New HESA statistics show decline in part-time study: The Sutton Trust responds

Commenting on statistics on student enrolments published today by the Higher Education Statistics Agency, Dr Lee Elliot Major, CEO of the Sutton Trust, said:

“While we welcome some improvement in the proportion of disadvantaged young people going to university, it is very worrying that the numbers of part-timers continue to fall. Part-time higher education is often a second chance for adults who missed out on higher education after school. Yet numbers have more than halved over the last decade. We need urgently to reverse this decline.”

NOTES TO EDITORS

• The Sutton Trust is a foundation set up in 1997, dedicated to improving social mobility through education. It has published over 200 research studies and funded and evaluated programmes that have helped hundreds of thousands of young people of all ages, from early years through to access to the professions.
• ‘Higher education student enrolments and qualifications obtained at higher education providers in the United Kingdom 2016/17’ is published today at https://www.hesa.ac.uk/news/11-01-2018/sfr247-higher-education-student-statistics.