In Sweden and for example Great Britain, contemporary higher education policy is giving attention to widening the participation of less-represented groups to better reflect an increasingly diverse population in society (HSV 2009; Carrington et.al., 2001; Flintoff, 2008). Experiences and perspectives of less represented groups are considered as a quality and complementary audit. Despite this, there has been and still is a low recruitment of students from diverse backgrounds within sport-related programmes in higher education in Sweden. A report by the Swedish National Agency for Higher Education (HSV 2009) following up widening recruitment stated that the Swedish School of Sport and Health Sciences had the lowest proportion of students from diverse backgrounds of any institution in Sweden (13%).

There are many factors that come into play when an individual or groups of individuals decide to apply to higher education: the labour market situation, gender, ethnicity, social class, economic conditions, traditions within the immediate and wider family, grades, and—not least—the individual’s own interest in the subject area. Bourdieu describes in his studies how streams of student groups appear to be characterized by a kind of recognized accumulation of objective assets that, in turn, are obtained as a result of individuals or groups of individuals learning to acquire these assets. However, Bourdieu believes that the statistical relationships regarding the recruitment of students give rise to questions about which social implications are concealed behind the classifications arising from the statistics, i.e. how people orient themselves, change, and assess the value of different symbolic and material assets (Bourdieu, 1977, 1984, 1990; Broady 1990). The life context that the individual develops and perceives he or she has access to creates conditions for a demand or not for higher education. There are, therefore, grounds to examine how social systems and practices interlock, and how they influence on how individuals and groups of individuals value higher education in sport related programmes and orient themselves towards it. 

The purpose of the study has been to highlight and increase the knowledge of how preconditions and premises for choosing to study a sport-related programme appear to students from diverse backgrounds that have started their studies. The aim has thus been to explore the students’ reasons for studying and the expressions of their experiences of studies, as well as their views on the means for increasing diversity within their educational programmes. Bourdieu’s theoretical framework has been used to increase the understanding of the processes by which increased diversity may be enabled or resisted. His concepts of habitus, capital,and practical sense form the base for the analysis of data.

The term sport-related programme refers to studies within PETE, sport coaching and sport management.

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