The influence of disability, socioeconomic status and regionality on higher education access and participation

Little is known about the cumulative impact of disability, low socioeconomic status and regionality on students in Australia and the barriers, levers and influences that impact their higher education decisions making. The overarching objectives of the program of research were to determine the factors that influence the decisions of people from low SES background with a disability from regional and remote areas to attend university and to provide strategies that might be effective in reducing barriers to higher education among young people with a disability.Study One involved a survey of university students with disability (respondents = 540) from five regional universities across three states of Australia to investigate: making decisions to study at university; resilience and career optimism; self-advocacy; and student demographics (such as employment status, age, gender). In Study Two, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 48 university students with disability, 15 community members with disability and 9 school students with disability. Study Two sought to explore experiences and perceptions of university study by people with disability and how these influenced aspiration, participation and success in university study. Human research Ethics approval was provided by all participating universities (NB: pseudonyms have been used to replace participants’ names throughout the report).