Queen Mary academic awarded €1.5 million grant to tackle inequalities in higher education

The 2026 funding round attracted 4,807 applications, including 1,575 in Social Sciences and Humanities, with 421 grants awarded. ERC Starting Grants support outstanding early-career researchers to develop ambitious, innovative five-year projects that advance the frontiers of knowledge across all research fields. 

Dr Camille Terrier, Reader in Queen Mary’s School of Economics and Finance, has been awarded funding for ELEVATE, a project examining why students from disadvantaged backgrounds remain underrepresented in higher education and what can be done to address these inequalities. 

Tackling inequalities in access to higher education 

ELEVATE will follow students through the entire university access process, from the choices they make about where to apply to universities’ decisions about whom to admit. 

Drawing on evidence from 14 countries, the project will investigate the factors that shape these decisions and test policies designed to improve the information available to prospective students. It will also explore how admissions systems could be redesigned to better match students with programmes where they can succeed. 

Through this work, ELEVATE aims to identify practical ways to make access to higher education more equal and improve student success. 

Dr Terrier said: “ELEVATE is about understanding why talented students from disadvantaged backgrounds are still less likely to access the universities and courses where they could thrive and identifying practical ways to reduce those inequalities. 

I am thrilled to receive a European Research Council Starting Grant, and particularly proud that the project will be hosted at Queen Mary, a university with an outstanding record on social mobility.” 

The UK is fully associated to Horizon Europe and QM researchers can participate in and lead projects across the programme. Participation in the EU research framework programmes is a springboard to productive partnerships across the world – strengthening the influence and impact of UK research. 

Professor Dan Todman, Vice-President and Executive Dean for Humanities and Social Sciences at Queen Mary, said: “Camille’s success in securing this highly competitive ERC Starting Grant is a fantastic achievement and reflects the strength and ambition of research across our faculty. 

“ELEVATE addresses an important challenge for higher education, and I’m delighted that Queen Mary will be home to research that has the potential to help us better understand and tackle inequalities in access and student success.” 

 Find out more about the 2026 ERC Starting Grants and see the full list of researchers selected for funding on the European Research Council website.