Dear Josh

 

Please find below a response to the FOI request which asked:

 

     I would like to know how much the School has spent on its Widening

     Participation projects.

 

     Specifically, if you could say how much the School has spent on /

     allocated to the WP department each year since 2000.

 

In answering your FOI question, we can provide a set of figures to show
how much the School has spent each year on the WP Department. We would
however like to provide context to these figures and to the changing
nature of WP provision and policy during the time period in question.

 

The question asked is broad in its definition and over the last 15 years
the funding streams for WP and how the WP Department at LSE is constituted
have both changed dramatically. Therefore any comparison year-on-year is
not necessarily comparing like-for-like.

 

LSE has been delivering widening participation activity since before
2000.  However, this was previously delivered in tandem with other Teams
within the Institution so it is not possible to break down all of the
costs that were attributable solely to WP as far back as 2000.  LSE also
has a strong track-record in attracting external funding to support its
widening participation work.  In answering your question on spend, we have
not included external funding in the figures below – that is why the
figure for 2000/01 is at 0, at a time when there was WP activity taking
place.

 

In addition to the information provided below, there is publically
available data on the Office for Fair Access (OFFA) website which outlines
the spend committed by the School under the Access Agreement. This is
available from 2006 when the tuition fee cap was raised and charging up to
the maximum allowed cap was dependent on having an Access Agreement in
place.

 

Over the years the requirements for the spend allocated under the Access
Agreement (and how this is reported) have changed. The figures below show
the extent of investment in Widening Participation, but cannot provide the
basis for like-for-like comparison.  You will see, however, that the
School has continued to increase the allocation of funds to the WP
Department over the years. When comparing any figure of spend on WP it
will never be a complete and total representation of all of the School’s
efforts on WP given the in-kind support received from across LSE and
beyond to support many WP Projects.

 

In summary the below figures answer your question about how much the
School has spent on the Widening Participation Department since 2000,
taking into account the context above. These figures contain some staffing
costs where possible, but in the earlier years especially staffing was not
from WP budgets and therefore not recorded separately as WP spend. In
interpreting your question the figures only relate to spend directly on/by
the WP Department and do not as stated above include external income
received for our WP activity.

 

We would be happy to discuss anything in relation to our WP activity
please do feel free to contact us to do so.

 

 

Year Total spend including staffing
where available
2000/01 £0
2001/02 £3,934
2002/03 £40,353
2003/04 £25,275
2004/05 £31,249
2005/06 £134,298
2006/07 £135,596
2007/08 £174,037
2008/09 £213,100
2009/10 £230,536
2010/11 £256,561
2011/12 £257,922
2012/13 £324,837
2013/14 £406,104
2014/15 £490,135

 

If you think that the information provided does not meet your request,
contact me on 020 7849 4622 or write to Kevin Haynes, Head of Legal Team, 
Governance, Legal and Policy Division, London School of Economics and
Political Science, Houghton Street, London, WC2A 2AE. We will then review
the response to your request and get back to you within 20 working days.
You can also contact the Information Commissioner's Office
[1]http://www.ico.gov.uk/, though they expect the internal review to be
carried out before receiving a complaint directly.

 

The provision of information by the LSE under the Freedom of Information
Act 2000 does not imply a right to copy, reproduce publish or otherwise
use such information.

 

Copying or reproducing such information in any way either in whole or in
part without prior written consent may be an infringement of copyright or
other intellectual property right belonging to the LSE or a third party.

 

Yours sincerely,

Rachael Maguire

Records Manager

London School of Economics

 

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