News

North East schools are top suppliers of students to Durham University

(2 January 2003)

Eight schools and colleges in the North East are among the top 10 suppliers of students to the University of Durham, according to figures released today. (23 December 2002).

The University has issued its "Feeders Top 10" to spread awareness about its activities in widening participation in higher education in the region, and to help raise the aspirations of able students from non-traditional backgrounds who might not feel confident about applying to university.

The top three establishments are in Middlesbrough, Sunderland and Durham City, and others are in Stockton, Darlington and Guisborough (see table below).

All eight suppliers are among 90 state schools and colleges in the region targeted by the University for wider participation work designed to get pupils and their parents thinking about university from an earlier age. Durham staff and students are engaged with all years from primary schools to sixth-forms. They run a programme of two-way visits and subject-related projects and, for the past three years, a week-long residential summer school for more than100 pupils from the region. The aim is to generate more applications - which in turn lead to a higher proportion of admissions.

An increasing proportion of Durham's intake is from the North East. It is now 20 per cent - or one student in every five - compared with 16 per cent in 1999. Currently 11 per cent of Durham's entrants are drawn from the poorest low participation neighbourhoods, compared with 7 per cent in 1999.

Richard Taylor, Head of Schools Liaison for Durham University, said: "The region's schools and colleges send us really talented students. These trends reflect our joint efforts to spread awareness about higher education, especially among people from backgrounds where they has been little or no tradition of going to university. We talk to pupils before they enter the sixth-form, and to their teachers, to raise aspirations. We expect the full effect of this work to come through even more clearly in next year's entry figures.

"This work contributes to the government's plans to bring more people into higher education. While Durham will continue to recruit from the best available people both nationally and internationally, we definitely aim to attract more applicants from our home region.

"We have occasionally come across a lingering perception here and there that 'Durham doesn't recruit locally' or 'Durham isn't for me'. But the message we have been putting out is consistently that we are interested in people with good academic ability and potential, from all areas and backgrounds."

Table of Schools and Colleges as "Feeders" to Durham University:

The latest completed statistics show that among the student intake in 2001, about 30 schools and colleges across the country sent 10 or more students to Durham. The "Top 10 Feeders" were:

	School/College	Students
1	St Mary's College, Middlesbrough	22
2=	New College, Durham	21
	City of Sunderland College	21
4=	Stockton Sixth Form College	19
	Middlesbrough College	19
6	Queen Elizabeth Sixth Form College, Darlington	18
7	Prior Pursglove College, Guisborough	17
8=	Hills Road Sixth Form College, Cambridge	16
	Durham Sixth Form Centre	16
10	Greenhead College, Huddersfield	15

Figures cover recruitment to undergraduate degree courses at both campuses of the University, in Durham and at Queen's Campus, Stockton which opened in 1992.

Highest placed independent school is Oundle, at 13th with 12 students. Eton College is at 27th with 11.
P7.1067 23 December 2002