Degree education ’more equal’ than league tables claim

A new study suggests a competitive market for university students which uses standardised information about courses to highlight differences in 'quality' is misleading. Treating potential and current university students simply as customers can overlook the 'personal transformative' effect of engaging with academic knowledge in undergraduate-level education. Results of a major Economics and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded three-year study of sociology and related social sciences degrees reveal today that students have benefited in equivalent ways from studying the same or related subjects at four very different universities - half towards the top of conventional league tables, the rest near the bottom. The Universities of Nottingham, Lancaster and Teesside investigated student experiences at four other unnamed universities. They will present outline findings from the 'Pedagogic quality and inequality in university first degrees' project at an event for policymakers at The Work Foundation, Westminster. These research findings have a number of significant policy implications that contradict approaches endorsed by government and higher education leaders following recommendations in last year's Browne Report. This study of sociology and related social science degree courses considered separate universities.