First minister Nicola Sturgeon was left “gobsmacked” by claims that students from “ordinary families and an average school” are being squeezed out of university courses, including law.
The reason given was the Scottish government’s policy on widening access to higher education, coupled with its cap on student numbers.
The issue was raised today at First Minister’s Questions, after which Ms Sturgeon responded: “In my earlier days of [being] first minister I used to be regularly criticised for the fact that there were too few young people from deprived communities going to university. Now I appear to be being criticised for the fact that there are too many going to university.”
Ms Sturgeon’s comments followed a question from Scottish Labour MSP and education spokesperson Michael Marra.
He said a freedom of information request had revealed that for courses such as law at the University of Edinburgh, only students from deprived backgrounds secured places.
Mr Marra said: “For Scottish pupils from ordinary families and an average school, the doors are closed, no matter their mind or their endeavour.”
He added: “With funding frozen for 13 years…and the SNP’s cap on Scottish students, the historic promise of a Scottish education is broken.”
Mr Sturgeon responded: “I’m actually quite gobsmacked that that question has been put in that way by a Labour [MSP].”
She said that the latest figures from the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (Ucas) showed that a record number of 18-year-old Scots had secured places at university.
She added that 18-year-olds securing places from the most-deprived areas had increased by 31 per cent since 2019 and that “within a context of a record number of Scots at university” that was “really good news”.
A University of Edinburgh spokesperson told Tes Scotland: “We take our commitment to widening access very seriously and recognise that a long-term and sustained effort is required to achieve meaningful social mobility in communities. More than 80 per cent of our entrants from Scotland consistently come from a state school and the proportion of students from Scotland’s most disadvantaged areas has almost doubled since 2015.
“The number of students we can accept from Scotland is capped by the Scottish government, which means that applicants are only in competition with those who are also within their own fee pool - that is, Scotland, rest of UK and international. This means that the number of places for international students has no bearing on the number of places available to students from Scotland or the rest of the UK.”
The Scottish government has set itself the goal of ensuring that students from the 20 per cent most-deprived communities will represent 20 per cent of entrants to Scottish universities by 2030.
Earlier this month, the government announced Professor John McKendrick had been appointed as the new commissioner for fair access to higher education in Scotland.
He succeeds Professor Sir Peter Scott, who stepped down as Scotland’s inaugural commissioner for fair access last year after six years in the role.
