Russell Group universities to admit students with grades as low as CDD

 Russell Group universities are preparing to admit students with grades as low as CDD, by giving them an extra year of tuition to get them up to speed.   

Some of the country’s leading institutions are now adding on an extra “foundation” year to undergraduate degrees to cater for pupils who failed to get good enough A-levels to win a place on the course.  

Universities are under pressure to accept students from a diverse range of backgrounds, and some foundation year courses are only open to students who grew up in disadvantaged households.  

The courses – which charge the full £9,250 in tuition fees - are designed to prepare students for the rigours of a university degree.  

The number of British students enrolling on university degrees with foundation years has almost tripled in the last five years, between 2012/13 and 2017/18, from 10,430 to 30,030.

Leeds University has six courses with a foundation year available in clearing, including a BA in Arts and Humanities that admits students with CDD in A-levels and Business Studies where students need CCC.

Both are only open to school-leavers who have been in care, went to a below average school or grew up in a deprived area.  

Sheffield University has 53 courses with foundation years on offer in clearing, while  Queen Mary University London has 27 and Southampton University has 46. York, Newcastle, Nottingham and Cardiff all run foundation years as well.  

The courses have been criticised as bad value for the taxpayer, since prepare for university at a much lower cost by enrolling at a further education college.

A Government commissioned review into higher education, published earlier this year, recommended that funding for foundation year courses should be scrapped.  

"It is hard not to conclude that universities are using foundation years to create four-year degrees in order to entice students who do not otherwise meet their standard entry criteria,” it said.  

“The taxpayer is entitled to ask why universities are not collaborating with FECs [further education colleges] on enrolling these students onto Access Diplomas with lower fees, more advantageous loan terms, and a standalone qualification, or, if necessary, running such courses themselves, as a few universities already do.”