Improve school performance to get more disadvantaged children to college

New research from the Institute of Education at the University of London compares how well England, Canada, Australia, and the U.S. do in terms of getting children from disadvantaged homes into undergraduate study. The authors used longitudinal data from each country, and found that socio-economic gaps in university participation are substantial in all four countries. However, they are more pronounced in England and Canada. Prior academic achievement is found to play a key role, and so one major recommendation of the report is that initiatives designed to boost school performance will be pivotal in reducing socio-economic inequality in university participation, rather than lowering the costs of university through bursaries and fee waivers. The authors argue that this is where the vast majority of governments' "widening access" funds should be spent.