CARE AND LEARNING IN HIGHER EDUCATION “We can send hundreds of emails out and offer financial support and things like that, but some will still not ever get back to us or take up that support. Even though we have 160 care experienced students at any one time, and about 250 estranged students, at least, at any one time, I'd say only about 40% of those students would actually take up that support.” Higher education representative Difference is not necessarily a bad thing, in an area where best practice is still emerging and needs can vary. We believe there are benefits to institutions innovating and experimenting with different approaches to support. Competitive dynamics have their place too, with universities seeing what their peers are doing and being driven to up their games. The Propel website is a valuable resource, allowing care experienced students to compare universities in terms of their approach to care experienced students. We certainly heard of students that chose their universities on the basis of the size of bursary on offer or other forms of support. “I got an offer from everywhere I applied, and probably the best out of those was [University A], but [University B] has a super generous care leavers bursary, which was really obviously nice to have, and also the Unite Foundation Scholarship is only available at [University B].” Student Yet if the variation is too wide, there is a risk that care experienced and estranged applicants are choosing institutions for the wrong reasons. If their decision is influenced too much by how much housing and financial support is on offer, they may deprioritise other educational or cultural factors that mean their preferred institution is not the right fit for them. They may feel unable to attend their preferred university because the economics don’t work. In HEPI’s student survey, 38% of care experienced students and 36% of estranged students have considered withdrawing from their course, compared to 25% of all students.51 One common reason they give is that they have chosen the wrong institution. Fiona Ellison, Director of the Unite Foundation, reported that “Anecdotally, we hear from students that what they think their university is going to provide isn’t always what is available or accessible, a likely 52 reason many consider leaving”. The issue is made worse by the fact that differences in provision track differences in resources rather than need. It is an over-generalisation to say that rich universities with fewer care experienced students can afford to treat them much more generously, whereas poorer universities that accept more care experienced students have to spread their resources more thinly – but it is an over-generalisation with more than a grain of truth. “It obviously isn’t [fair]. [High-tariff provider] congratulates itself that it has this amazing bursary scheme for its disadvantaged students. You know, there are literally 10 of them, and, yeah, they give them the earth because they can afford to. […] On the other hand, you have institutions that basically let in a load disadvantaged students, then don't do anything [to support] them, and then expect to be congratulated because they've let them in” Policymaker, on distribution of resource across the HE sector Let us examine a few illustrative examples. The University of Sheffield offers a substantial bursary, worth up to £10,000 overall, but is third from bottom in Civitas’ 37