Can anyone prove their parents didn't go to uni?

@titchy
The government is using a very blunt instrument to try and make universities "inclusive".

hmm What blunt instrument is theGovernment using Stanley? Universities are not required to, or funded for, increasing the number of first in families. Where these interventions exist it's because the university actively wants to target this group.

Really Titchy, do I have to answer this? There are enough posters on this thread mentioning "blunt instrument" and crude" to answer your question. Simply "ASKING top unis to take a student's background into consideration is definitely a "blunt instrument".
As this article suggests, www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/maintenance-grants-university-students-russell-group-tim-bradshaw-diversity-a8471816.html
There ARE other less blunt instruments the government could use.
Ethnicty, low income in the family, postcode, first application from family to university, There are others that the government or unis could use. But as for having to prove it all. You are joking right? Re ethnicity, In Nazi Germany you had to be able to prove you were not too ethnically connected to Jewishness to avoid the gas chamber, do you seriously want to bring this in! Give us a break!

As mentioned previously, universities aren't measured on getting first generation students in the doors, but they typically ask this question to help select students if they are oversubscribed for a particular event or for ensuring the intervention is well targeted and designed to meet the needs of students attending. We all accept that this tool is not a perfect one and is open to manipulation which is why it's not really used in isolation. In hugely general terms, using this information along with other markers might mean talking about the pros/cons of HE to parents who haven't gone to university, application information, student finance info and signposting to other resources. The provision in schools can be patchy and may come too late when students (and parents) have closed off certain avenues so although the question may not seem important in the grand scheme of things, at a local level, it helps universities in their widening participation work.

Ironically I mostly worked because my degree had so few contact hours

So I could probably get away with saying I didn’t go! 😂

The widening participation scheme should concentrate on assisting DC who attend underperforming schools

They do. Plus those from low participating postcodes (note 'low' participating, not 'never' participating). It's a blunt instrument (though not particularly for the reasons stated in this thread!), but the vast majority of those targeted in such schemes will be significantly less privileged.

Incidentally, predicted 3 x Cs by a state school does not mean she would only have achieved 3 x Cs. The fact that you valued her education enough to pay for a much better suggests she would have achieved much higher than that if she'd have stayed.

“Universities probably don't care whether people exploit it or not. I bet they are simply being driven by targets to demonstrate that they are "inclusive"

Can assure you this is not remotely true, certainly at my institution. It matters a lot to us.

Being a first generation student actually has a huge impact on a whether someone attends university and more significantly, which university they attend.

I could prove I've never been to uni as I have worked full time in naff jobs since finishing college. Plus my current employer is paying for me to do an NVQ3 which they will only do of you have no higher than an nvq 2.

@RedskyToNight there are definitely a lot of jobs you could fit around it. It’s was also pretty easy to talk the staff into switching your tutorial groups to lunch/after work. Hypothetically at any rate it was 100% possible.

@StanelySteamer so basically you think that it’s never going to be the case that everyone will get an adequate education so everyone should get a shit one? First off, it’s better that there are at least some people who are well educated. They are a great service to society. Secondly, if everyone is equally uneducated then you move further away from meritocracy rather than towards it. My family is from the USSR. They didn’t all go to medical school (most sought after degree in their city) because they were smart or somehow more deserving. They all went to medical school because their parents knew the right people. Having some well educated people is better than having none at all.

I also wanted to say that I don’t know who your first tag was for but I think you did your job really well!

@Velveteenfruitbowl
In the comprehensive in which I taught, with some students from very poor backgrounds, (for example two disabled parents living in a council flat, or others where no one in the family has ever been to university, and thus do not have much of an idea of what is involved), what have I done wrong by helping these students get into Russell Group universites? Should I just have perpetuated the unfairness of their lives? Should I have just sat back and allowed "que sera sera"?
Sorry, but, having had the dubious advantage of a Public School education, I at least knew the advantages that such an education gave to the offspring of the rich when it came to getting into top universities. I used my knowledge of this to help my charges get into the top universities. Was I doing wrong? I don't think so.
As far as I was concerned I was doing my job and doing it properly. If all 6th form mentors had my background/knowledge and my drive to help their students succeed then there would be no need for the government to try to "even things up" by encouraging top unis to take more students from disadvantaged backgrounds, as well as students from ethnic groups, (don't believe me, read this www.theguardian.com/education/2018/dec/06/slow-rise-in-university-admissions-from-disadvantaged-students-ucas, or this www.gov.uk/government/news/scheme-encouraging-disadvantaged-pupils-to-apply-for-leading-universities-opens or most recently this www.ucas.com/corporate/news-and-key-documents/news/record-number-disadvantaged-students-university).
You may be interested to know that all this happened after I retired in 2015. Before then government "encouragement" was not so strong.
@Velveteenfruitbowl in an ideal world, education across the country would be equal for all students and there would be no need for parents to buy a better education for their offspring, there would be no grammar schools, no independent schools. MPs would send their children to ordinary state schools and everything in the garden would be lovely. But human nature being what it is, some parents always want to obtain advantage for themselves and their children in whatever way they see fit. So the ideal of equal and good education for all is not always achieved. In other countries where private education is no real advantage then people try to move into the catchment area of a prestigious state school, Henri IV in Paris for example. Even under Socialism in the old USSR where egalitarianism was supposed to be the norm, influence became the currency used by those with influence.
This is why I wrote a book to help students from ordinary schools get into top unis, and the two students mentioned earlier on, one of whom ended up in Nottingham doing English and Australian Law and the other who ended up doing PPE in Balliol and now works for the FCO, wrote endorsements. (I cannot really go any further on this, anti-spamming oblige.) So, I agree entirely with you that ideally the government should provide a "proper" education. Trouble is, even with Ofsted, which frankly is shit compared to old fashioned HMIs, this is very hard to obtain. Teaching is such a tough and ill-remunerated profession that few of those best equipped to do the job do it, in states schools, whereas those who do it in private schools are almost always better qualified etc. It is an easier and better paid job there. For instance almost all my teachers had Oxbridge degrees. If it was better paid and the conditions were better and private schools were illegal, then a "proper" state education would have a better chance. This is not to say that there are not a lot of extremely well qualified and well intentioned teachers in state school. there are and I was privileged to work alongside many of them.

It's the schooling that matters not the postcode etc.

If my DD had continued to attend the state school she left mid yr8 her predicted grades would probably be CCC (Average A level grade at the school). She has attended a private school since mid Yr8 predicted grades A* AA... So it's the same child but the difference schooling makes is massive, neither DD's DF or I attended Uni, that's irrelevant ..had DD continued her education at the state school she would not have been offered a place on any widening participation scheme because the postcode of where we live is graded 5 - very high progression rate...she certainly would not be applying for a place at any of the Uni's on her UCAS application.

The widening participation scheme should concentrate on assisting DC who attend underperforming schools e.g. the DC who tend to enter secondary education with good SATS but underachieve when they leave secondary school.

I don't think whether you parent went to Uni makes much difference. The main thing seems to be where you live and what school you go to. Obvs you could "work the system" but would people, given the choice, really make their DC go through this to get an offer a grade lower at A level?

I also can think of examples of very middle-class families where parents didn't go to university (once upon a time, not everyone did), so the idea of their DC being advantaged by such schemes when in every other way they already are would be laughable.

@Stillabitemo

Thank you

It does sound a bit mad tbh. It reminds me a bit of a poster saying her child’s school raised concerns because they didn’t have a microwave or a dishwasher.

I know of someone who lied about DS being on free-school-meals to try to boost their potential application to a much-sought after college.

I have always wondered about this, as many people will go to extraordinary lengths to put their own DC ahead (thinking of the parents who helicopter into catchments areas for the best secondary schools, living in rented accommodation).

The issue of where you live postcode-wise doesn't necessarily mean you are disadvantaged though. It isn't uncommon for well educated people to not necessarily live in affluent areas, particularly if they work in the public sector and work in cities where house-prices are high.

@autumnrose1 it’s a very broad range but everything from residential summer schools, campus visits, subject master classes, study skills support, ucas application support or supported admissions programmes where students complete a set number of tasks/events and receive a reduced offer or financial support. Exactly what a university offers is determined by their access and participation plan

“ ’m a widening participation manager at a uni so happy to answer any questions you have on these sort of schemes.”

I’ve not heard anything about this so I’d be interested to hear more generally please. What kind of opportunities are having this criteria attached?

Usually the most competitive widening participation schemes (summer schools or supported entry for example) target student on postcode. Students will need to be from a participation POLAR or IMD postcode depending on the universities targeting system. That’s the primary method of recruitment and the secondary are what we’d class as other widening participation characteristics such as being first in family for example. So even if you did lie the benefits you’d receive would be small.

I’m a widening participation manager at a uni so happy to answer any questions you have on these sort of schemes.

Interesting - that all the local schools in one area are on the Bristol list.

the comment further up that you would have to abolish private schools and grammars to make things fairer does not entirely work either because there are some selective state academices and also comprehensives ina reas where house prices are £1m+ - posh comps as it were - which would still mean unfairness. UYnlses we cloned every child int he land and had them all brough up on identical group homes I doubt we could ever make things wholly "fair" in terms of your genes and your treatment at home by parents and your school including tutoring like the blairs had done for their state religious school educated children (roman catholic).

In the county I grew up in, 100% of schools/colleges are on that list from Bristol

I was the first person of my generation in my huge family to ever go to uni, it was something you just didn't do and I'm a woman, yeah!
I left school with nothing and finally got to uni in my thirties.

It's awful that someone who had been given opportunities would feel the need to lie about this.

Is this a new thing? I went to a summer school when I was 16 that was for people whose parents hadn't been to uni. I am 31 now. I think it must have just been honesty based at the time, but I hadn't really thought about it much.

how is it fair to deny someone an education for choices their parents made

Who's being denied an education? OP is talking about extra curricular stuff, with those from a disadvantaged background being given priority for places. Because you know, they're disadvantaged.

I could have easily fitting a full time job around that.

Where a course has very low contact hours, students are expected to spend the remaining hours studying.... if you can hold down a full time job, go to four hours of lectures, read two Thomas Hardy novels and critically analyse them each week and still gain decent grades you must be superwoman! Most can't though.

I could have easily fitting a full time job around that.

Depends on the nature of the job surely? If it's the sort of job where you have to be in an office from 9-5 you'd struggle to manage to be at university for 4 hours during that period (unless university was next door and the hours were all near lunch time I suppose). A lot of DH's jobs involved travel; it would have been nigh on impossible for him to make fixed hours at a fixed location. If you were self employed and could choose your own hours it might be more likely.