Universities should set up 'summer schools' to help working class children

By Christopher Hope. Universities should set up “summer schools” to help working class children go on to higher education, the Universities minister has said. The summer schools could be targeted at schools “that aren’t sending people to university”, David Willetts said.
In an interview on BBC Radio Four’s Today programme, said: “There have been summer schools for a long time.
“But I want to see real summer schools which aren’t just a visit for an afternoon which involve targeting the schools that aren’t sending people to university and saying – send you kids to this university for two or three summers.
“They can work in the labs, they can have some mentoring from current students, then they can raise their performance and get to universities – that kind of stuff.”
He said universities should not be used as “instruments of class war”, but could offer conditional offers to working class children who come to the summer schools. Read more...