A hopeful young person applies to five universities with excellent projected grades in three A Levels: Biology, Music and Polish. The way their language A Level is treated varies across universities. For some, it’s a fully acceptable third A Level which carries equal weight in an applicant’s offer. For other university admissions teams, this A Level in Polish – and in many other languages which are often referred to as ‘home, heritage and community languages’ – raises alarm bells and is reason to reject the talented applicant. Our Toolkit seeks to equalise the playing field in admissions decisions.
Home, heritage and community language A Levels
A home, heritage and community language (HHCL) is a language which is usually used and learned at home, within the community or in faith settings (e.g. Arabic, Polish, Urdu). There are GCSEs and A Levels in a number of HHCLs, including Bengali, Chinese (Mandarin), Greek, Gujarati, Panjabi and Turkish.
A person’s HHCL may also be one of the commonly taught curricular languages (e.g. French, German, Spanish) or an indigenous UK language (e.g. Gaelic, Irish, Welsh). A Levels in curricular and indigenous languages are, however, widely accepted in university admissions processes, and so will be excluded from our discussion here.
University admissions
As you’ll be well aware, UK universities are free to set their own policies and admissions criteria for potential undergraduates. This means that there is diversity in how A Levels in HHCLs are treated in the sector. Approaches range from policies which always accept HHCL A Levels, regardless of the applicant, to policies which exclude these language A Levels in all circumstances.
Our research has found that decisions to exclude are often based on a range of rationales and assumptions which do not reflect the realities of applicants or fairly represent their abilities. For example, many universities state that an A Level in a HHCL is excluded from offers because they want applicants to show academic rigor; an A Level in Urdu is too easy and applicants must be shown to be challenging themselves.
It’s too easy for them
We challenge this view on multiple counts. First, we believe that it suggests a misrepresentation of the A Level specifications. An A Level in a language tests much more than a candidate’s competency in the grammar of the language. Indeed, it requires critical interaction with cultures and societies where the assessed language is in use. This could be in the form of analysis of a piece of literature or film, or an exploration of a society’s political history through a guided research project. A full discussion of the A Level specifications, and comparison of their requirements to other languages and other subjects, can be found in the Toolkit.
Beyond the contents of the A Level, our research also clearly demonstrates that young people with a HHCL represent a huge range of language backgrounds and skill levels, with most young people we spoke to describing their proficiency in their HHCL as minimal and usually limited to spoken skills only. Applicants to university with an A Level in a HHCL are then far from a uniform group, and the concept of a ‘native speaker’ is not straightforward.
Visibility and transparency
The issue is not limited, however, to the exclusion and inclusion of A Levels. Applicants face a further hurdle: these policies are often not visible and are very rarely transparent. This means that applicants and those supporting their applications (e.g. teachers and caregivers) are unable to make informed decisions about where to apply. Instead, we have a situation where young people are applying to university without knowing that their HHCL A Level will be automatically excluded from their offer. This can have serious repercussions on applicants’ access to university.
Why is this important for universities?
We believe that the treatment of HHCLs A Levels in admissions processes is fundamentally an EDI issue. If your university is committed to equality, diversity and inclusion, then our Toolkit invites you to examine your current approach and consider how it aligns with research‑informed best practice. An equitable and inclusive policy ensures that these principles shape every applicant’s first experience of your institution. In addition, policies which reflect the realities of applicants' backgrounds (and are not based on assumptions) increase your pool of undergraduate candidates, so you no longer overlook and potentially exclude a highly capable cohort of multilingual candidates.
How can my university lead best practice in admissions?
Our Toolkit guides university stakeholders to review their current admissions policies against research-informed best practice.
The Toolkit, which takes around 30 minutes to complete, offers practical advice for evaluating the policy itself, as well as its visibility and transparency.
- We are currently in the process of piloting the Toolkit, to ensure its clarity and ease of use. If you would like your university to be involved, please get in touch.
- The full launch of the Toolkit will then take place later this year. Keep an eye out for email from toolkit@qub.ac.uk.
If you are involved in admissions or EDI, we would love to hear from you: What motivates your university’s decision to exclude or include A Levels in HHCLs?
Dr Emma Humphries leads a team of researchers at Queen’s University Belfast on a major project which seeks to improve access to qualifications and Higher Education for young people who speak a home, heritage and community language (funded by AHRC and QUB). To find out more, email the team here.