Vikki Boliver is Professor in the Department of Sociology, Durham University, and has published widely on social inequalities impacting access to higher education. She is a leading expert on the use of contextual socioeconomic data to inform more equitable admissions decisions and has mentored dozens of doctoral and early career researchers.Nadia Siddiqui is Professor in the School of Education, Durham University. Currently, she is researching disadvantage in education to inform policy and practice. She also supervises postgraduate students and doctoral researchers within the university.

• Chapter 1. Issues of access, diversity and inclusion in contemporary higher education ; PART ONE: ACCESSING HIGHER EDUCATION; Chapter 2: Do supported progression and bursary initiatives improve student outcomes?; Chapter 3: Identifying contextually disadvantaged students in Chinese higher education; Chapter 4: The links between higher dducation expansion, intakes and funding in China; PART TWO: THE STUDENT EXPERIENCE; Chapter 5: The experiences of working-class medical students in England and Portugal; Chapter 6: Unpacking diversity in UK commuter students’ experiences; Chapter 7. The challenges posed by the Covid-19 crisis to first generation elite university students; Chapter 8. Socioeconomic inequalities of access to elite graduate labour market positions in China; PART THREE: THE ACADEMIC WORKFORCE; Chapter 9. Mapping the positionality of English for Academic Purposes practitioners in English universities; Chapter 10: How organizational networks shape the career trajectories of Pakistani female professors; Chapter 11. Who inhabits the spaces of power in elite universities?