Blog12 February 2026
According to the Office for Students (OfS), approximately 88.7% of full-time, first-degree entrants in England between 2019 and 2023 continued into their second year. On average, students who are male, mature (over 21 years old), Black, or from more deprived neighbourhoods (IMD quintiles 1 and 2), are less likely to continue.
However, averages do not tell the story of all institutions and students. Some English higher education providers report continuation rates below 70% while others near 100%, and gaps between different socio-economic groups within providers vary considerably as well.
Why do students decide to discontinue their studies?
In short, we don’t fully understand why some students decide to discontinue their studies. Researchers from different disciplines offer different views about what drives this behaviour. Economists propose that students continually weigh the costs (such as tuition fees, foregone earnings, and the effort required to study) against the benefits of higher education (including future earnings and access to intellectual and cultural activities). Students withdraw when the present costs begin to outweigh the perceived benefits.
Sociologists take a different view – emphasising the role of social relationships, institutional culture, and sense of belonging. Rather than focusing solely on individual decision-making, these approaches highlight how students’ experiences within universities shape their likelihood of continuing.
What are transition support programmes?
In practice, many providers combine insights from economic and sociological perspectives when designing transition support programmes. These initiatives seek to lower the challenges or costs associated with transitioning to university while also promoting belonging and meaningful social connections.
Common examples include pre-entry academic courses (summer bridge courses), seminars, inductions and orientation events, mentorship schemes, wellbeing initiatives, and targeted programmes for specific student groups, such as those from low-income backgrounds, minority ethnic groups or disabled students.
Do transition support activities really ‘work’?’
Much of the evidence regarding the impact of transition support programmes is obtained through correlational studies comparing outcomes of participants and non-participants. For instance, d a longitudinal questionnaire published in 2018 found that, among 88 first-year psychology students, students who were enrolled in a pre-entry programme reported higher academic self-efficacy and satisfaction compared to students following the typical entry route.
An analysis of the completion data of 1,653 UK students between 2013 and 2024 and found that students from low participation neighborhoods who completed foundation year bridging programmes had significantly lower attrition. While these studies are informative, they do not control for selection bias – meaning there may be other factors besides the transition programme driving the differences in student outcomes.
In the UK, the What Works? Student Retention and Success Programme remains one of the most comprehensive evaluations of transition support initiatives. Spanning seven projects across 22 higher education institutions in England, the programme used mixed methods, combining survey data, institutional records, and interviews.
A report synthesising the findings of this project concluded that pre-entry initiatives, induction, and early-learning teaching were central to promoting student engagement and sense of belonging. These interventions were successful in increasing students’ confidence, engagement and formation of peer networks, and were associated with higher rates of progression to second year.
This study provides valuable insights into the effectiveness of transition support interventions. However, the evaluations did not employ robust methods of causal inference, which limits the strength and reliability of their conclusions. It is worth noting that the evidence gathered in this project pre-dated the large increase in UK tuition fees in 2012 – prompting questions about its validity in the present day context.
To our knowledge, the study by Azzam (2022) is the only study that has employed a randomised controlled trial design to assess the impact of a transition support programme. The study randomised 1,565 students who opted into a learning community programme, which was designed for students’ integration and engagement during the first year at a public research university in the US.
The trial found no effect of the intervention on continuation. Interestingly, when the same data was re-analysed using quasi-experimental methods the authors found large impacts of the programme indicating that the validity of the findings from previous non-randomised studies may not be robust.
Why more research is needed
Overall, the existing literature suggests that transition support programmes have the potential to improve student continuation and success. However, with conflicting theoretical explanations as to why students discontinue their studies – and the absence of robust methods of causal evaluation in a UK context – we still don’t know why some students leave their studies early, or, importantly, what might help them continue and succeed in higher education.
More robust evaluation on transition support programmes is needed to understand whether these programmes are truly driving the positive outcomes observed, or whether other factors are at play.
To further the evidence-base on the effectiveness of transition support programmes, TASO has commissioned three evaluations of transition support programmes at the University of Leicester, Middlesex University, and University of Nottingham.