Contextual offers - good idea but don't seem quite fair?

[MrsKypp]

I think the idea is great and I totally support it.

However, the example of these two families I know well makes me wonder. I am calling them 'child' for clarity, although of course they are a bit old for that label.

Just to clarify, this is nothing to do with my own DC.

Family 1
Rent a very modest flat.
The Dad is a waiter and the Mum does unskilled part-time work.
Child went to local non-selective state school.

Family 2
Own outright house they live in: semi-detatched in nice area.
Own outright a buy-to-let they rent out in nearby nice town
Dad has a PhD from highly prestigious uni, Mum has 2 MSc from Russell Group Unis
Child went to local non-selective state school.

Family 1 lives very near Family 2, but 1 is just into a London borough, while 2 is just into Surrey.

The child from Family 2 was eligible for and was given an amazing contextual offer due to the school apparently not being great, although that child was happy and successful there. The child from Family 1 was not eligible for a contextual offer.

I'm hoping that this isn't typical of how contextual offers work.

There are several different types of contextual offers depending on the university applied for.
So did both family 1 and family 2s dc apply to the same universities / similar courses?
Some contextual offers (but not all) take into account whether or not parents went to university.
For many it depends either on postcode i.e. whether the area you live in has a low participation rate in higher education or on the actual school attended

I agree, did both DC apply to the same course at the same Uni? Did they both have the same grades in the same subjects?
Contextual offers vary and can take into account with differing rates the post code, secondary school, disability, young carer, household income, and competitiveness of the course itself. They also are very specific about the grades you need to achieve as in while a biology course may be advertised as needing AAA, a contextual offer could be ABB but the A has to be in biology so ABB with a B in biology won’t do.

My friends dc received a contextual offer due to postcode. They live in a £3.5 Manor House (outside a mining village in the north of England)

This is why offers should be the same for everyone.

Yes, it's a good scheme but a bit hit and miss. DD got one contextual offer due to our postcode, ie the street we actually live on. Other universities only took into account the town itself, which is quite middling, so all her other offers were standard. I think it might have been POLAR vs ACORN, but I could be wrong. Other factors such as school and parental educational attainments sometimes come into play. There isn't really a perfect system that someone couldn't poke holes in.

Moving house can also affect it so you could move into a less desirable area for a while during sixth form and qualify. Or move from a less desirable area at the same time and despite living in a deprived postcode for 16 years you don't qualify. Having said that I think it is important to try to address the inequalities even if with a blunt tool.

A friends daughter had a contextual offer based on postcode only, despite going to a £30k a year selective boarding school. She even rang the uni to query it and they insisted the offer still stood. That’s not really in the spirit of the purpose of contextual offers. Probably attending a fee paying school (unless on a bursary) should rule you out?

There will always be anomilies, and maybe more can be done to filter these out to ensure the right children receive more of them, but overall I 100% support the principle of contextual offers.

Yep I know someone who had a contextual offer despite going to Eton and being from a wealthy family - again due to postcode

Saynotothefishtank - but that doesn't play fair to people like my DC. We live in an area where hardly anyone goes to HE, myself and DH included. They go to a college that has received RI from ofsted for the last few inspections, since it was taken over as failing. The average predicted grades in DC's A Level class are C/D for A Levels, DC is predicted A's or A*, college are not really sure, DC is just working so much ahead of the rest of the class. They went on a trip to Cambridge University, the tutor told the bus driver that he'd taken them to the wrong place as he dropped them at a college, they wanted the university not college... Fighting against the tide like that, isn't it only fair that my DC be offered a slightly reduced grade, compared to schools that offer support and coaching for Uni?

There will always be anomalies like this but overall contextual admissions have good evidence and recognise a range of disadvantage. However you should compare two students unless they’re applying for exactly the same course and university, as every university operates contextual admissions differently, and there are variances even within courses at a university. For example where I work we have extensive contextual admissions set up for humanities subjects other than law, but much less available in STEM

That's interesting @Bunnyannesummers I didn't know it varied between different disciplines like that. What's the reasoning behind that (my DCs are beyond that stage now, but I'd still be interested in hearing)?

Just to add to PPs, individual schools can also be subject to contextual offers. We live in a middle-class grammar school area where the alternative to GS (other than going private) is a not terribly good Secondary Modern. Pupils who attend that school receive contextual offers from some universities.

@appleapricot i hope your child gets a chance to go to somewhere amazing - you must be so proud !

One if my three kids got a contextual offer from 1 uni due to postcode of where school was based. Not the others and his siblings didn’t get one either.

@thing47 essentially it’s because academics in most of our STEM subjects don’t feel that students achieving lower grades would be up to the standard they need to be at to manage the course load, whereas humanities are more flexible and have made adjustments to ensure it’s not an issue - but it’s easier for them to do so.

Very interesting, thanks.

DD2 is a scientist and she's improved with age! Got average A levels (by MN standards at least), a decent first degree at a mid-rank university and then a first-class Masters from a top two (for her area) university. But I can see that if you don't have the basic grounding you might struggle later on.

When my son had me drive some kit to a friend from university who has a contextual offer and also got a lot of money - cannot remember what programme or grant that came from - and the house is worth £3m....... I did wonder if contextual offers were always fair. There we go. Anyway it all comes right in the end - if people get in who are not up to it even in arts subjects they will still fail in life in real jobs.If they deserve the contextual offer though and are bright as a button employers will not only hire but keep them. The employment free market tends to be accurate over time.

Ds2 got a contextual offer from Durham. He has ended up going for the much higher grades required offer at UCL who didn’t give a contextual offer.

Not sure how it works with Oxford but both Dses got to interview stage for Oxford, DS1 got in and is doing engineering.

We are not a disadvantaged or low earning family but our dses have gone to a ‘crap’ school under requires improvement for most of their time there and both were high achieving outliers within the school.

Its not an infallible system but I do think there needs to be some recognition of children at bog standard or failing comprehensives excelling versus those at grammars, ‘outstanding’ comps or private schools.

I'm broadly in favour of them.

But when dd was applying she knew two people who got contextual offers.
One was by postcode-and had been to exactly the same schools as she had since preschool, but had moved from near us to 3 miles away which took them into a "poor" postcode.
One was by school. He'd been to private school (and a good private too!) until 6th form and had moved to the local state school as they offered a subject he wanted.

Both said they felt a bit insulted by getting a contextual offer, and they would have got the non-contextual offer on A-level day.

I think it's a good idea, but I also think if it really starts becoming a big thing then people will manipulate it.
I jokingly said to dd that maybe we should have applied from friend's house. And there's nothing to stop you from applying from a different house. Everything goes by email so you couldn't tell.
And I think you could also see people deciding to go for contextual schools and heavily top up with tutoring.

Different unis have different criteria. Some use home postcode, some have a list of schools, some use POLAR - but some use different levels, same for IMD. Some use ethnicity, some use disability. Being a young carer, or care leaver. To be the first in your family to go to uni. For some you need to meet more than 1 criteria.
Some offer a contextual offer if you've got onto a Scholar scheme or done a summer school for which the criteria also differ. It's all to get their widening participation stats up.

And you need either a good teacher to sniff this stuff out and see if it relates to their pupils or a parent/student to track down the info. Which if you are disadvantaged and go to a failing school is not easy.

I think you'd have to be very clued up and motivated to try to game the system by moving into a poorer area with low participation in HE, and going to a school with a RI grading, just to cover all possible bases. Sometimes the wrong people get offered a leg up that they don't need. That's still better than working on the basis that all candidates have had the same opportunities and guidance.

@DahliaMacNamara
The schools can be ranked Good. I know many in my area that are in the schools list but are Good. They are not all RI schools on the list. Look at Bristol. They might get great p8 scores. They just have fewer bright children so are down the league tables. Some on the lists are actually very good schools!

The “failing” school thing can also be a bit of a misnomer. DDs state school had a bad Ofsted this year, RI and the head booted out.

Best A level and GCSE results on record though this year…..

Thanks for your very interesting replies everyone.

Family 2's contextual offer was because of the secondary school. I don't think they did anything particular or sneeky to get the offer, it was all done legitimatly.

Just doesn't seem entirely fair considering the level of education and relative wealth in the family when compared to family 1.

But I still think contextual offers are really important, even if it's sometimes a somewhat blunt tool.

Some unis are adjusting admissions to ensure a better mix of students. Edinburgh's RUK students are >50% privately educated.

www.ed.ac.uk/news/2022/student-admissions-change-to-increase-diversity