1
From Appendix 1, IV, Table 56. There is an important qualification in the Report to this extrapolation of past trends. The proportion of boys leaving at 17+ who have gained A-level passes has been roughly constant between 1955 and 1961, while among girls the proportion has been rising. The Report for various reasons assumes that this trend among the girls will cease. This is an important qualification, since ‘if… the proportion (of the age group achieving the relevant school-leaving qualifications) had been estimated by a straight continuation of the trend from 1954 and 1961, the number of places needed would have been 60,000 higher than has been estimated’. (1, IV, §177.) For the rationale for this assumption, see ibid., §42-44 and 49.
2
The Report sometimes gives the impression, as here, that it is predicting social trends, whereas it is in fact recommending a specific number of places for an increased demand of unknown size and timing flowing from some social trend about which the authors have speculated. The figure of 10 per cent attached to the presumed growth in the proportion of qualifiers who apply for places is almost wholly arbitrary (see the discussion in 1, IV, §85-91); nor is there any good reason for believing that the increased demand resulting from this tendency will be confined to the years when provision is made for it. Yet each one percentage point by which the estimate differs from reality will mean a difference in 5,000 places (equal to one new university) in 1980/1 (1, IV, §178)–and this is one of the less important factors entering into the estimates and recommendations.
3
Sir Peter Venables in discussion suggested another accelerator which I had not thought of and which is not mentioned in the Report: that is, the rise in the numbers of ‘second generation’ educated employers, who will encourage and perhaps even require their employees to continue their higher education. There may well be other accelerating forces at work.
4
The Report suggests (1, IV, §29) that there may be other social forces which will tend to reduce the effective demand for places in higher education. One example given is the possibility that increased numbers of graduates in the future would lead to unemployment among them, or to lower salary levels, and thus in turn lead to a reduction in the demand for places, or at least a slowing in the rate of growth of qualified candidates. In principle, of course, such ‘decelerating’ forces cannot be ruled out. But there is reason to believe that it is extremely unlikely that such negative factors would cancel the forces making for the growth of demand. With respect to the specific ‘decelerating’ force cited, it is perhaps relevant that, contrary to similar predictions in the United States after World War II, a very large growth in the numbers earning degrees in higher education has been accompanied by an increase in the differential income associated with a college degree, and by a marked inverse relationship between education and unemployment. See Herman P. Miller, ‘Annual and Lifetime Income in Relation to Education: 1939-1959’. in The American Economic Review, Vol. 50, No. 5, December 1960, pp. 962-986 and Martin Trow, ‘The Collegiate Explosion’, in New Society, November 7th, 1963.
5
Professor Claus Moser noted that the Robbins enrolment projections are based on recent trends, not all of which are linear, and that some of the forces I have mentioned are at work in these trends, and thus are taken into account. In some measure this is true; these factors are ‘not taken into account’ only insofar as the will increase more rapidly in the future than in the immediate ast, and thus wdaccelerate the rate of growth in the number of qualified candidates over and above the Robbins projections. For example, the candidates who applied for admission to the universities over the past decade were the sons and daughters of people whose own education had not been affected by the Education Act of 1944. That Act accelerated the gain in the educational achievement of the British population, and those gains will almost certainly be reflected in the numbers of qualified candidates starting in the late '60s. It is certainly debatable how much this and the other ‘accelerators’ will increase the qualified demand for higher education over the Robbins projections. It is much more difficult to maintain that they will not have any appreciatle effect. Incidentally, if it should be suggested that while these factors may lead students to stay in school longer, they will not affect the numbers of qualaera, I can only refer to the work of Jean Floud and others, as well as to the relevant section in tie Report on the pool of ability. The weight of both English and American experience is that standards of performance do not decline with rising numbers, but will at least keep step with increasing numbers who want to qualify. (See 1.III.)
6
General Register Office, Census 1951, England and Wales: Occupation Tables (HMSO, 1956), from Table C, pp. 652-665.
7
1, II Table 15. See also Jean Floud, ‘Social Class Factors in Educational Achievement’, in A. H. Halsey, ed., Ability and Educational Opportuniry, O.E.C.D., 1961.
8
It is likely that students from working-class backgrounds comprise a larger proportion of the student bodies of C.A.T.'s than of universities. But the Report envisions only 45,000 out of 350,000 university places in 1980 in what are now C.A.T.'s. Moreover, as the C.A.T.'s gain in status and enter the circle of elite institutions, they may tend to recruit a smaller proportion of working-class youth. It would be interesting to learn if that has been happening in recent years.
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