Social class and wellbeing among staff and students in higher education settings: Mapping the problem and exploring underlying mechanisms

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Isla Dougall ◽  
Mario Weick ◽  
Milica Vasiljevic
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Social Class ◽  
Underlying Mechanisms

Social Class and Wellbeing among Staff and Students in Higher Education Settings: Mapping the Problem and Exploring Underlying Mechanisms

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Isla Dougall ◽  
Mario Weick ◽  
Milica Vasiljevic
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Social Class ◽  
Social Factors ◽  
Unique Contribution ◽  
Staff Members ◽  
Class Differences ◽  
High Social Class ◽  
Lower Social Class ◽  
Underlying Mechanisms ◽  
The Relationship

Within Higher Education (HE), lower social class staff and students often experience poorer wellbeing than their higher social class counterparts. Previous research conducted outside educational contexts has linked social class differences in wellbeing with differences in the extent to which low and high social class individuals feel respected (i.e., status), in control (i.e., autonomy), and connected with others (i.e., inclusion). However, to our knowledge, there has been no research that has investigated these factors within HE settings. Furthermore, inclusion, status and autonomy are correlated, yet little is known about how these factors contribute to wellbeing simultaneously, and independently, of one another. To fill these gaps, we report the results of two studies; firstly with HE students (Study 1; N = 305), and secondly with HE staff (Study 2; N = 261). Consistently across studies, reports of poor wellbeing were relatively common and more than twice as prevalent amongst lower social class staff and students compared to higher social class staff and students. Inclusion, status and autonomy each made a unique contribution and accounted for the relationship between social class and wellbeing (fully amongst students, and partially amongst staff members). These relationships held across various operationalisations of social class and when examining a range of facets of wellbeing. Social class along with inclusion, status and autonomy explained a substantial 40% of the variance in wellbeing. The present research contributes to the literature exploring how social class intersects with social factors to impact the wellbeing of staff and students within HE.

‘I don’t want to go to a crummy little university’: social class, higher education choice and the paradox of widening participation

2009 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 209-224 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tina Byrom
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Social Class ◽  
Young People ◽  
Working Class ◽  
Summer School ◽  
Widening Participation ◽  
Education Choice ◽  
School Based ◽  
Institutional Habitus ◽  
Participation In Higher Education

Whilst there has been growing attention paid to the imbalance of Higher Education (HE) applications according to social class, insufficient attention has been paid to the successful minority of working-class young people who do secure places in some of the UK’s leading HE institutions. In particular, the influence and nature of pre-university interventions on such students’ choice of institution has been under-explored. Data from an ESRC-funded PhD study of 16 young people who participated in a Sutton Trust Summer School are used to illustrate how the effects of a school-based institutional habitus and directed intervention programmes can be instrumental in guiding student choices and decisions relating to participation in Higher Education.

scholarly journals Social-Class Disparities in Higher Education and Professional Workplaces: The Role of Cultural Mismatch

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-73 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicole M. Stephens ◽  
Sarah S. M. Townsend ◽  
Andrea G. Dittmann
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Social Class ◽  
Working Class ◽  
Cultural Models ◽  
Cultural Barriers ◽  
Cultural Barrier ◽  
Cultural Mismatch ◽  
Cultural Ideal ◽  
Key Sites ◽  
And Performance

Differences in structural resources and individual skills contribute to social-class disparities in both U.S. gateway institutions of higher education and professional workplaces. People from working-class contexts also experience cultural barriers that maintain these disparities. In this article, we focus on one critical cultural barrier—the cultural mismatch between (a) the independent cultural norms prevalent in middle-class contexts and U.S. institutions and (b) the interdependent norms common in working-class contexts. In particular, we explain how cultural mismatch can fuel social-class disparities in higher education and professional workplaces. First, we explain how different social-class contexts tend to reflect and foster different cultural models of self. Second, we outline how higher education and professional workplaces often prioritize independence as the cultural ideal. Finally, we describe two key sites of cultural mismatch—norms for understanding the self and interacting with others—and explain their consequences for working-class people’s access to and performance in gateway institutions.

scholarly journals The social class gap in bachelor’s and master’s completion: university dropout in times of educational expansion

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jens-Peter Thomsen
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Social Class ◽  
Bachelor's Degree ◽  
Disadvantaged Students ◽  
Educational Expansion ◽  
Master's Level ◽  
Percentage Points ◽  
The Social ◽  
Upper Secondary ◽  
University Dropout

While many papers have focused on socially unequal admissions in higher education, this paper looks at the persistence of class differentials after enrolment. I examine the social class gap in bachelor’s programme dropout and in the transition from bachelor’s to master’s in Denmark from the formal introduction of the bachelor’s degree in 1993 up to recent cohorts. Using administrative data, I find that the class gap in bachelor’s departures has remained constant from 1993 to 2006, with disadvantaged students being around 15 percentage points more likely to leave a bachelor’s programme than advantaged students, even after adjusting for other factors such as grades from upper secondary school. Importantly, the class gap reappears at the master’s level, with privileged students being more likely to pursue a master’s degree than less privileged students. The size of the class gap is remarkable, given that this gap is found among a selected group of university enrolees. As other studies have found that educational expansion in higher education is not necessarily a remedy for narrowing the class gap in educational attainment, scholars need to pay more attention to keeping disadvantaged students from leaving higher education.

Higher Education, Social Class and Social Mobility

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ann-Marie Bathmaker ◽  
Nicola Ingram ◽  
Jessie Abrahams ◽  
Anthony Hoare ◽  
Richard Waller ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Social Class ◽  
Social Mobility

Parenting, Social Class, and the College Admissions Scandal

Contexts ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (3) ◽  
pp. 40-45
Author(s):  
Katerina Bodovski
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Social Class ◽  
College Admissions ◽  
The Media

In March of 2019, news of the college admissions scandal broke. Opinion pieces flooded the media on how and why such a thing could have happened. Here, the author argues that the scandal is more about parenting than the institution of higher education.

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