Low socio-economic status

Low socio-economic status

The SMILE project will address the challenge of lower access and attainment rates of students with a low socio-economic status, which leads to their underrepresentation in higher education.

‘Low socio-economic status’ is not defined in the same way in all countries and no recent aggregated comparative data is available. However, the educational attainment of parents can be used as a proxy, as it is closely related to employment, occupation and income. Students whose parents have attained a higher level of education have higher rates of completion in all EU countries, though to varying degrees. A Finnish study, comparing students from working-class background with middle-class students, found that students from working-class backgrounds are more uncertain about the suitability of higher education for them and use slightly less time for studying. In addition, they are more likely to have to work alongside studying and take out a student loan.

As part of the SMILE project, a summary and state of the art will give an overview about the situation of low socio-economic background students in Europe. Also, there will be a section in the audit model, which enables HEIs to self-reflect on how they address the inclusion of  this group of students. Furthermore, a CPD course will be designed that allows both academic and non-academic university staff to become more aware and knowledgeable, as well as prepared to support students from lower socio-economic groups. Finally, a set of policy recommendations will provide institutional leaders and decision makers with ideas on how to implement changes that benefit said group of students.

You can watch now our webinar on low socio-economic status organised by the University of Turku (FI) with the Technical University of Iasi (RO) and Solidar Foundation (BE).

SMILE CPD course for HE staff on Students with low socio-economic status

The Socio-Economic Status (SES) represents a trigger to divide the perspective of the stakeholders and actors from Higher Education. The SMILE CPD course intends to broaden perspectives, work on skills of communication, build up flexibility and develop new skills.
 
You can now download the course and start using it straight away. This course is self-contained.
 

You can download this CPD in English clicking the button above, and also its translated version in German, Spanish, Finnish, French, Italian or Romanian from below.

Note: the original version of this CPD has been written in English. If you find any incongruence when you use the translated version, please refer to the original document in English for clarification. Thank you.

Explore our other SMILE pillars: 

Don't forget that SMILE has developed a CPD Introductory course to Diversity!

You can download it clicking the button below: