Of students who attended a summer school — such as the one run at The University of Nottingham for the last 10 years — and responded to a survey, 88 per cent graduated with a 2:1 or first class degree. This compares with 56 per cent of students achieving these classifications nationally, and 67 per cent in leading research universities.
The findings of the Sutton Trust Review are backed up by a separate analysis by The University of Nottingham which found that 78 per cent of all its own summer school students admitted to the university received 2:1s or firsts in their degrees — slightly higher than the institutional average.
Sutton Trust summer schools target students in Year 12, the lower sixth form year or first year of college, with the aim of encouraging them to progress to a prestigious research-led university. The schools focus on those who have displayed high levels of academic ability from family backgrounds with no previous experience of university and/or a less affluent socio-economic grouping.
The schools run for a week and are residential, involving both university lecturing staff and student volunteers. There are both academic and social events, and many opportunities for participants to find out — at no charge — about all aspects of study at the host institution.
The Sutton Trust, set up by Sir Peter Lampl in 1997 to improve social mobility through education, pioneered the one-week long university courses in the UK in 1997. Over the last decade more than 10,000 students have benefited from the summer schools supported by the Trust and its partners.
Pulling together different strands of research, the Ten Year Review of Sutton Trust Summer Schools summarises a number of studies on the impact of the schools as well as interviews with past students. As well as The University of Nottingham, the research covers the universities of Oxford, Cambridge, Bristol and St Andrew's, where the sponsored weeks are conducted by staff and mentors from those universities.
Sir Peter Lampl, Chairman of the Sutton Trust, said: “The success of the summer schools is not just demonstrated by how well past students do academically at leading universities — impressive though these results are. The summer schools are also about social benefits — many students told researchers how for the first time they found like-minded people during their university stay — after feeling isolated in their own local schools.
“Such experiences show just how life transforming the summer schools can be. This is a vital message to get out today to students from homes where neither parent went to university, from schools which don't send many students to leading universities and from families whose parents work in non-professional occupations.”
Dr Penelope Griffin, Head of Widening Participation at The University of Nottingham, said: “These findings demonstrate that given the opportunity, students from non-privileged backgrounds will do as well if not better than their counterparts from other backgrounds.
“The University of Nottingham shares the Sutton Trust's aim of encouraging talented young people to achieve their potential and we are delighted to work together on the Sutton Trust Summer Schools. To date, 679 young people have benefited from these Summer Schools at the University.”
The findings of the Review also suggest that ex-summer school students are much more likely to go on to do a postgraduate degree — one in five as opposed to one in 16 nationally — particularly at doctorate level. They are also more likely to go into teaching: 17 per cent went on to work as teachers in compulsory education compared to about 7 per cent nationally.
The review also includes the results of an analysis by the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) into the financial returns for these students based on extra earnings over a life-time. BCG estimated that for every £1 spent on the Bristol summer school a discounted present value of £9 of extra earnings were generated and this figure rose to £14 at the Cambridge summer school.
It also includes a study by the National Foundation for Educational Research which found that the impact of the summer schools was equivalent to having four additional GCSEs at grades A or A*, or the difference between having parents with no formal qualifications and having at least one parent with a degree-level qualification, in relation to whether or not young people took up places at summer school universities.
Summer school students are far less likely to come from professional backgrounds than other university students. Fewer than four in ten (38 per cent) students attending summer schools in 2000 had parents in professional, managerial and non-manual occupations. This compared with more than eight in ten full time students at research-intensive universities.
Source: By The University OF Nottingham
