ABSTRACT
In their analysis of trends in class and gender in access to higher education in the United Kingdom in the twentieth century, Egerton and Halsey (1993) distinguish three key characteristics: it was, they write, a period of enormous expansion, there was considerable movement towards gender equality, and there was very little movement towards social-class equality. This chapter examines these trends over the first two-thirds of the century, in the expansion that took place leading up to the Robbins Report (Robbins 1963a). An eightfold increase in numbers took place over this period – from 25,000 full-time students in 1900 to 216,000 in 1962 (ibid. Table 3) – but who benefited? Which social categories were empowered by this expansion in access to higher education? The period was one in which higher education was still only providing for an elite minority. The age participation index, as far as can be determined from the various forms of data available, rose over the period from about 1 per cent of the age set in full-time higher education in 1900 to about 8.5 per cent in 1962. Going to university was against the norm. In 1962 it was even against the norm for the most socially privileged group, of young males in the higher professional social class (Robbins 1963a: Tables 5 and 21). In this chapter, we examine the growth that occurred and in particular the way in which the social composition of the student population began to change. The expansion noted by Egerton and Halsey began in this period. However, there were only relatively small movements towards gender equality, and still less towards class equality. Chapter 3 will examine participation trends in the final third of the twentieth century, in which there was further growth, this time including a slow but significant element of gender equality (and a factor that was new on a substantial scale, ethnic equality) but again a period of stagnation in redressing class inequalities.
