Education help

In recent days your newspaper has highlighted the 
extremely low number of 
students from deprived areas studying in Scottish universities.

Everyone who wants to pursue higher education in Scotland should be able to, regardless of their background.

The fact that around 20 per cent of colleges’ work is delivering higher education to students is often overlooked in 
the debate surrounding access to 
degree-level study in Scotland.

Going to college is the main route into higher education for students from the most deprived backgrounds. Almost 50,000 students undertook a higher education course at a college last year. Most have articulation links, more often than not with the “newer” universities.

Articulation links between colleges and universities provide students from the most deprived backgrounds the chance to progress their education and achieve more, often without having to repeat years of study. Around 5,500 students articulated into a university last year, and just over 20 per cent of those students were from the most 
deprived backgrounds.

These partnerships between colleges and universities must be given the recognition they deserve – both sectors work hard to create and maintain articulation links so that students can benefit from them.

We hope that the Scottish Funding Council’s Outcome Agreements with universities, due for publication soon, will take the importance of linking college and university courses into account, and encourage the growth of articulation networks throughout the country.

We will continue to work with universities to protect, 
promote and deliver articulation links for any student who wishes to take advantage of them.

We hope that the universities with the lowest number of 
students from deprived areas will work with the colleges in their region to remove barriers to higher education.

John Henderson

Scotland’s Colleges

Castle Business Park

Stirling