The Sutton Trust's latest report, marked out by the claim that five schools in the UK sent as many people to Oxbridge over the past five years as the lowest 2,000 did, has been a fairly big news story this week. Broadly speaking, I have a lot of respect for the Sutton Trust, and there are definitely inequalities in terms of access to the top universities, but this study isn't the best one I've ever seen - in particular, the headline claim is overstated by a bit of statistical trickery.
The basic problem is that it deals in absolute numbers, without accounting for the size of the school. Four of the five schools that they cite have a larger-than-average sixth form size. Specifically, Eton has 257 pupils leaving the sixth form each year, Westminster has 188, St Paul's has 168, St Paul's Girl's School has 70, and Hills Road a full 873: by contrast, the average for the 2,343 schools they have data for is 136, and it's just 83 for the smallest 2,000. Just by dint of size alone, Hills Road will send many more pupils to top universities than a school like this will, which makes the statistic misleading.
This doesn't explain all (or even most) of the difference, though: but the underlying assumption here, that all schools ought to send an equal proportion of their pupils to Oxford, is questionable. All five of these schools are selective: rightly or wrongly, they're able to ensure that their pupils are better at tests and interviews than those in a comprehensive, by definition. It's not overwhelmingly surprising that a few years later, they go on to do better at tests and interviews and thus get into the top universities. Indeed, the fact that Hills Road - which isn't a fee-paying school - is in the top five is heartening, because that suggests it is a largely meritocratic process, not a result of money or private school connections.
Are there genuine inequalities here? Yes, but the problem isn't necessarily the existence of a cabal of 'elite schools' who have an unfair advantage. The problem is more a difference in the way success is measured, which means that 'non-elite' schools can't devote as much time to Oxbridge preparation. The standard metrics by which schools are judged (percentage of students getting 5 A*-C grades, average number of UCAS points) don't line up with what Russell Group universities want to see. Things like GNVQs, focusing on D/C boundary students and General Studies A-levels are encouraged to get the numbers up, whereas Oxbridge admissions need them to engage in the profoundly unprofitable practice of taking the A and A* students and stretching them further - which won't produce any increase in exam statistics. 'Elite schools', on the other hand, because they have a historically high Oxbridge admissions rate, can ‘advertise’ to potential students on the basis that they are so good at getting students into top universities – and so they both attract the type of students likely to go to Oxbridge, and they have a better incentive to really stretch the students. It’s not a genuinely unfair advantage – it’s just that they’re measured on a different, unofficial metric, which rewards them for devoting time to the top students..
On this logic, one of the solutions to the ‘problem’ would be to make this metric a lot broader – to judge all schools on how many of their pupils go to top universities, as has been suggested. The danger, though, is that a different metric will do more harm than good. Schools have scarce resources, and if we change the system to encourage them to funnel more resources towards the top students, that will mean that they aren’t being used to help the weaker students – and the numbers of illiterate and innumerate students are perhaps more worrying than any statistics on access to higher education. I’m by no means convinced that – if we have, say, a given amount of high-quality mathematics teaching to offer – that it’s best used to ensure that Mary gets into Cambridge rather than Anglia Ruskin, instead of overcoming Sally’s more basic difficulties in order to get her a C in GCSE Maths and a level of numeracy needed to be a functioning adult.
Essentially, there are good reasons for having schools (as a default position) work to get as many people as possible up to a baseline level of argument, writing, numeracy, scientific literacy and civic participation, which is what our current metrics measure. It’s dangerous to change that – to encourage schools instead to work on making the best students better – and it may well be worth accepting that some schools can have a niche in the market, and work hard to stretch the best pupils, in order to allow the majority of schools to use the teaching methods and resources which most benefit the majority.
