Abstract:

Since the turn of the century there has been a UK government agenda to widen participation at university (Leese, 2010) with a commitment to doubling the proportion of students from disadvantaged backgrounds by 2020. One such initiative is encouraging more students to progress from Further Education (FE) to Higher Education (HE) and to enter university as direct entrants. In Scotland, honour degree programmes generally take four years to complete and an increasing number of students undertake 1 or 2 of those years at FE, undertaking a Higher National (HN) qualification, before articulating to HE to complete their degree.

When moving from a FE to an HE environment, students often experience multiple transitions including academic, environmental and social change (Cheng, 2015c, HEA/NUS, 2013). Transition is ‘rarely a simple, straightforward process’ (Cheng, 2015a, p3). In fact, Christie et al (2008, p573) suggest that student engagement in new learning environments in often tentative and uncertain, and refer to it as being a ‘real rollercoaster of confidence and emotions’ as students experience feelings of alienation and exclusion, as well as excitement and exhilaration.

Much of the existing research on transition focuses on students entering the first year of university programmes. However, the 2013 joint report by Higher Education Academy and National Union of Students Scotland found that transition issues can often be exacerbated when students are entering at a later stage directly from FE (HEA/NUS, 2013). This can be in terms of preparedness in areas such as independent learning, study and learning strategies, academic writing, critical analysis and independent study but also as a result of them being more socially diverse, coming from families that have little university experience and baring financial difficulties.

This paper assesses the level of, and factors affecting, academic self-confidence of direct entry students progressing from FE to HE within a Scottish HE establishment. Sander and Sanders (2003) advocate that measuring confidence is useful for building a better understanding of students and for enhancing teaching, while Santigo and Einarson (1998, p164) suggest that identifying confidence issues may ‘prove useful in the early identification of students at risk of attrition and for suggesting programmatic interventions’. The paper draws on a questionnaire survey which was distributed to a large group of third year direct entry students at the start and the middle of their first year of university study examining their self-rated levels of confidence. The first distribution of the questionnaire survey indicated that, overall, self-rated confidence was higher than expected, whilst a second distribution surprisingly indicated a slight dip. In addition, a focus group qualitatively explored some aspects of the survey in more detail to try to find reasons for the a slightly higher levels of self-rated confidence at the start and lower levels as the programme progressed. Overall, results indicated that the high level of confidence at the early stages of the programme is potentially attributed to a mismatch of student expectations. Therefore, the paper argues for strategies to be put in place which will more appropriately manage expectations of direct entry students.

Keywords:

Further Education, Higher Education, Academic Self-confidence, Realistic Expectations.