University challenge: help for care leavers

Introduction by Michael Sanders, chief executive, What Works for Children’s Social Care

When making government policy, you learn there are no silver bullets – no intervention on its own is going to radically transform the lives of the people you are there to serve. Most have only modest effects when evaluated.

There are two exceptions to this rule. Most prominently in our society today is vaccination. On the social policy side, it’s education.

Research by the Institute of Education finds half of social immobility – which prevents talent from rising to the top – is caused by differential access to education. This unequal access is particularly prominent for young people leaving care.

The most recent data shows only 13 per cent of young people with care experience will attend university by the age of 19 compared with 43 per cent of their peers. The gap narrows over time. Research by the University of Oxford’s Rees Centre estimates about 30 per cent of care-experienced adults will access higher education at some point. But the delay in attending university might have meaningful consequences for later life.

At What Works for Children’s Social Care, we want to build the evidence about what gaps exist and how we can close those gaps. That is why we commissioned a team at the Children’s Social Care Research and Development Centre (Cascade) at Cardiff University to look into it for us. They analysed data from the Next Steps study, which follows a group of young people from early adolescence into early adulthood.

The majority of the gap can be explained by grades. At GCSE, young people who have been in care for less than 12 months are less than half as likely to get five A* to G grades than their peers who have not been in care – according to research by the Rees Centre.

But grades don’t tell the whole story. Other than academic performance, the biggest driver of higher education attendance is students’ expectations – how likely they think they are to go to university. Here, there are already large gaps between care-experienced students and others at age 13-14 – with care-experienced young people more than 20 percentage points less likely to think they will attend university.

Over time this gap gets wider, rising to a 24 percentage point difference by the time students turn 17. The research by Cascade also showed this gap was at least partially driven by the expectations of other people around the child – their foster carers, teachers and social workers, who may have lower expectations for children in care and pass that on to the young people themselves, whether deliberately or not.

This suggests everyone working with young people has a part to play in helping them on their educational journey. We have to set our sights high if we expect them to do the same. Care-experienced young people can also benefit from role models – people like them who have made a success of university life.

While working at the Behavioural Insights Team – which was set up to advise government – I helped run a study to support young people from disadvantaged backgrounds with good grades to apply to university. Instead of us telling them how great university is, we sent them letters written by Ben and Rachel, two students from similar backgrounds who were already enjoying university life.

The results were staggering. Students who didn’t get the letters had an 8.5 per cent chance of applying to and accepting a place from a selective university, while for those who received both letters that probability went up to 11.4 per cent.

Over the past year, What Works and the Centre for Transforming Access and Student Outcome (Taso) have been working with Become, the national charity for care leavers, to do the same for young care-experienced people. We sent letters via their virtual schools and created video testimonies from some amazing care-experienced young people at university, who make the compelling case that they bring more to university life in terms of experience and drive than their peers.

This is a start, but it isn’t enough. We need to raise attainment as well. This is something we are doing through our Signs of Potential projects, where we are investing in online maths tutoring, catch-up support in reading, vocabulary enrichment and helping create a research mindset among designated teachers for looked-after children.

Higher education institutions themselves have also got work to do. A recent report for Taso, by King’s College London, found the path to higher education among people with care experience is likely to be different to the route taken by other students. The researchers argue universities need to be more flexible in their application criteria and offer more tailored support to care-experienced young people applying and studying with them.

The research shows us the scale of the task ahead and gives us some hints about what we can do about it. We have a responsibility now to take up the challenge and make sure we narrow this gap together, using robust evaluation to help best practice spread and benefit every child.

IN NUMBERS

• 31,260 number of care leavers in England aged 19–21 in 2020
• 39% of care leavers aged 19-21 were not in education, training or employment in 2020 compared with 13% of all young people of that age
• 13% of young people with at least one year’s care experience progressed to higher education by the age of 19 in 2018/19 compared with 43% of all other pupils
• 1% of care-experienced young people attended top-ranked universities and higher education institutions in 2018/19 compared with 11% of their peers

Source: Department for Education

I KNEW UNIVERSITY WAS MY TICKET TO A NEW LIFE

By Aoife Clarke, 24

At the age of three I lived in foster care before returning to my family home. The next 13 years consisted of countless social workers. When I was 16 I became homeless and began to live independently; this was when I officially became a “looked-after child”.

School was always hard and the teachers made it seem that university wasn’t a possibility for me. But their opinions didn’t matter. I knew that I wanted it. University was my one-way ticket out of the life others had destined for me.

When I was completing my Level 3 qualifications none of the teachers helped me. I applied for university on my own with no support whatsoever. I never thought in a million years that I would be accepted onto a course. I had no idea of the opportunities that lay ahead for me.

I began a BSc in Psychology in September 2017, scared and fearful university would be like school. But I was wrong. During the three years of my undergraduate course I flourished, becoming the young woman I longed to be, the young woman others told me would not exist.

The lecturers on my course knew what I had been through and never questioned my capabilities. I received support from the community outreach officer, who helped ensure I was progressing in the ways that I wanted and received the support I was entitled to. I had never felt so accepted for just being me. I can’t thank these people enough; they were my biggest cheerleaders.

I chose to study psychology as I knew it would assist me in better understanding my life and the people that were part of it. It has helped me in so many ways. I graduated in July 2020, four months after the Covid-19 pandemic began. I returned to university in September 2020 to begin a MSc in applied psychology and I am now two weeks away from finishing this course. I can’t wait to see what the future has in store for me.

If I could send a message to my younger self, I’d tell her it’s going to be okay and that the stuff she has been through has a higher purpose. Keep pushing, keep believing.

If I could send a message to other care-experienced young people like me, I would tell them the sky is their limit. Own who you are, keep pushing, keep believing. And lastly, if I could send a message to teaching staff and social workers, I would tell them to never doubt a young person’s aspirations or dreams just because of their past. You could be the only person in their life to show them that they are capable of more. So, keep pushing them, and keep believing in them.

• Aoife works with Northern Ireland-based charity Voice of Young People in Care www.voypic.org
  
  

KINGSTON UNIVERSITY
SCHEME PROVIDES PRACTICAL AND PASTORAL SUPPORT

Kingston University in south-west London has been at the forefront of efforts to identify and support care-experienced students within higher education.

The university was involved in the development of the now discontinued Buttle UK Quality Mark for Care Leavers introduced in 2006.

Since then its KU Cares scheme has been supporting care leavers and in recent years has been extended to other groups including young adult carers.

KU Cares provides a mix of practical and pastoral support and currently works with more than 260 students. The vast majority are care leavers, care-experienced students or those estranged from their families.

Beth Taswell, who studied at Kingston as a care leaver, is one of the scheme’s two access and support advisers.

Students may be referred to the scheme via their local authority or picked up as a result of information on their Ucas form. All students are asked if they have been in care during enrolment. Students can also self-refer and others are identified once they have started their courses.

“We offer training for both professional services and academic staff throughout the year and that helps raise awareness and helps people identify students,” says Taswell.

Those eligible for the care leavers support grant and aged under 25 when they start their course automatically qualify for a bursary of £1,500 for each academic year as well as the wider £2,000 Kingston Bursary.

On completion they are also eligible for a £1,000 graduation bursary to help with the transition to employment, further study or housing costs.

“It guarantees every student the same. They should be getting support from their local authority but that’s so inconsistent so you will get some students who have a very generous offer and quite a lot of financial support and others who are only able to access the bare minimum outlined in law,” says Taswell.

Finances are often a key concern for KU Cares students, especially those who no longer qualify for local authority support who may arrive at the university in debt or rent arrears. The advisers can help them access the university’s hardship fund and other sources of support.

Housing is another key issue. Some care leavers are effectively stuck in expensive supported accommodation while they wait for permanent housing.

“Sometimes, the local authority says if they leave that accommodation, they won’t be prioritised for a council house so young people are kind of forced to make a decision between being able to access secure, long-term housing and their education, which is really frustrating to see,” says Taswell.

At Kingston, recent care leavers who live in halls can get year-round accommodation so don’t have to leave in the summer.

Pastoral care is another key element of the scheme and this is tailored to each student’s needs, explains Taswell.

“University is a big change and a brand new environment and we’re there to make students’ lives easier,” she says.

“We may help liaise with different sorts of support teams, or external organisations and will sometimes advocate for them with their local authority, if they’re not receiving the support they should be.”

If students are struggling with academic work, they may arrange a joint meeting with lecturers to discuss support needs.

The advisers aim to meet all students in person in the first couple of weeks of term and some of the support they provide is about helping young people feel confident they are in the right place.

“Many say they feel everyone else has got it all together and they’re the only ones that don’t know what’s going on. We try and reassure them that everyone feels like that,” says Taswell.

KU Cares students are also prioritised for opportunities such as the university’s Beyond Barriers mentoring scheme, careers and employability support and paid work opportunities. They are guaranteed an interview if they apply to be a paid student ambassador.

Meanwhile, KU Cares is training a small group of students to be KU Cares Connectors to act as ambassadors and offer peer support to others on the scheme.

Data gathered by the university shows KU Cares students are more likely to report having a disability, be from low-income households, live in deprived areas and be the first in their family to go to university.

Care-experienced students tend to have lower grades when applying and are more likely to need to repeat assessments or repeat a year than other students.

However, the data shows most do go on to complete their degrees. The proportion of students with care experience – or on the edges of care – who continue after their first year has remained at above 90 per cent for the past three years.

Meanwhile, just 5.6 per cent of students supported through KU Cares withdrew from their course in 2019/20 with many of those helped to access education, training or employment elsewhere.

Taswell believes KU Cares can make the difference between getting a degree or not, especially for students who don’t have family networks or other support to draw on.

“There’s a risk in such a big institution that students become ID numbers,” she says. “We get to know our students and hopefully help them feel seen and valued at the university.”

• www.kingston.ac.uk
  
  

TOP TIPS ON HOW TO SUPPORT CARE-EXPERIENCED YOUNG PEOPLE IN HIGHER EDUCATION

The Care Leaver Covenant is a national programme to support care leavers to live independently. The programme and its partner organisations put together this advice for children’s services professionals and universities on what good practice looks like

1. Ensure all university staff understand the term care leaver and know what it means to be care experienced. Attending university can often be a daunting time for a student with care experience.
   
   Universities need to ensure all staff – teaching and professional services staff – understand what it means when someone says they are “care-experienced” or a “care leaver”. This will prevent young people from having to disclose this repeatedly to different departments and help ensure they get the best support during their time in higher education.

2. Encourage young people to “tick the box”. Keep encouraging young people to tick the box on their Ucas application form to let universities know they have been in care. This is confidential and will help the right person at the university know an individual might need financial or other support, which can be put in place before they start their course.

3. Identify your care leavers and care-experienced students. The Office for Students says universities need to ensure they are collecting relevant data on potential care-experienced students and using it to build appropriate support. This can then be passed to a designated point of contact who can take action ahead of enrolment. Having a dedicated staff member in place to provide expert advice will help with making referrals to other support services within the university. Importantly you will create a strong support network for students.

4. Keep in touch – even if they blank you. The National Network for the Education of Care Leavers advises regularly keeping in contact with care-experienced students on the understanding they may not give much – if anything – back. Making contact early and being consistent means a student will know that when they do need you, you will be there. The Department for Education also stresses the importance of consistency and to not stop trying even if universities are not getting much interaction.

5. Provide free accommodation for the duration of a student’s study. This is a significant investment but one which could make a lifelong difference and give the best opportunity of success. The Unite Foundation – set up by Unite Students – works with universities across the country to provide free student bedrooms for care-experienced students – no rent, no bills in purpose-built accommodation for a maximum of three years plus a free programme of support. They believe universities could look to do this too. thisisusatuni.org/

6. Make sure students apply early for finance. The Student Loans Company stresses universities should ensure students apply early for student finance, even if they only have a general idea of what and where they plan to study. Students can change this information before they register. Just get the application in.

7. Shout about the scholarships and financial help you offer. Heavily publicise scholarships and financial awards but avoid using terms like “hardship”. This encourages an early connection between student and university and addresses very practical barriers.

8. Show empathy. Charity Stand Alone’s advice is to imagine yourself in the shoes of a young person without any parental support and then imagine what that could mean when entering higher education and respond with services of support accordingly. The charity Become also encourages universities to think about every part of student life and what helps to make it a positive experience – the small things really do make a difference.

9. Sign up to the Care Leaver Covenant. More than 70 universities are signed up already and have made specific pledges to support care leavers and care-experienced students. Contact them at education@mycovenant.org.uk to find out more.

• www.mycovenant.org.uk