Offering students incentives worth up to £500 would still fail to persuade many of them to visit top universities such as Leeds, Manchester or Cardiff, according to a survey conducted by the UK admissions clearing house, Ucas.
Institutions face a stiff battle persuading students to set their sights higher and apply to enter selective universities such as those in the research-orientated Russell Group, including Nottingham, Southampton and Newcastle, as well as to Oxford and Cambridge, the results suggest.
The survey of 16,000 British undergraduate applicants, weighted to reflect the national population, found that 57% of those who did not apply to the so-called higher tariff institutions did not even consider doing so, with little variation between regions or sex.
Nearly half of those who did not consider more prestigious universities said the entry grades were too high, but almost as many said that none offered a course they wanted to study, while one in five said they were “too expensive” and one in six said they didn’t know enough about them.
The potential offer of travel vouchers was not enough to tempt more than half of those to apply to the likes of Exeter or Edinburgh. Around a quarter wouldn’t even consider visiting the universities even when the proposal was raised to £500 – suggesting that money alone would not be enough to overcome the barriers that many students experience.
About a quarter of the 16,000 undergraduates who entered in 2015 agreed that those at university “tend to be from a wealthier background than me”, while most disagreed.
A report by Ucas based on the survey results recommended that universities “consider financial incentives to encourage applicants to attend more open days” and should be clear about course entry requirements.
In another surprising result, potential students were just as likely to be impressed by their halls of residence than in academic reputation. Some 64% agreed that having the right accommodation at university was just as important as the quality of the course they wanted to take, while just 17% disagreed.
The importance of student accommodation found a gap between men and women: 66% of women wanted to be happy with their rooms compared with just 61% of men.
Other results had some opposing outcomes: 85% agreed that “some universities are much better than others”. But there was an almost even split on whether “everyone knows which universities are best”, with 38% agreeing, 35% disagreeing and 26% undecided.
One-fifth of applicants said they had “felt sure” they would apply to university from the age of 10.
White applicants were the least likely to aim for university at such a young age, compared with other ethnic groups. Nearly a quarter of black or Asian students said they set their hopes on higher education from 10 or younger.
“We need to reset the barometer reading for progression to higher education to a much earlier age – 10 or younger. Having a focus on university helps provide the rationale for working hard and doing well at GCSEs, which is the strongest predictor of success in higher education,” said Mary Curnock Cook, Ucas’s chief executive.
