Minding the gap: Ethnicity, Gender and Degree Attainment Project

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Minding the gapEthnicity, Gender and Degree
Attainment Project Opening the conferenceRuth
FarwellVice Chancellor Buckinghamshire New
UniversityChair of project steering group
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DIUS research showed that there is a difference
in the achievement of students from certain
minority ethnic groups in terms of final degree
attainment even after controlling for the
majority of contributory factors. In addition it
showed that women are more likely to obtain a
higher degree classification than men, except
when it comes to attaining a first.
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The Ethnicity, Gender and Degree Attainment
project picked up from the DIUS research and is a
provisional survey of the landscape with some
very practical suggestions for how the higher
education sector might engage with the issues
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This project is about action planning for
institutions and the sector, not about further
abstract or abstruse discussion and speculation
on causes, or whether the gap does or does not
exist.
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We in institutions should analyse our own data,
take the outcomes of the analysis, look at our
own practices, question our own practices and
consider whether we could do things differently
so that all students can benefit to the full from
their higher education experience.
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The possibility that our policy infrastructure
and some of our approaches to teaching and
learning including assessment may not be enabling
some of our students to achieve their full
potential is surely something that institutions
would wish to discuss and act upon, not
withstanding our duties under the equalities
legislation.
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We would not want this report to be an end to the
debate but rather we would like it to be a
beginning. And this conference is the start.