Report
21 April 2021
Summary
Evidence shows that mature students are more likely to drop out of their higher education course than younger students. Mature students also tend to have poorer degree outcomes than young students. TASO’s previous evidence synthesis found that there was not enough research on how to support mature students in higher education.
TASO undertook a review to understand the evidence around supporting higher education access and student success for mature learners.
This review found that there are few rigorously evaluated studies relating to mature learners, and most of the existing studies qualify only as ‘weak evidence’ in terms of describing how best to support these learners. The majority of the literature on mature students is descriptive and exploratory, and there is a lack of published work focused on understanding the impact of efforts to widen participation among mature learners. However, there is some limited evidence that transition programmes and information, advice and guidance interventions may be helpful.
The findings of our review point to some major themes which can be used to inform future research on how best to attract and support mature students, relating to affirmation, belonging and identity; and affordable, flexible programme offers.
A survey experiment was also undertaken to explore which institutional features are attractive to mature learners. We asked online research participants who had left formal education without an undergraduate qualification to rate different fictional higher education courses depending on a range of attributes.
This experiment revealed that mature learners are more likely to choose university courses that offer online or blended learning options, and that they also prefer providers who offer extra support, such as out-of-hours classes, extra academic support or a designated staff member.
This study can help institutions think about how best to structure and market their undergraduate offer in order to attract mature learners.