaches to widening access to HE by successive Welsh administrations since devolution in 1999. Of key significance here will be to establish the rationales that underpin the approaches adopted in Wales; and to compare these with those that have informed policy approaches in the other countries of the UK and England, in particular. In addition, the study will examine the ways in which national policies have been implemented by the Welsh universities, paying special attention to the assumptions about the determinants of HE participation that are in play here. This part of the study will be based on fieldwork, comprising the analysis of official and semi-official documents and interviews with politicians and senior officials responsible for widening-access policies; and with the professionals inside the universities responsible for implementing these policies.The results of the research will be fed directly into the deliberations of the WG and the HEFCW on the future development of policies on widening access to HE, which will be especially intensive over the next few years. Moreover, they will also provide the basis for working with the professionals in the universities with responsibility for implementing widening-access policies, to integrate the use of analyses of administrative data more firmly into their day-to-day practices.