Social Mobility in the UK's Higher Education Sector

Social mobility is at the forefront of the British Government's plans to improve the lives of the most deprived groups in society. Since the election of the New Labour government in May 1997, consecutive governments have championed the concept of social mobility. The fundamental aim of social mobility is to tackle social barriers for disadvantaged groups in education and employment. However, within the social sciences there has been a lack of critical discussion regarding the theorisation of social mobility within the context of higher education (HE). In recent times higher education research has instead had a greater focus on pedagogy. The aim of this review is to critically explore past and current debates on social mobility, and the importance the concept has in the higher education sector. In this paper special reference will be made to the new UK government higher education policy on the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF).

Bringing the doctoral thesis by published papers to the Social Sciences and the Humanities: a quantitative easing?

10.31235/osf.io/25j6s ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

John Rigby ◽

Barbara Jones

Keyword(s):

Social Sciences ◽

Higher Education ◽

Doctoral Degree ◽

Education Sector ◽

Academic Field ◽

Doctoral Thesis ◽

Social Sciences And Humanities ◽

Scientific Disciplines ◽

The Social ◽

The Uk

This paper reflects on alternatives to the traditional form of doctoral thesis which are emerging to reflect a new approach to the valuation and designation of scientific outputs. We examine the changes and consider some implications. We suggest that the adoption of co-citation as underpinning principle for the measurement of knowledge structures has led to re-designation of the value of knowledge and knowledge producers in increasingly quantitative terms. We use notions of ‘institution’ and ‘logic’ to better understand such a change and its implications. Under a new logic that is gradually embedding itself across the higher education sector, the ‘constitutive rules’ concerned with the value of research now prioritize quantification, and tangibility of output, and quality is increasingly equated with citation. Whilst the scientific disciplines have traditionally been closer to this model, albeit with significant national variations, subjects within the Social Sciences and Humanities are now being affected. We present evidence from a small study of the UK higher education sector of university regulation of doctoral degree submission format in two disciplines in the Humanities and Social Sciences (History and Sociology). Our evidence shows the recent and gradual adoption of a practice, previously more common in scientific disciplines, that allows the doctoral thesis to be constituted by a series of publishable papers, known by a variety of names, the most common being ‘Thesis by Published Papers’, ‘Journal Format Thesis’, ‘Alternative Format Thesis’, and ‘Integrated Thesis’. As the thesis of the Social Sciences and Humanities – itself an important institution in the academic field - begins to reflect a greater emphasis upon quantity of knowledge outputs, a tension emerges with the most central of all scientific institutions, the peer-reviewed journal paper.

Neoliberal Meritocracy: How 'Widening Participation' to Universities in England Reinforces Class Divisions

Teachers – Being in Control or Being Controlled? - On Education. Journal for Research and Debate ◽

10.17899/on_ed.2021.10.8 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 4 (10) ◽

Author(s):

Christopher Cunningham ◽

Colin Samson

Keyword(s):

Higher Education ◽

Education Policy ◽

Social Mobility ◽

Higher Education Policy ◽

Service Providers ◽

Widening Participation ◽

Regulatory Frameworks ◽

The Social ◽

Class Privilege ◽

Class Divisions

This essay details the processes through which English universities reinforce existing social class divisions while at the same time extending access for populations that had historically been excluded from universities. Practices commonly referred to within higher education policy as ‘widening participation’ that purport to show solidarity with previously excluded student populations, we argue, function to maintain not diminish inequalities. While the meritocratic ideals underpinning the social mobility narrative of widening participation encourage economic and employment aspirations as prime motivations for applying and entering university, widening participation has not coincided with meaningful mobility. Through an analysis of major shifts in higher education policy, we argue that categorisations of the ‘disadvantaged’ student are manufactured to assist universities to fund and legitimate themselves as vehicles of social mobility. In this context, we argue that a precarious legitimacy exists because social mobility operates within a wider culture of embedded class privilege, and this is constantly managed by state regulatory frameworks which reshape and repurpose universities to fit a neoliberal meritocratic image of the larger society and the role of universities within it. Ideas of ‘disadvantage’ service solidarity not with the ‘disadvantaged’ but with educational service providers, as they offer a target for the promotion of neoliberal meritocracy. In the course of this, class differentials are reinforced by channelling ‘disadvantaged’ and ‘advantaged’ students into different niches of the labour market, preserving existing inequalities, and sorting graduates into winners and losers.

Connecting With Kinesiology: Observations of an Outsider

Kinesiology Review ◽

10.1123/kr.2020-0059 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 1-7

Author(s):

Jay Coakley

Keyword(s):

Social Sciences ◽

Higher Education ◽

Professional Growth ◽

Sociology Department ◽

Physical Activities ◽

Professional Service ◽

Social Sciences And Humanities ◽

Faculty Appointment ◽

Interdisciplinary Approaches ◽

The Social

This article is organized around the idea that a person can be a part of kinesiology without being in kinesiology. Trained as a sociologist and never having a faculty appointment outside of a sociology department, I am an outsider in kinesiology. However, my participation in kinesiology and relationships with scholars in kinesiology departments have fostered my professional growth and my appreciation of interdisciplinary approaches to studying sports, physical activities, and the moving human body. The knowledge produced by scholars in kinesiology subdisciplines has provided a framework for situating and assessing my research, teaching, and professional service as a sociologist. The latter half of this article focuses on changes in higher education and how they are likely to negatively impact the social sciences and humanities subdisciplines in kinesiology. The survival of these subdisciplines will depend, in part, on how leaders in the field respond to the question, Kinesiology for whom?

Documenting mobility

The New Social Mobility ◽

10.1332/policypress/9781447310662.003.0004 ◽

2017 ◽

Author(s):

Geoff Payne

Keyword(s):

Higher Education ◽

Social Mobility ◽

Early Life ◽

Child Poverty ◽

White Paper ◽

Education Students ◽

The Social ◽

Conservative Policy ◽

Cherry Picking ◽

Independent Commission

While mobility was the sole concern of recent politics, its importance can be gauged from official documents. These include Labour’s White Paper New Opportunities (2009); the Liberal Democrats’ ‘Independent Commission on Social Mobility’ (2009); Conservative policy papers Building Skills, Transforming Lives (2008) and Through the Glass Ceiling(2008); the Coalition’s Opening Doors, Breaking Barriers: a strategy for social mobility (2011) and White Paper Higher Education: Students at the Heart of the System (2011), and the Conservatives’ Fulfilling Our Potential (2015); plus reports from the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission (‘SMCPC’), the All-party Parliamentary Group on Social Mobility (2012), and briefings like the Cabinet Office Strategy Unit’s Getting on, getting ahead (2008). A review of these reveals wrong technical definitions, cherry-picking of research evidence, and unwarranted assumptions about early life intervention as a mobility facilitator.

Teach a Student to Fish? International Relations Scholars in the Classroom

Political Science and Politics ◽

10.1017/s1049096516002468 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 50 (01) ◽

pp. 214-220

Author(s):

Nina Srinivasan Rathbun ◽

Brian C. Rathbun

Keyword(s):

Social Sciences ◽

Higher Education ◽

International Relations ◽

Political Science ◽

Undergraduate Students ◽

Theoretical Work ◽

Practical Skills ◽

Relevant Research ◽

American Higher Education ◽

The Social

ABSTRACT American higher-education institutions are under increasing pressure to prepare their students with practical skills for the workplace, and the social sciences—including political science—are not immune. Political figures have suggested—sometimes seconded by academics themselves—that research distracts academics from imparting practical skills to undergraduate students. Using a survey of international relations (IR) scholars, this article shows that this is not the case. Those who spend more time on research actually devote more time to policy-relevant research in their courses than more abstract and theoretical work, and they incorporate more contemporary issues. Research seems to encourage academics to teach their students to fish.

Editorial

Learning and Teaching ◽

10.3167/latiss.2012.050201 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 5 (2) ◽

pp. 1-4

Author(s):

Penny Welch ◽

Susan Wright

Keyword(s):

Social Sciences ◽

Higher Education ◽

Learning And Teaching ◽

The Social

Welcome to this issue of Learning and Teaching: The International Journal of Higher Education in the Social Sciences. Our thanks go to the authors of articles, the essay and the reviews, the anonymous referees who read the articles and the essay, the publishers who provided review copies of the books, our own publisher Berghahn and the Editorial Board.

European Higher Education Policy and the Social Dimension

10.1057/9781137473141 ◽

2015 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Yasemin Kooij

Keyword(s):

Higher Education ◽

Education Policy ◽

Higher Education Policy ◽

Social Dimension ◽

The Social ◽

European Higher Education

From Higher Education to Employment: Synthesis Report. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and DevelopmentHigher Education and Employment: The Case of Humanities and Social Sciences. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development

Comparative Education Review ◽

10.1086/447360 ◽

1996 ◽

Vol 40 (1) ◽

pp. 89-92

Author(s):

Abby Riddell

Keyword(s):

Social Sciences ◽

Higher Education ◽

Economic Cooperation ◽

Humanities And Social Sciences ◽

Education And Employment ◽

Synthesis Report

A Theme for Social Sciences?

Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement ◽

10.1017/s1358246100000096 ◽

1970 ◽

Vol 4 ◽

pp. 82-90

Author(s):

Michael Drake

Keyword(s):

Social Sciences ◽

Higher Education ◽

Latin America ◽

Science Studies ◽

Rapid Expansion ◽

The Other ◽

Human Knowledge ◽

The Past ◽

Proper Form ◽

The Social

In recent years the quest for the proper form and content of social science studies has been a major preoccupation of academics. The reasons for this are numerous: the very rapid expansion of higher education generally and the particularly marked demand for the social sciences has led to a proliferation of new departments; brash young men have been promoted early (too early, many would say) to positions of power within the universities; the increasingly vocal criticism by the consumers of education – the students themselves – and, perhaps most important of all, a growing desire to re-aggregate human knowledge to counter the trend towards ever narrower degrees of specialism. All these factors have contributed to a mounting dissatisfaction with the traditional ways of studying the social sciences – that is, in almost hermetically sealed departments of economics, of politics, of sociology, and so on. Instead attempts have been made to draw the various social sciences together in studies of particular areas (Britain, Latin America, the underdeveloped world, the ‘new nations’); or of particular processes such as industrialisation, or urbanisation; or of particular problems as associated with, for instance, poverty or race. Each of these represents, of course, a multi- or inter-disciplinary approach to the study of the social sciences. Over the past four years I have been associated with two attempts to produce an integrated, inter-disciplinary course in social sciences. One was a failure; the other, my current preoccupation, is, I think, promising. What I have to say tonight is concerned with an analysis of these two intellectual experiments.