Academics today warn that the government's drive to widen higher education participation and attract more students from disadvantaged backgrounds is failing because educational achievement is inextricably linked to family background, writes Debbie Andalo.
They say that one look at primary school league tables provides good evidence that a child's success in the classroom can be traced back to class, family background and parental experience with education.
Their report, on behalf of the funding council Hefce, suggests that if widening participation is to work and reach those disaffected youngsters who leave school at 16 with no GCSEs and no aspirations for higher education, the time has come to scrap, or at least change, the academic requirements for entry to university.
At the same time, the education secretary, Alan Johnson, admitted today that the government was unlikely to meet its target of 50% of young people entering university by 2010.
And he was concerned that some teachers were failing to encourage teenagers from poorer or disadvantaged backgrounds to "aim low".
For generations, sport - especially boxing and football - has been seen by youngsters, their peers and their families as an acceptable route out of poverty and social deprivation.
So is it the case that widening participation can only work when parents and their disenchanted teenagers recognise that education also offers them the same way out?
