The impact of the pandemic on widening participation students: the teaching professionals’ perspective

A number of studies have shown that the COVID-19 pandemic has had a disproportionately adverse effect on the education of those from more disadvantaged backgrounds. However, less is known about the pandemic's impact on the educational ambitions of the same young people and their prospects for progressing to higher-level study. Although those engaged in widening access have continued to provide support to these students, the circumstantial evidence suggests that the lockdowns and school closures associated with the pandemic may have further widened the participation gap between young people from more affluent backgrounds and their less advantaged peers. Now schools have reopened and things have return to normal, there is a need to understand the progression challenges those from widening participation backgrounds face. This study seeks to do this by drawing on the insights of 14 teaching professionals from a selection of schools and colleges in the English West Midlands with catchment areas that draw heavily on disadvantaged neighbourhoods. Conducted in spring 2021, the semistructured interviews with these teachers presented an opportunity to reflect on the impact of more than 12 months of educational disruption and to consider what is now needed to widen university access.