Universities use ‘first in family’ or ‘first generation’ as an indicator to increase the diversity of their student intake, but little is known about whether it is a good indicator of disadvantage. We use nationally representative, longitudinal survey data linked to administrative data from England to provide the first comprehensive analysis of this measure. We employ parametric probability (logit) and non-parametric classification (random forest) models to look at its relative predictive power of university participation and graduation. We find that being first in family is an important barrier to university participation and graduation, over and above other sources of disadvantage. This association seems to operate through the channel of early educational attainment. Our findings indicate that the first in family indicator could be key in efforts to widen participation at universities.

大学使用“家庭中的第一”或“第一代”作为增加学生入学多样性的指标，但对于它是否是劣势的好指标，人们知之甚少。我们使用具有国家代表性的纵向调查数据与英格兰的行政数据相链接，以对该措施进行首次全面分析。我们采用参数概率（logit）和非参数分类（随机森林）模型来研究其对大学参与和毕业的相对预测能力。我们发现，在家庭中排头兵是除其他不利因素之外，大学参与和毕业的重要障碍。该协会似乎通过早期受教育程度的渠道运作。