Stress in students is well-documented in the literature as having negative effects on cognitive, emotional and physical health. We’re all aware of the great stress most of our students are under, juggling paid work with university work, the ever-rising cost of living, negotiating personal relationships and trying to carve out time for a social life. But add into the mix, the challenges associated with being a parent, and the stress triggers are amplified. This blog post by Dr Hilary Drew discusses a new research project, in collaboration with Cardiff Metropolitan and Aberystwyth universities, investigating how students, who are also parents, juggle the demands of family, university work and sometimes paid work and how their ability to complete their chosen programme of study is affected.
What do we know?
Student parents in Higher Education (HE) are not a new phenomenon. Widening participation strategies since the late 1990s have deliberately targeted mature students, a demographic more likely to have caring responsibilities for dependent children than the under-21s (Brooks, 2012). We know that student parents typically come from disadvantaged socio-economic backgrounds and may experience intersectional inequality due to class, gender, disability or ethnicity (Moreau, 2016; Arday, 2017). Furthermore, in latter years, the number of international students, especially at postgraduate level, has increased. Many of these students are also likely to have dependents, as highlighted by changes to student visa requirements from January 2024, impacting students with dependents.
Whilst we can estimate that there has been an increase in the number of students who fall into the category of being most likely to have parental responsibilities, there are no exact figures available. This is not surprising, as there is no requirement to collect data about student parents, either at institutional or national level. The Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) does not require that universities collect data on caring responsibilities, and many universities do not systematically collect information on student parents.
Hidden Figures
In our provisional enquiries here; at UWE Bristol, we contacted a number of different services across the university to find out whether or not our institution collects any data on student parents, as well as to ascertain the extent to which students with dependents are visible at UWE Bristol. However, in line with the literature, and in common with the findings of the two other institutions in our research project, we were unable to piece together a conclusive picture of student parents at our institution. Nevertheless, many student-facing services admitted that more information about student parents would assist them greatly in designing and delivering more targeted support and other initiatives.
Our enquiries about student parents bounced around the university; for example, we were directed to the Student Advice Team, as they support students facing both personal and academic challenges. We were recommended to contact Halley Nursery, but obviously this did not give us a full picture, because students can use other childcare services. We also spoke to Student Money Services as students may access the Enhanced Childcare Bursary, amongst other university service providers. Evidently, a further obstacle in obtaining this information is GDPR issues, as services are not able to share sensitive data on individual students and there is no central system where all the different pieces of information about students are captured.
‘That’ Gap
The conflicting demands of being a student and a parent are already well-documented in the literature, as well as, in some cases, undertaking paid work. It is widely reported that balancing parenting and academic work requires careful planning, in contrast with the widespread assumption that students’ lifestyles are hedonistic (Hodge, 2002). Moreover, unequal gender responsibilities at home, which we see elsewhere in society, also play a role here (Connell 2013; Osborne et al., 2004). Student-mothers report needing to develop coping strategies to manage their academic workload. These include studying when children are at school or nursery, or in bed and restricting any non-university or non-child-related activities (Moreau and Kerner, 2015). We’ve met parents of younger children who have even admitted to taking study notes along to soft play! Student-mothers admitted feeling guilty about trying to juggle motherhood and their studies; whereas Brooks (2015; 2012) found that student-fathers did not report feelings of guilt about being a student and a parent.
Since most universities are not set up to support students with dependents (Moreau, 2016), once on campus, we see student parents facing a myriad of challenges due to HE structural and policy barriers (poor on-site childcare facilities; restrictive ‘no child on campus’ policies; late availability of timetables; lectures scheduled too early or too late (Osborne et al., 2004; Alsop et al. 2008; Brooks, 2012; Brooks, 2015; Moreau and Kerner, 2015; Moreau 2016).
Where Next?
Building on the work of Claire Evans (Cardiff Metropolitan University) on student parents during the pandemic (Evans, 2023 Forthcoming), Hilary Drew[1], Damian Whittard[2], Mahwish Khan[3] and Lucy Venables[4] from UWE, together with Dr Evans[5] and Megan Williams[6] (Aberystwyth University) have gained ethical approval to find out more about students with dependents and are seeking funding to begin work on a project, entitled A Cross-Institutional Analysis of Student Parents’ Experience of Studying in Higher Education.
The overarching aim of the research is to examine parental provision at the three institutions, with the aim of encouraging our institutions to make student parents visible and to use their voices and experiences to inform policy and practice. Across the three institutions (Cardiff Metropolitan University, UWE and Aberystwyth University), we will focus on two key research questions:
To determine how being a student-parent affects engagement with the programme of study;
To determine what kind of initiatives help or hinder student-parents to pursue their HE goals.
Given the exploratory nature of the research questions, a qualitative approach will be adopted. To that end, a series of semi-structured interviews, lasting approximately 60 minutes, will be undertaken. In order to ensure that we can be as flexible as possible, and can fit into the participants’ already busy lives, these interviews will be performed on-line via Teams, telephone or in-person, according to the availability of the participants. For more information about the study and how to participate, please see our Sway presentation and/or get in contact with Dr Hilary Drew hilary.drew@uwe.ac.uk .
References
Alsop, R., Gonzalez‐Arnal, S. and Kilkey, M. (2008). The widening participation agenda: The marginal place of care. Gender and Education, 20(6), pp.623-637.
Arday, J. (2017). Exploring black and minority ethnic (BME) doctoral students’ perceptions of an academic career. University and College Union.
Brooks, R. (2012). Student-parents and higher education: a cross-national comparison. Journal of Education Policy, 27(3), pp.423-439.
Brooks, R. (2015). Social and spatial disparities in emotional responses to education: feelings of ‘guilt’ among student‐parents. British Educational Research Journal, 41(3), pp.505-519.
Connell, R. (2013). Gender and power: Society, the person and sexual politics. John Wiley & Sons.
Evans, C. (2023) ‘Failing as a parent, failing as a student’: the challenges faced by student parents in the COVID-19 pandemic. Forthcoming.
Hodge, M. (2002) Examination of witness, question 263 (London, House of Commons Select Committee on Education & Skills).
Moreau, M. P., & Kerner, C. (2015). Care in academia: An exploration of student parents’ experiences. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 36(2), 215-233.
Moreau, M.P. (2016). Regulating the student body/ies: University policies and student parents. British Educational Research Journal, 42(5), pp.906-925.
Osborne, M., Marks, A. and Turner, E. (2004). Becoming a mature student: How adult applicants weigh the advantages and disadvantages of higher education. Higher education, 48, pp.291-315.
[1] Hilary Drew gained her PhD from Cardiff University. She joined UWE in 2011 and is currently the Director of Partnerships and International at CBL. She is a member of the HRWE and DRAGoN groups and her research interests are in low pay and student working.
[2] Damian Whittard is an Associate Professor in Economics at UWE, Programme Manager of the Wage and Employment Dynamics Project, and an Academic Assessor for the Government Economic Service. Additionally, he is a Research Fellow funded by ADR UK, an ESRC investment.
[3] Mahwish Khan has a PhD from UWE and she is the Associate Director of Organisation Studies cluster and a member of the HRWE Group. Her research interests include gender and employment, equality and diversity management and comparison of public and private sector employment practices.
[4] Lucy Venables is the School Manager for Bristol Business School, UWE. She has over seven years’ experience working in student service roles in universities and is interested in using research to better understand and support the student experience.
[5] Before turning to academia, Dr Claire Evans qualified as a chartered accountant with PwC (Coopers & Lybrand Deloitte at the time) and worked in industry. Since working at Cardiff Metropolitan University, Claire’s research interests have focused gender, inequality and low-pay.
[6] Megan Williams, Aberystwyth University, is a qualified accountant (CIMA). She has taught in Higher Education for over 20 years, teaching financial and management accounting to UG and PG students.