Over the last ten years half a million fewer men than women have been accepted to university.
This is true for students living in the UK when they applied, for all students accepted to UK universities since 2007 the difference is a little over half a million.
“In ten years half a million fewer males have gone to university than females.”
Karl McCartney MP, 18 January 2017
We asked Mr McCartney’s office who said that he was referring to the difference in the number of UK-based men and women accepted to UK universities from 2007 to 2016.
There were 489,000 fewer men than women accepted to undergraduate courses during this time.
Just under 2.4 million women living in the UK were accepted to university over the last ten years compared to 1.9 million men.
Looking at all students, no matter where they lived when they applied, there were 516,000 more women than men accepted over the last ten years.
If you look at the proportion of applications which resulted in an acceptance then the two groups are roughly similar. 75% of applications resulted in acceptances for women living in the UK compared to 79% for men since 2007.
It’s worth remembering that these figures aren’t complete as they only cover around two thirds of Scottish applicants to higher education colleges. Students living in the Channel Islands and Isle of Man when they applied are also not counted as being from the UK in the figures.
We’ve written before about how likely white working class boys are to go to university in the UK.
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