Lack of intersectional thinking as an example of whiteness

In this section I argue that WP policy has not sufficiently considered the intersections of class and ‘race’ which can have negative outcomes for BME students. I use an intersectional lens to interrogate the interactions of class and ‘race’ at institutional and policy level and argue that whether they converge (class and ‘race’) or diverge (class versus ‘race’) they can have negative

outcomes for BME students and thus perpetuate whiteness. Firstly, I argue that Widening Participation policy has foregrounded issues of socio-economic class and that by doing so it side-lined questions of ‘race’. In support of my argument I provide evidence on the levels of WP expenditure on financial aid which indicate the focus of support. Secondly, I argue that the actual links between ‘race’ and social class can mean that inadequate financial support can have more adverse results for BME students. I use the case of the abolition of grants and NHS bursaries to support my arguments. The above, I argue, can serve as examples of how not considering intersectionality in the process of

conceptualisation of WP policy can have negative effects on different groups of students.

5.2.1. Class versus ‘race’

In this subsection I argue that the WP policy has given primacy to socio-

economic issues against questions of ‘racial’ equality, thus side-lining the latter. This is particularly important as addressing economic issues does not address all the issues that BME students may face (Bhopal, 2018) in HE and can be seen as an example of a lack of intersectional thinking in the conceptualisation of WP policy.

When discussing WP policy, interviewees talked mainly about students with financial difficulties and providing financial support. Kathleen, the head of widening participation at the University of Merit was clear in how WP was being operationalised with such students in mind:

We have a high percentage of students from low income backgrounds, so we assessed that what we do well is getting students in, so as a result of that a lot of our 8 million odd [pounds] is spent on financial support for those students, so by far the biggest chunk and I haven’t got figures on me, but could let you have them, by far the biggest chunk goes on students bursaries…

(Kathleen, head of WP, University of Merit) Kathleen’s explanation of the policy direction as concentrating on providing financial support for students from lower socio-economic classes can be seen as the enactment of the then governmental WP policy. Since 2012 universities have committed most of WP expenditure, through Access Agreements, to financial support in a form of bursaries (money paid directly to students),

despite very weak evidence of this being an effective form of support in the first place (OFFA, 2016; Thomas, 2011). The focus of WP expenditure on financial support can be interpreted, I argue, as the policy concentrating on the issues of people from lower socio-economic classes, rather than the questions of ‘race’ and racism, which following CRT can be interpreted as attempts to make ‘race’ invisible (Gillborn, 2008). This is particularly problematic especially since

discussions of working class people in British education often presume that they are actually White working class (Ball et al., 2013; Rollock et al., 2015a).

Although, efforts to eradicate injustices along the socio-economic class lines have the potential to partially help BME students as class and ethnicity intersect, I argue that on their own they are not enough to address all the

barriers that BME students face which go beyond financial constraints and include such issues as the whiteness and systemic racism in HE (Bhopal, 2018), which I argue in more detail in chapter 6.

Since the interview with Kathleen, the government introduced two pieces of legislation that gave more focus to efforts of equalising educational

opportunities for students of colour. First, in 2016 it introduced a White Paper, ‘Success as Knowledge Economy’, which set a target to increase the proportion of students from minority ethnic backgrounds in HE by 2020 by 20% (BIS, 2016). However, that target can be seen, using CRT, as an example of interest convergence with dubious ethical motivations and effects. This can be argued in at least two ways. Firstly, it has been proposed that workforce shortages, particularly in STEM areas, in the developed economies can be addressed by educating more ethnic minority groups as they are the fastest growing

populations in the western world and indeed in pre-university education in England (DfE, 2017; Leggon, 2010). That is to say, that the expansion of higher education provision to ethnic minority groups is a good idea if it eventually profits the economy of the Global North, where mostly White people, particularly White men, hold systemic power (e.g. through being CEOs, board members, shareholders, and/or wealth holders). Secondly, the governmental target to increase the proportion of BME students, without a target for closing the racialised degree awarding gap can be beneficial mostly to universities (financially and representationally) rather than the majority of BME student themselves. By focusing on the access, i.e. increased enrolments of BME students, English universities can secure more income from student fees to survive in the conditions of difficult recruitment resulting from the overall

decreasing number of 18-19 year olds, which are not forecast to start increasing until 2020, juxtaposed against the growing BME population (Bekhradnia and Beech, 2018; ONS, 2017). At the same time, not having a target to close the racialised degree awarding gap, i.e. not concentrating on outcomes, can allow universities to continue business (racism) as usual and to offer experiences steeped in whiteness and outcomes which are at best transformational only for a fraction of the BME population (when compared with the White student population) (McDuff et al., 2018). In turn, universities admitting increased numbers of BME students can portray themselves as open, welcoming and

diverse environments, and the failure of BME students to achieve the same quality of results as White students (i.e. the racialised degree awarding gap) can feed into the neo-liberal narrative of individual responsibility of an

independent learner (Chadderton, 2018). This then appears like a case of interest convergence, which is theorised as allowing any progress toward racial equality to be only achieved if it is beneficial to the dominant (White) groups and the progress being partial and temporary for the dominated (BME) population (Bell, 1980; Driver, 2011).

A second piece of legislation, the Higher Education and Research Act 2017, created the Office for Students (OfS) which currently has the responsibility for WP policy. The OfS operationalises the policy through Access and Participation Plans (APPs), which claim to put “an increased focus on outcomes” and “a stronger focus on reducing gaps in success and progression” whereby these gaps are identified as the retention and degree attainment gaps for BME and disabled students in particular (OfS, 2018a, p. 11). Therefore, the new policy claims to have more focus on BME students than on socio-economic class of students and to address the above laid criticism of the 2016 white paper. Having this in mind, I argue that one should expect universities to be moving away from providing direct financial support (e.g. bursaries) which concentrate on the economic aspects and directing their WP expenditure into student

success and progression work, which should aim to close the racialised degree awarding gap. This can be done by examining the documents detailing WP expenditure. Table 5.1 provides a comparison of the available data, between expenditure from 2014-15 Access Agreements, when staff interviews were conducted and 2019-20 Access and Participation Plans (APPs), the latest documents available under the new direction of the OfS for the five research- intensive universities in the research project. Although the OfS (2019) has issued a new guidance for 2020-21 APPs which, not only continues the 2019- 20 APPs policy direction but puts even stronger emphasis on the target of closing the attainment gap and gives more freedom to universities as to how they wish to enact the policy to reach that target, the APPs for 2020-21 are not yet available and the analysis has to come from the 2019-20 APPs.

Table 5.1 WP expenditure by category of spend in 2014-15 Access Agreements (AA) and 2019- 20 Access and Participation Plans (APP) for the five research-intensive universities

Institution Document Source:

Type of spend

Access Success Progression Financial support Total University of Benefit AA 2014-15 £0.4M £0.2M No data £3.4M £4.0M APP 2019- 20 £0.6M £1.4M £0.2M £1.4M £3.6M University of Books AA 2014-15 £2.2M £0.6M* £10.0M £12.9M APP 2019- 20 £3.6M £2.2M* £9.2M £15.0M University of Confidence AA 2014-15 £2.0M** No data £8.5M £10.5M APP 2019- 20 £4.0M £1.1M £0.1M £7.9M £13.1M University of Labour

AA 2014-15 £1.5M £1.2M No data No data No data APP 2019-

20 £2.6M £1.6M £1.0M £3.9M £9.0M

University of Merit

AA 2014-15 No

data No data No data No data £8.1M

APP 2019-

20 £1.0M £1.0M £0.3M £8.8M £10.9M

* combined success and progression figures, ** combined access and success figures

Table 5.1 indicates that the declared expenditure on financial support has decreased between 2014-15 and 2019-20. From the available data it can be calculated that it dropped from 80% to 62% of the overall WP spent at the five research-intensive universities. This, however, means that the majority of support is still directed toward financial assistance rather than student success, which in the five APPs for 2019-20 constitutes only 14% of the overall WP expenditure. Therefore, the de facto enactment of the government’s WP policy can be understood, I argue, as still firmly directed towards students from lower socio-economic backgrounds with the work on success of BME students lagging behind.

5.2.2. Class and ‘race’

In this subsection I argue that the inadequate financial support has more detrimental outcomes for BME students than for White students, yet again highlighting the possible negative consequences of the lack of intersectional considerations in the policy decision making processes. One of the main discourses used by consecutive governments in respect to social justice and

WP is that by providing financial support in the form of grants and loans they removed barriers to HE participation. While this is indeed important, this

discourse falls short of recognising that access and participation is about much more than financial barriers (Harrison and Baxter, 2007; Hatt et al., 2005; Usher et al., 2010). And while in the previous section I argued that concentrating on providing financial support can only partly help poorer BME students, here I argue that not providing good financial support can impact them more adversely. In the 2016-17 academic year the government changed the

undergraduate student finance by abolishing maintenance grants, meaning that those with the most need have to rely more on loans and thus will incur higher debts for their studies. As people from minority backgrounds in the UK are twice as likely to live in poverty than White people (EHRC, 2016; Kenway and Palmer, 2007), this policy will potentially affect them more.

Additionally, changes to the NHS bursary will also disproportionally affect BME students, who will be forced to take on debt through the student loan system, where previously they would have been given a bursary covering tuition fees and some extra costs (DHSC, 2017). This is because subjects aligned to medicine, which are no longer being funded by the NHS, have been some of the most popular among BME students with 16% of all BME students studying these subject areas (Advance HE, 2018c).

Thus, I argue, the economic aspects of WP policies perpetuate whiteness of the HE field. On the one hand limiting financial support risks having more adverse outcomes for BME students, and on the other hand, focusing too much on providing only financial support does not address all the issues that BME students may face in access to and participation in HE. The majority of the financial support has concentrated on UG programmes and it was not until 2016-17 that students could apply for a postgraduate loan. Therefore, the next section looks at how concentrating WP policy on UG education adversely affects BME students in PG programmes.