ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the relationship between social class and entry to postgraduate study in Britain. In the face of higher education’s staggering growth in the last quarter century it is perhaps unsurprising that sociologists and higher education researchers have focussed their attention on access to first degrees. Extensive research in the UK and elsewhere has investigated entry to undergraduate study and its domination by the more advantaged social classes. Comparatively little attention has been paid to what happens after the first degree (Gorard et al., 2007; Wakeling, 2010a; Wakeling and Kyriacou, 2010; McCulloch and Thomas, 2013; Moore et al., 2013). Currently, there is a discernible turn in both policy and research towards the investigation of graduate outcomes, but even here the main object of interest is differences in the achievement of ‘graduate-level’ jobs across social class background. Until recently, there has been almost no consideration of access to postgraduate qualifications such as masters degrees, doctorates and professional diplomas, either in the UK or elsewhere.
