Though ethnicity awarding gaps have been a long-standing problem in UK universities, it seems that there is still no effective solution found to tackle this issue. For 16 years in the United Kingdom, there have been notably lower proportions of “home-status” undergraduate students of colour who graduate with first class honours or upper second-class honours, than white students, according to research published by Advanced HE.
This discrepancy is called the awarding or attainment gap, and it continues to exist to this day, with a reported gap of 18.4% between the two groups by Universities UK for the academic year 20/21.
The gap widens further when international students of colour are taken into account, with 28% of non-EU international students obtaining a lower-second or third-class degree compared to the 20% of home-students in the academic year 21/22, reported by the Financial Times.
Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) investigated the factors affecting the awarding gap between white and Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) students, and found that even after “controlling for individual and institutional characteristics”, and bypassing the proportion of white students and students of colour, a large awarding gap still persists between these ethnic groups.
The organisation stresses the importance of moving away from a deficit model in explaining awarding gaps in [Higher Education]’. The deficit model attributes the failures of students in their achievement, learning, or success in gaining employment to a personal lack of effort or deficiency, instead of failures or limitations of the education or training system or socio-economic circumstances.
When individual characteristics are taken out of the equation, what is left to explain the awarding gap is race. What follows this realisation is the matter of institutional racism, and the lack of support and acceptance that students of colour are likely to receive in higher education institutions.
Progress at Sussex has been slow. The persisting gap shows efforts are not enough…
Arham Farid, Equity and Inclusion Coordinator at the University of Sussex Students’ Union, argues that some key factors contributing to the awarding gap is the lack of diversity in the course curriculum, outdated teaching, and teacher attitudes in the classroom. These factors lead to students “naturally” feeling “alienated”, “passive”, “uncomfortable”, and “discouraged” when what they are learning or who they are learning from does not reflect, respect, or empathise with their culture, values, or perspectives.
She asserts that this will lead to students to “naturally just stop coming to classes, and stop giving any sort of care about what’s happening in the classrooms”.
“There definitely needs to be a transformation of teaching and pedagogy [in higher education],” Farid says.
“[Universities] must recognise that they do have a colonial legacy [and] history, and that does inform knowledge production. And… let students know as well, and help them understand, how knowledge historically has been racist, and has been misogynistic and patriarchal, and has all of these systems of power and oppression in place, and that the university now is going to break that,’ Farid comments.
She elaborates on how this can be done through the updating of course curriculums and teaching methods with the help of curriculum designers, experts, counsellors, and even artists, who can enhance and add more creativity to existing teaching. It should also involve people of colour, who can add cultural diversity and richness with their insights.
Farid also emphasises the importance of student voice, and how crucial it is for the university to listen to students and their subjective and unique perspectives, as Farid believes it is the students themselves who will provide the “best input”.
“[Because students] are the biggest stakeholders, when it comes to the university itself, because they pay the money, and universities exist for the students to teach them,” Farid states.
Universities across the UK have been addressing the issue of the awarding gap for years, and coming up with their own solutions to try and tackle this problem, which vary in range, format, and impact. The University of Sussex, considered to be one of the universities with a comparatively larger attainment gap, is also working to combat this issue.
Farid says that the University is “quite committed to the cause”, in particular through the ongoing “Curriculum Reimagined” project to create a more accessible, diverse, inclusive, and anti-racist curriculum, the passionate education and enhancement team. In addition to that, the Business and Media, Arts, and Humanities Schools also run the Race Equity Advocate scheme, where students of colour collaborate with these schools to feed in the subjective experiences of other students of colour, and improve the experience of students of colour.
In relation to the awarding gap between international students and home students, Sussex reports that the gap is “narrowing”, and that they are working hard to advance even further “through greater investment in academic support, from intercultural awareness to further language support,” reported by The Financial Times.
Nevertheless, progress at Sussex, and nation-wide, has been slow. The persisting numbers signal how these efforts are still not enough, and demonstrates how there is still a long way to go before UK higher education institutions are able to effectively counter and abolish the awarding gap.
Farid compares the issue of the attainment gap to COVID-19, and how “if in that one year, pedagogy can change all of a sudden because it is being forced to because of a disease, then at the same time, that something needs to be done right now as well, because [the awarding gap] is a major concern”.
With the awarding gap being such a big issue, with seemingly no chances of it disappearing in the near future, more pressure is needed for universities to acknowledge the urgency of the issue and to take more initiative to close the gap.
The Awarding Gap: How Students of Colour are Falling Behind their White Peers
Though ethnicity awarding gaps have been a long-standing problem in UK universities, it seems that there is still no effective solution found to tackle this issue.
For 16 years in the United Kingdom, there have been notably lower proportions of ‘home-status’ undergraduate students of colour who graduate with first class honours or upper second-class honours, than white students, according to Advanced HE.
This discrepancy is called the ‘awarding’ or ‘attainment’ gap, and it continues to exist to this day, with Universities UK reporting of a 18.4% gap between these ethnic group, in the academic year 20/21.
When international students of colour are factored into this, the numbers increase even further, with the Financial Times reporting of 28% of non-EU international students obtaining a lower-second or third-class degree compared to the 20% of home-students in the academic year 21/22.
HESA set out to discover the factors affecting the awarding gap between white and BAME students, and found that even after ‘controlling for individual and institutional characteristics’, and bypassing the proportion of white students and students of colour, a large awarding gap still persists between these ethnic groups.
The organization stresses the importance of ‘moving away from a deficit model in explaining awarding gaps in HE,’ in that the failures of students in terms of their achievement, learning, or success in gaining employment are due to a personal lack of effort or deficiency, instead of failures of limitations of the education or training system or socio-economic circumstances.
When individual characteristics are taken out of the equation, what is left to explain the awarding gap is race. What follows this realization is the matter of institutional racism, and the lack of support students of colour are likely to receive in higher education institutions.
Arham Farid, Equity and Inclusion Coordinator at the University of Sussex Students’ Union, argues that some of the major contributions to the awarding gap is the lack of diversity in the course curriculum, outdated teaching, and teacher attitudes in the classroom, which leads to students feeling ‘alienated’, ‘passive’, ‘uncomfortable’, and ‘discouraged’, when what they are learning or who they are learning from does not reflect or respect their culture, values, or perspectives.
She talks about how ‘there definitely needs to be a transformation of teaching and pedagogy’ in higher education.
‘[Universities] must recognize that they do have a colonial legacy [and] history, and that does inform knowledge production. And… let students know as well, and help them understand, how knowledge historically has been racist, and has been misogynistic and patriarchal, and has all of these systems of power and oppression in place, and that the university now is going to break that,’ Farid comments.
Universities across the UK have been addressing this problem for years, and coming up with their own solutions to try and tackle this problem, which vary in range, format, and impact. The University of Sussex, considered to be one of the universities with a larger attainment gap, is also working to combat this issue.
Farid says that the University is ‘quite committed to the cause’, in particular through the ongoing Curriculum Reimagined project to create a more accessible, diverse, inclusive, and anti-racist curriculum, the passionate education and enhancement team, and the Race Equity Advocate scheme run by the Business and Media, Arts, and Humanities Schools that feeds in the subjective experiences of students of colour back to the schools.
Nevertheless, progress at Sussex, and nation-wide has been slow. The persisting numbers signal how these efforts are still not enough, and demonstrates how there is still a long way to go before UK higher education institutions are able to effectively counter, and abolish, the awarding gap.
Farid compares the issue of the awarding gap to COVID, and how ‘if in that one year, pedagogy can change all of a sudden because its being forced to because of a disease, then at the same time, that something needs to be done right now as well, because [the awarding gap] is a major concern.’
With the awarding gap being such a big issue, with seemingly no chances of disappearing in the near future, more pressure is needed for universities to take acknowledge the urgency of the issue, and to take more initiative to close the gap.
