by Julia Morgan, Hazel Marsh and Colin Clark

Universities often present themselves as institutions committed to equality, diversity and social mobility. However, for many Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities, higher education remains a space defined by serious inequalities, poor representation and ongoing forms of exclusion. Despite decades of widening access and participation initiatives, the communities remain largely invisible within university policies, curricula and institutional cultures. Why is this the case? What needs to change?

These questions provide the starting point for our new edited collection, Gypsies, Roma, and Travellers in Higher Education: Contemporary Critical Perspectives (Routledge, 2026). Bringing together academics, practitioners, students, graduates and community members, the book investigates the structural, cultural and institutional barriers that continue to define educational opportunities and experiences. Critically, it also challenges the assumptions underpinning how universities understand dis/advantage, social inclusion and educational achievement.

Moving beyond the deficit model

One of our core arguments is that discussions about Gypsy, Roma and Traveller participation in higher education have tended to be framed through a ‘deficit’ perspective. That is, low participation is explained by reference to cultural attitudes, family expectations, educational aspirations or supposed community resistance to formal education.Such explanations, we find, are deeply problematic. They locate responsibility for educational inequalities within communities themselves rather than examining the institutions and social structures that reproduce and amplify educational disadvantage.

The contributors to this volume powerfully show why a different approach is fundamentally necessary. Racism, racialisation, historical exclusion, economic insecurity and unequal educational opportunities are not minor or peripheral concerns. They are essential to fully understanding how educational pathways and trajectories emerge and why access to university remains so uneven and unfair.The chapters addressing Romani history, academic-community partnerships, whiteness and experiences of compulsory schooling help establish this wider context and the foundations of the later discussion. They remind us that inequalities faced at university cannot be separated from longer histories of racism, marginalisation, and institutional discrimination.

Questioning the ‘inclusive university’

The collection asks readers to question the assumption that universities are inherently progressive, inclusive, and ‘good’ institutions. Higher education in the UK, and elsewhere, operates within increasingly marketised, commodified, and competitive environments, where widening participation is measured through stark metrics – recruitment figures, institutional targets, performance indicators and the like. Although such measures and data can help support positive change, they can also reduce complex questions of equality and justice to matters of institutional compliance. This raises a very important question: are universities genuinely transforming themselves to accommodate historically excluded communities, or simply expecting those communities to adapt to existing institutional norms?

This distinction, we argue, matters. Increasing student numbers is important, but participation cannot be understood only through the prism of entry qualifications, admissions, or progression and retention statistics. It must include belonging, recognition, intellectual representation, student wellbeing, and opportunities beyond graduation day. Contributions to the book that examine the neoliberal university, widening participation, distance learning and career guidance shine a spotlight on the limitations of approaches that prioritise access without considering the experiences that follow.

The vitality of lived experience

We believe that a distinctive feature of this collection is its commitment to bringing community voices into a direct conversation with academic research and institutional practices. Deeply moving, powerful, and personal accounts from Gypsy, Roma, Traveller and Showmen contributors show the complicated relationships between educational achievement, identity, belonging and social mobility. These contributions confront ‘heroic’ narratives of individual success against the odds. While such educational achievements must be celebrated, exceptional personal journeys must not become substitutes for confronting systemic inequality. It is a truism that the language of ‘resilience’ can obscure the conditions that make such resilience necessary.

We also appreciate that Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities are not homogeneous. Experiences can differ greatly across ethnic identities, national contexts, gender, class, migration histories, languages, and family circumstances. Effective widening participation policies must acknowledge these differences rather than reproduce an artificial sense of community uniformity.

Decolonising knowledge and challenging institutional power

Another important theme of the book concerns whose histories, knowledge and experiences are recognised within higher education. Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities have too often been represented as objects of academic investigation rather than as producers of knowledge in their own right. Their histories and intellectual contributions remain marginal within many university curricula. Chapters addressing decolonisation and community cultural wealth query this imbalance. They encourage universities to reconsider not only what is taught, but who determines what counts as ‘legitimate’ knowledge.

This requires a lot more than adding occasional references to Romani history or celebrating cultural diversity through isolated initiatives. It demands sustained engagement with questions of representation, institutional power, epistemic injustice, and meaningful community participation. As such, universities must be prepared to learn from communities rather than simply conduct research about them.

From partial recognition to meaningful change

What does this book not do? We do not argue that this collection provides a comprehensive solution to the inequalities it identifies. Indeed, one of its important contributions is to expose the limitations of existing knowledge and practice. This book is about beginning an informed discussion of where we are, and where we need to get to.

As such, further sustained longitudinal research is required to understand educational journeys across different stages of life. Far greater comparative work is required to explore differences between national higher education systems. We also need better evidence concerning the effectiveness of institutional interventions, particularly those designed to support progression, retention, and graduate employment.

There is certainly a pressing need to move beyond short-term projects and individual institutional champions towards properly resourced, accountable and sustained structural change.

One significant step forward would be recognising anti-Gypsyism and anti-Roma racism as institutional concerns, embedding community participation within university decision-making, improving educational and careers support, and ensuring that curricula reflect the histories and contributions of marginalised communities. Ultimately, moving forwards, our question is quite simple: what kinds of universities are we asking Gypsy, Roma and Traveller students to attend? If higher education is truly committed to social justice, it must be willing to interrogate its own practices, assumptions, and inequalities.

Our hope is that this book contributes to that conversation, helping to shift the debate from access and aspiration towards recognition, belonging, and institutional transformation. For sure, the responsibility for change cannot rest with Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities alone. It must also rest with the universities that have historically excluded them.

Gypsies, Roma, and Travellers in Higher Education: Contemporary Critical Perspectives, edited by Julia Morgan, Hazel Marsh and Colin Clark, was published by Routledge in October 2026. Further details here.

Dr Julia Morgan is Professor of Global Health and Wellbeing at the University of Greenwich and Deputy Director of the UBEL ESRC Doctoral Training Partnership. She has undertaken two research projects examining the under-representation and experiences of Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities in higher education and has co-edited a handbook on developing good practice in the sector. Alongside Hazel Marsh and Allison Hulmes, she has been commissioned by King’s College London to produce a best practice guide for universities and their staff on supporting Gypsy, Roma and Traveller students.

Hazel Marsh is Professor of Cultural Politics at the University of East Anglia. Her research is interdisciplinary and focuses on issues concerning social justice; education, health and environmental inequalities; the politics of representation; popular music and politics; Romani and Traveller contributions to society. Recent projects include ‘Strengthening Romani Capacity in Colombia’, ‘Embedding Gypsy Roma Traveller History Month in the Public History Calendar’, and ‘Romani and Traveller Voices in Music Archives’. She has collaborated with Patrin Films to co-produce the short film A Basket Full of Eggs (Lisa Smith, 2025). 

Professor Colin Clark is Associate Dean (Research and Innovation) and Professor of Sociology and Social Policy in the Faculty of Health, Education, and Social Care at the University of the West of Scotland (UWS). Colin has over 30 years of experience working in higher education, having previously held academic positions at the universities of Glasgow, Newcastle, and Strathclyde, before joining UWS in 2013. Colin’s research interests encompass ethnic and racial studies, social inequalities, identity, citizenship, migration, and mobility, with expertise in the lives, experiences, and rights of Roma, Gypsy and Traveller communities in central and Eastern Europe and the UK. His work demonstrates a strong commitment to social justice, equality, and the development of inclusive and anti-racist public policy. Outside of UWS, Colin is a director of the Coalition for Racial Equality and Rights, a trustee of Romano Law (Roma Voice), and an elected member of the Barvalipe Academy of the European Roma Institute for Arts and Culture. He is also an executive committee member of The Traveller Movement and the Advisory Council for the Education of Romanies and other Travellers.