Widening Participation in Australia
Lessons on Equity, Standards, and Institutional Leadership
Jade McKay1 and Marcia Devlin2, 1Faculty of Business and Law, Deakin University, Australia, 2Office of the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Learning and Quality), Federation University, Australia
Widening participation movements inevitably give rise to discussions of the false dichotomy between equity and standards. The assumption is that by allowing differently prepared students into university and thereby improving equity, standards are somehow compromised. A recent national Australian study examined effective teaching and support of university students from low socio-economic status (LSES) backgrounds from the conceptual framework of bridging sociocultural incongruity rather than from a deficit perspective that assumes lower standards are operating. This chapter outlines the findings from that study of relevance to institutional leaders and policy makers. It draws on the rich qualitative data to show that, contrary to claims of lowered standards, students from low socio-economic backgrounds are high achievers who both expect and want high academic standards. It argues that the dichotomy between equity and standards is premised on an assumption of deficit in, and fundamental lack of respect for, students from diverse backgrounds which undermines the widening participation agenda. Where the false dichotomy exists in institutions, a situation is created which mitigates against LSES students feeling empowered to achieve high academic standards and overall success. It presents the key factors for empowering students from low socio-economic backgrounds to achieve academic success of the highest standard.
Keywords
Widening participation; higher education; academic standards; low SES background students; equity versus standards
Introduction
The widening participation agenda has been widely discussed in recent years in light of targets set by the Australian Government in 2009 to increase the proportion and number of students from LSES backgrounds in higher education (HE). With a change of government in Australia in late 2013, the targets per se were softened. However, the government’s commitment to equity and to supporting disadvantaged students in HE continues. There is thus a clear need for institutions to continue to explore how best to support, include, retain, and graduate students who have diversity in their preparedness and social capital (Devlin, McKay, Kift, Nelson, & Smith, 2012).
This chapter draws on the findings from a recent Australian study that examined effective teaching and support of university students from LSES backgrounds from the conceptual framework of “bridging sociocultural incongruity” (Devlin, 2013), rather than from a deficit perspective that assumes lower standards are operating. As this chapter will show, a discourse around “dumbing down” often plagues the widening participation agenda. There exists an assumption that by allowing differently prepared students into university, and thereby improving equity, standards are compromised. This dichotomy is premised on an assumption of deficit in, and inherent lack of respect for, students from LSES backgrounds. There is thus a clear need for a purposeful challenge to the equity/standards dichotomy in order to ensure LSES students feel respected and empowered to achieve the high standards they want and expect. We argue that this requires an institution-wide approach and a sound policy framework incorporating appropriate structural arrangements and an overall supportive institutional culture (Devlin et al., 2012).
To this end, this chapter distils the lessons learned from a national study about how institutions can support and ensure the success of students from LSES backgrounds. It will firstly outline the widening participation agenda in Australia, before exploring the equity/standards dichotomy. The succeeding section will present the findings from the study for institutional leaders and policy makers to consider before offering concluding remarks.
The Australian Widening Participation Agenda
Widening participation aims to “open up and transform” an exclusive HE system “by dismantling educational barriers and challenging the traditional class identities and identifications associated with university entry” (French, 2013, p. 238). An extensive body of work has been undertaken on inclusive teaching in US and UK institutions. However, Devlin et al. (2012) note that while, “Australia has learnt, and has much more to learn, from this work, the Australian HE sector is different structurally and operationally from its international counterparts and operates within a unique policy, regulatory and cultural context” (p. 9). Contextualizing the issue, James (2007) explains, Australia has been a leader in establishing a national equity policy framework, and making powerful moves—like the Higher Education Contribution Scheme—toward an egalitarian HE system. Gale and Parker (2013) claim widening participation has a long history in Australia and since 1990, the term “equity” has been the focus of the debate, with the aim being that the representation of people from LSES backgrounds in the student population should reflect their representation in the broader population. While participation for Indigenous people, people with disabilities and people from non-English-speaking backgrounds has improved somewhat, students from LSES backgrounds remain significantly underrepresented, despite 20 years of equity policy (James, 2007).
James (2007) concludes that in the Australian context, “higher education disproportionately serves high SES people…as it does elsewhere in the world” (p. 8) (see also Schuetze & Slowey, 2003). According to Whiteford, Shah, and Nair (2013), “Diversity, or rather the lack of it,” was foregrounded in the landmark Bradley Review (2008) which “suggested the need for inclusive policies to improve and access and participation of disadvantaged subpopulations in higher education” (p. 304). The government’s widening participation agenda represents part of ongoing attempts to address this. Things are changing slowly and some institutions do better than others in this regard. Research has shown that elite universities tend to have an average of 7% of students from LSES backgrounds compared to post-1987 universities, which have an average of 21.5% (Shah, Lewis, & Fitzgerald, 2011).
Equity and Standards
While some champion the move from a restricted, elitist university system to a more open-access system (Weiss, McCarthy, & Dimitriades, 2006; Young & Muller, 2007); others fear “that letting increasing numbers of nontraditional students into higher education will result in a dilution of academic standards” (French, 2013, p. 237) (also see Bretag, 2007; Trout, 1997). Since the former Labor Government set targets to change the proportion and numbers of students from LSES backgrounds, there has been apprehension in the Australian sector around the equity agenda (Devlin et al., 2012). For example, two Australian Vice Chancellors recently expressed concerns that meeting participation targets for LSES students may pose a threat to quality and standards (Campus Review, 2010; Coaldrake, 2011; Trounson, 2012). Similar sentiments were echoed by the elite Group of Eight Australian universities who have demanded greater funding to deal with these students entering HE and the subsequent threat of compromised standards (Hare, 2012; Mason, 2012; Trounson, 2012).
The dichotomy between equity and standards has also taken center stage in populist and media commentaries. Recent articles testify to this, with newspaper article titles including “Quality must not be sacrificed for quantity” (Mason, 2012), “Rush for more a threat to quality” (Hare, 2012, p. 31) and “Low Entrance scores a quality risk” (Trounson, 2012, p. 22). French (2013) explains that claims about the threat to standards purportedly posed by LSES students tend to coincide with widening participation agendas (also see Furedi, 2005; Hayes, 2003; Leathwood & O’Connell, 2003), and so it is not surprising the United Kingdom, United States, and countries in the EU are also contending with these issues (James, 2007; Leathwood & O’Connell, 2003). In the UK context, for example, a wealth of academic reports and media articles have emerged linking widening participation to the “dumbing down” of HE (see, for example, Hulme, 2003).
This fear and apprehension, as O’Farrell (2005) sees it, arises because democratization has the potential to threaten the traditional privileges afforded the powerful groups in western society. O’Farrell (2005) is not alone in this view. Drawing on the work of Cohen (1972), French (2013) expounds, the “dumbing down” catchcry is part of a “moral panic” stemming from a struggle to deal with a change or threats to core values. Neoliberal politicians and middle-class pundits, French (2013) continues, have “mobilized around this fear of standards in an expanded higher education sector” (p. 239). The notion of “dumbing down” has unfortunately had the effect of propagating the divisive thinking and elitism historically built into the HE system (Locke, 2010). French (2013) claims such views, “feed on the foundations of a long-standing, albeit implicit, distrust of the growth in the sector on elitist, ideological grounds.”
Not surprisingly, an increasing number of voices are rising to counter populist views that widening participation negatively impacts standards. For example, Whiteford et al. (2013) argue that while students from disadvantaged backgrounds may require greater support, “their levels of educational achievement are, over time, no different from their peers or perhaps, indeed slightly better” (2013, p. 301). James (2007) similarly insists, “the belief that widening participation will lower university standards is one of the most pernicious myths, reflecting a deeply pessimistic view of human potential and the capacity of education to develop people” (p. 11). Whiteford et al. (2013) propose:
“Despite recent research which shows comparable academic outcomes between traditional and non-traditional students, the literature has historically reflected a view that enhancing the accessibility of an institution to disadvantaged students may be damaging to its reputation and profile. Embedded within such a perspective seems to be a tacit assumption that disadvantaged students will be underperforming students and that time spent on them by academics disadvantages higher performing students.”
(p. 303).
Furedi (2005) sees the scaremongering around academic standards as unsubstantiated and certainly not informed by research. Meanwhile the Australian Universities Quality Agency (AUQA) (2009) stresses the need for this type of deficit thinking to be challenged by drawing on “counter-arguments … based on strong and explicit evidence” (p. 3). The study discussed in this chapter provides such evidence.
The Study
The Australian study examined, from a research and evidence based perspective, how higher education institutions (HEIs) could best support, include, retain, and graduate students from LSES backgrounds. It set out to deliberately recruit “successful” LSES students; that is, those students who had completed at least a year of university study and reenrolled for another year. The project thus sought to capture the experiences of students from LSES backgrounds who had successfully negotiated and completed that first challenging period of their university experience and ask them to articulate “what works” (Devlin et al., 2012).
Theoretical Framework
The study drew on the tenets of constructivism (Bruner, 1996), transition pedagogy (Kift, 2009; Kift & Nelson, 2005), and inclusive pedagogy (Waterfield & West, 2006), as well as on conceptual work undertaken by Warren (2002) in integrated curriculum design, as its theoretical framework. Unlike other studies, a unique conceptual framework was developed that avoided adopting either a deficit conception of LSES students or the institutions which they attend. This framework, drawn from Devlin (2013), maintained that the success of LSES students could be most usefully conceptualized as a “joint venture” between students and institutions toward bridging sociocultural incongruity. The notion of sociocultural incongruence (Devlin, 2013), was adopted as a way of conceptualizing the differences in cultural and social capital between students from LSES backgrounds and the high SES institutions in which they study.
Data Collection
Data was collected from four sources: (i) a review of the literature on the experience of students from LSES backgrounds in HE; (ii) interviews with 89 successful students who were from LSES backgrounds and in the first generation of their family to attend university; (iii) interviews with 26 staff identified as experts in teaching and/or supporting students from LSES backgrounds at university; and (iv) an environmental scan of effective policy, programs, and practice in teaching and/or supporting students from LSES status backgrounds across Australia.
The full findings from the study can be found in Devlin et al. (2012). This chapter highlights the key findings related to academic standards and the need to empower them to succeed.
Institutional Lessons on Equity, Standards, and Respect
Standards are without doubt of utmost importance to HEIs as demonstrated by the amount of dedicated time which has been spent developing specifications and indicators of HE quality over the last five decades (Bennett, 1995; Coates, 2010; Trow, 1987). According to Coates (2010), academic standards lie “at the heart of higher education quality” (p. 5), and it is thus not surprising that the term itself is difficult to define. Drawing on the Australian Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA, 2014), “academic standards” refer to
“an agreed specification (such as a defined benchmark or indicator) that is used as a definition of a level of performance or achievement, rule, or guideline. Standards may apply to academic outcomes, such as student or graduate achievement of core discipline knowledge and core discipline skills (known as learning outcomes), or to academic processes such as student selection, teaching, research supervision, and assessment.”
Notably, TEQSA’s definition focuses on achievement and outcomes, rather than on entry methods or student history or background. This is entirely appropriate. As Tim Pitman from the Australian National Centre for Student Equity in Higher Education says, what Australian universities are supposed to do is educate people and create a quality output, not validate a quality input (Pitman, 2014).
This paper argues that where the false dichotomy around equity and standards exists in institutions, a situation is created which mitigates against LSES students feeling empowered to achieve high academic standards and overall success. The research presented in this section provides “strong and explicit” (AUQA, 2009) evidence to challenge the dichotomy and hopefully create a culture to uphold standards and empower students from LSES backgrounds in HE. Institutions can create the high standards that LSES students expect and want by attending to the points presented below.
Debunking Myths of Lowered Standards
Contrary to frequent claims about lowered standards, there was significant evidence in the study of a focus among LSES students and staff highly experienced in teaching them on high academic and personal standards. The findings reveal a picture of students from LSES backgrounds as high achievers, and both staff and students as committed to upholding high academic standards.
Staff interviewed collectively and emphatically pointed to the need to maintain academic standards, stressing that assumptions made about students from LSES backgrounds are unfounded. One staff respondent said:
“… the first thing I would say is don’t make assumptions about the students … you should always teach students with the expectation that they can excel and that they are capable and have capacity.” [COL_008]
Another staff member was keen to foreground that these students are high achieving and equally determined to do as well as traditional students. She spoke of one LSES student: “I had someone who got High Distinctions, who came to see me to do better.” Another staff member explained:
“… it’s not about dumbing things down … it’s [about] clarifying the expectations. So to me, to respond to the diverse situations …it’s about flexibility and responsiveness to a person’s situation and thinking about what is the contextual factors around them that are impacting on their ability to meet … the demands of the course.” [COL_009]
Successful LSES students interviewed talked about themselves as high achievers, actively seeking academic challenges. When asked what had helped them succeed, they articulated their high aspirations and high internal standards:
“… I have been quite dedicated and trying to achieve high results.” [STU_041]
“… I love anything to do with the science subjects. I excel at them … they’re very challenging … I think that’s part of their attraction—they’re not easy.” [STU_082]
“I always had in my mind that paying money to go to university that I wasn’t just going to be there just to get a pass. That would have been pointless if I was paying hundreds of dollars to attend these classes. I was going to give it my best shot and get the best marks that I possibly could.” [STU_035]
“… my lowest grade I have received overall so far has been a credit, so it’s been mainly high distinctions, high distinctions.” [STU_064]
One LSES student criticized her friends for merely seeking pass grades:
“I have so many of my friends say, ‘Oh, yeah. All I need is a pass and I just want to get a pass.’ But I want more than that …” [STU_002]
Another student shared this attitude:
“… if I’m going to do something, I want to do it well. I don’t just want to scrape together a thousand words and hope it passes.” [STU_087]
Other students explained how their choice of subjects was based on those that posed an academic challenge:
“I remember taking my three subjects in first year. I chose the most difficult…to begin with and … that … really gave me the motivation to study and keep on with it.” [STU_103]
The majority of students were found to set high standards for themselves and demonstrated a clear will to achieve and succeed:
“Well, you just got to put in effort. You’ve got to—it’s none of this high school stuff, leaving it to the very last day and then doing it … You’ve just got … research it, take initiative and responsibility, and just get in and do it and put your best and don’t do sort of, ‘Oh, I’ll just do a half job and that’ll be fine.’ You can’t have that attitude at university. You’ve got to put in your best.” [STU_044]
This rich qualitative data points to the need to debunk myths of low standards which surround students from LSES backgrounds. Devlin et al. (2012) conclude: “Senior and other leaders must communicate both ongoing expectations of continuing high standards and the necessity that staff not make erroneous assumptions about LSES students on the basis of their backgrounds. An important part of this role is to continually challenge misconceptions that link the participation of LSES students in higher education to a lowering of standards” (p. 42).
Respecting the Contexts of Students from LSES Backgrounds
Another finding to emerge is the need for institutional leaders and policy makers to understand and appreciate the contexts of students from LSES backgrounds. Twenty-three out of twenty-six staff interviewed alluded to the importance of students feeling “known” as a significant part of feeling respected and empowered to succeed, and this is reflected in the prior research (Erikson & Strommer, 1991; Fenty, 1997; Grabau, 1999; Midoboche, 1999). Fitzgibbon and Prior (2006) claim that academic staff in HE institutions need to have an overall understanding of all students’ needs, but particularly those of students from nontraditional backgrounds because their requirements, perceptions, and experiences are vastly different from those of more traditional cohorts.
The literature provides insight into the array of contextual differences that institutions and policy makers need to be mindful of in relation to LSES students. Some of these include: fewer benefits (in terms of tutoring, personal computers, and the like) (Greenbank, 2006); the need to prioritize paid employment over studies (Greenbank, 2006); balancing study with career duties, personal demands, and paid employment (Benson, Hewitt, Devos, Crosling, & Heagney, 2009); lacking in support from friends and family, child care, and emotional support (Devlin et al., 2012); time constraints stemming from a range of competing priorities (Crozier et al., 2008); reluctance to seek support (Benson et al., 2009; Lawrence, 2004); nonacademic challenges including decreased self-esteem, lower income, dependent children, less encouragement from parents (Hahs-Vaughn, 2004); and, cultural incongruity whereby these students find it hard to adapt to university life, primarily because of a mismatch between their cultural capital and the middle-class culture they encounter in HE (Greenbank, 2006). Research further testifies to the fact that these students: are time poor; have not always had positive educational experiences; experience worries about finances; often have fear of failure; can have fear of “fitting in”; and, finally, may have different levels of preparedness than their peers (Devlin & McKay, 2011; French, 2013; Hutchings & Archer, 2001; Reay, Crozier, & James, 2008).
Given this range of factors, it is not surprising that students from LSES backgrounds may have specific challenges to overcome in order to succeed at university (Devlin et al., 2012). Developing an inclusive environment and culture is about more than just teaching technique and relates to respecting students as individuals who have diverse backgrounds, different learning needs, and a variety of valuable prior experiences; it is about students feeling that their strengths and differences are acknowledged, fostered, and maximized (Devlin et al., 2012). It is also about every part of an institution implementing this “rigorously, vigorously and thoughtfully” (Griffiths, 2010, p. 8). One staff member stressed the importance of knowing and respecting LSES students and made suggestions about how to achieve this:
“… find out about them, make them feel valued, make them feel important, that their knowledge and skills are as important as anybody else’s, and to utilise those skills … Nothing devalues somebody more than being made to feel like their skills aren’t important.” [COL_011]
In terms of academic standards, what is notable about these findings and the subsequent recommendations to leaders is that applying them will contribute to higher quality learning and teaching and student experiences, and therefore higher standards, for all students.
Facilitating Student Choice
Both students and staff in the Devlin et al. (2012) study saw the provision of flexibility, variety, and choice as critical to success. The literature substantiates the finding that flexibility is a key factor in effectively catering to the learning needs of diverse student cohorts (Yorke & Thomas, 2003). Further, research indicates that students are increasingly demanding flexibility from their institutions (McDonald & Reushle, 2002).
Importantly, academic respondents in our interviews were very careful to stress the significance of maintaining appropriate standards while enabling flexibility, variety, and choice in a transparent, fair, and equitable manner. One interviewee explained:
“So to me, to respond to the diverse situations … it’s about flexibility and responsiveness to a person’s situation and thinking about what are the contextual factors around them that are impacting on their ability to meet all the demands of the course.” [COL_009]
Another stated:
“I suppose the first thing … is flexibility … when I’m designing my teaching delivery approaches, I’m quite supportive of not requiring students to be in a particular place at a particular time … I always tape all my face-to-face lectures … the key is to be flexible, so to make that learning environment one that is valuable for students if they’re there face-to-face, but also if they’re listening online.” [COL_027]
These views echo the findings in a recent Australian study (Te Riele, 2014), which found flexible learning contributes to marginalized students overall learning and well-being, as well as educational success.
Enabling Inclusive Curriculum and Assessment Design
Devlin et al. (2012) found that institutions need to pay particular attention to the critical role of the curriculum as a key mechanism for supporting students from LSES backgrounds. Other theorists share this view about the importance of inclusive curriculum (James, 2007; Kift & Field, 2009). Kift and Field (2009, p. 2) argue that “in all their diversity, and acknowledging their multiple identities and changing patterns of engagement, it is within the first year curriculum that commencing students must be engaged, supported, and realize their sense of belonging. In this way, the curriculum has an important role to play in first year transition and retention.” And the criticality of the curriculum undoubtedly extends beyond first year.
According to Hockings (2010), rather than operating on the assumption that learners from LSES backgrounds have “special needs” that necessitate attention outside the curriculum in adjunct programs, integrated curriculum design targets all students and embraces the varying cognitive, linguistic, knowledge, and culture resources which exist in diverse student cohorts. The importance of curriculum design in meeting the needs of students from LSES backgrounds was explained by one respondent in the Devlin et al. (2012) study in the following way:
“… make sure [the curriculum] … actually comes from where the students are from, so it is flexible enough that they can bring in their world but then it actually challenges them to go beyond that.” [COL_008]
Many interviewees in the same study referred to the importance of taking a program-level perspective in curriculum review and development:
“… we do need to be aware that our student cohorts are changing … and not assume that they’ve got the skills to tackle first year university … we do need to adjust our assessment, our communications, how we design our curriculum, how it all hangs together so that the students can see a clear, common sense, plain English path for their studies.” [COL_014]
Promoting Engagement with and Support from Others
Institutional leaders need to work with academic and general staff to ensure that students from LSES backgrounds have sufficient opportunity to engage with other students, teaching staff, and when possible, their families and communities. Students were emphatic about the importance of engagement and support from others:
“… the most learning I have achieved is through discussions with other students.” [STU_049]
“I probably did better on the subjects where I had lots more social interaction with people doing the same subject.” [STU_072]
“… it helps to have a really good support network otherwise I really don’t know if I’d have the drive to continue doing it.” [STU_092]
Staff similarly stressed the importance of student support networks and engagement with others. One staff member suggested that institutions might consider ensuring students have appropriate places and spaces to meet with others and study:
“… I would prefer to see an inclusive and welcoming and supportive and interested personalised learning environment for all students … our research showed [that] students perceive institutional comfort as a proxy for respect.” [COL_007]
Engagement and support can and should be provided to students from LSES backgrounds by encouraging and facilitating collaborative learning; mentoring programs; spaces/places to meet and study; external support networks (e.g., family); and online engagement.
Normalizing and Encouraging Help-Seeking Behavior
Institutions have a central role to play in both ensuring staff are adequately educated about the adjunct support services available and what they offer students, and about the need to encourage independence by directing students to appropriate services (Devlin et al., 2012). Prior research suggests there are many potential barriers to help-seeking behavior by students (Easton & Laar, 1995; Grayson, Miller, & Clarke, 1998; Karabenick & Knapp, 1991). Clegg, Bradley, and Smith (2006) posit that upon entry to university, students often protect their self-esteem by not seeking assistance from formal support services. To counter this, they suggest that seeking help be normalized (Clegg et al., 2006).
Staff in our interviews proposed that encouraging help-seeking behaviors can be achieved by making support services explicit and normalizing their use. One interviewee commented:
“I think the thing is, you can hope that by putting the message out, the ones who particularly need help will come along.” [COL_001]
Respondents were clear on the need to normalize help-seeking behaviors among LSES students, many of whom fear being perceived as “needy” (Devlin et al., 2012):
“I’ve found that students have said ‘Oh, I don’t like to ask’. I suppose there’s that self-perception … that they don’t want to be seen to be needy.” [COL_024]
“… these students don’t perceive themselves as the kind of person who would access that service … [using] the support service indicates to them that they’re not succeeding at university and probably they’ve got learning deficits.” [COL_021]
These factors are essential for institutional leaders to note and address (Devlin et al., 2012). It is critical, Devlin et al. (2012) argue, that seeking and using help is portrayed as “normal” and not as indicative of deficit. Staff suggested some ways in which students’ help seeking might be normalized. These related to the manner and tone in which support services were discussed and linking the seeking of help to students’ current frames of reference:
“… we make sure its practical … we try our best to make sure it’s not stigmatised even though it might be targeted at groups with a shared attribute and we just do that by making it as normal and open and friendly and ordinary as possible.” [COL_026]
Minimizing Financial Challenges for Students
It almost goes without saying that students from LSES backgrounds contend with varying degrees of financial challenge. Many of these students have financial responsibilities for themselves and others and they are often required to work while studying. Our study found that many students are struggling to cope financially:
“I have three jobs and I still can’t manage.” [STU_104]
“I work night shift to put me through uni so that part-time job can be tiring when I go to uni [after] finishing at 2:30 or 3 in the morning and then getting up for uni can be taxing on not only my body but mentally as well.” [STU_037]
Research indicates that the financial assistance proffered by institutions, can have a positive impact on students from LSES backgrounds—particularly on their retention rates and overall success. Hatt, Hannan, and Baxter (2005) found that LSES students who were provided with financial assistance were more likely to continue and succeed than those who do not receive financial assistance. Many researchers have explored the financial burdens LSES students experience in HE and call for action by institutions to assist in easing the financial pressures on these students (Aitken, Schapper, & Skuja, 2004; Allen, Solomon, Storan, & Thomas, 2005; Hornak, Farrell, & Jackson, 2010; Stater, 2009; Titus, 2006).
Articulating the financial difficulties experienced by these students, and the impact this can have on student learning and overall success, one student interviewee in the Devlin et al. (2012) study said:
“As a student counsellor here, I see a lot of students who are really struggling, and I think maybe that’s half the reason why a lot of students drop out is because of their financial situation.” [STU_064]
Institutions might consider providing financial services and support for students, which may include equity scholarship programs, financial advice, and financial and equipment loans.
Resourcing Teachers of Students from LSES Backgrounds
Twenty-one out of twenty-six (81%) of staff respondents in the Devlin et al. (2012) study mentioned the extra time and work involved in providing careful attention to a diverse cohort of students and to the particular needs of LSES students. The existing literature surrounding the support of students from LSES backgrounds testifies to the importance of providing staff with support, professional development opportunities and the resources they require to teach increasingly diverse student cohorts (Darling-Hammond, 2000; Mulryan-Kyne, 2010; Swafford, 1998; Tucker et al., 2005). While theorists argue for different approaches, there is general consensus that staff need considerable support as demands on their time and workload increase (Devlin et al., 2012).
Staff respondents explained the importance of giving these students their time:
“You need a unit of interaction where at least some individual engagement and attention can occur.” [COL_026]
“I think it’s just time. I think I would spend the most time with them. Isn’t that one of the most valuable resources that you can really give, is time?” [COL_025]
In the staff interviews, the matter of potential burnout among academics who work with diverse cohorts was frequently alluded to. Aspects of institutional policy and practice in relation to LSES students were also raised and identified as being in need of consideration. Respondents proposed policy approaches that might assist with this issue:
“… [one] strategy … at the institutional level … [is] bringing back a higher percentage of the workload for teachers who are teaching first year students, so that they can spend the time, and making that policy.” [COL_012]
“… unless there are some kind of career related incentives, then it will always be the troupers who are … carrying the world on their shoulders.” [COL_004]
These are serious matters that warrant immediate consideration by institutional leaders. Without due consideration and the development and implementation of appropriate policy and strategies, significant staff dissatisfaction and turnover may become an issue. If this were to occur, this might threaten the quality of teaching and learning and academic standards.
Conclusion
Since the former Labor government set targets to increase the proportion and number of students from LSES backgrounds in HE, an apprehension in the Australian sector around the equity agenda has been exposed. That apprehension stems from a pervasive assumption that by allowing these students entry into HE, standards are somehow compromised. The national study which this chapter draws on provides compelling evidence to counter these assumptions.
The 26 exemplary educators interviewed as part of the Devlin et al. (2012) study were insistent about the need to set and maintain academic standards and to support these students to achieve these standards. Staff found students from LSES backgrounds were not necessarily the students who were struggling or failing. The data to emerge from the 89 student interviews substantiates the view of these students as capable, agentive, and academically successful. Students spoke of their academic successes, high standards, and aspirations to exceed expectations. Rather than just aiming for pass grades, students showed they were high achieving, hardworking, and determined. The findings from both data sets counter the all too frequent assumptions made about students from LSES backgrounds and the threat they are assumed to pose to standards.
This chapter maintains that where the false dichotomy around equity and standards exists in institutions, a situation is created which mitigates against LSES students feeling empowered to achieve high academic standards and overall success. It stresses the need for HE institutions to foster a culture which both upholds standards and empowers students from LSES backgrounds in HE. Institutions can create the high standards that LSES students both expect and want by attending to the suggestions provided in this chapter.
Whiteford et al. (2013) call for institutions to respond proactively to the needs of diverse student cohorts while ensuring that academic standards are rigorously upheld. Macdonald and Stratta (2001) claim that a radical rethink of more appropriate approaches to a diverse student population is required; and this needs to be a top-down approach. While stressing the importance of equity, Whiteford et al. (2013) are unequivocal that widening participation should “not compromise quality standards” (p. 300). Schnee (2008) also proposes that high education standards must be upheld at all times, even when dealing with academically underprepared students. This chapter has argued for the need to maintain high academic standards. It proposes suggestions for institutional leaders and policy makers to consider in their efforts to empower LSES students to aspire to high standards and succeed. The widening participation agenda in Australia, and the proportion of LSES students entering HE, should not change the need to uphold quality and standards and, in our view, nor do they.
Acknowledgments
We would like to acknowledge an Australian Commonwealth Office for Learning and Teaching (OLT) Strategic Priority Grant, which provided funding for the research outlined in this chapter. We also acknowledge the contributions to the OLT-funded research of our project colleagues.