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Paper short abstract

Drawing on a qualitative study of higher education access in Nigeria, this paper examines how high-stakes, 'gender-neutral' national admissions policy and practice reproduces gendered inequalities and undermines inclusive development and social justice.

Paper long abstract

Despite decades of global and national efforts to expand girls’ access to education, women in many low- and middle-income countries remain disproportionately disadvantaged at critical points of educational transition. While policy attention has focused on participation disparities in basic education, less is known about how gendered inequalities are reproduced at the point of entry into higher education - an increasingly consequential site for social mobility in massifying systems.

Drawing on in-depth qualitative data from a study of university access in Nigeria, this paper examines the everyday realities of young women navigating high-stake national entrance examinations. Focusing on the account of a rural female school-leaver, the analysis shows how a 'gender-neutral' policy intersect with gendered family support, digital inequalities, and patriarchal expectations to shape who can compete - and on what terms. Using feminist conceptualisations of intersectionality and marginalisation, the paper approaches academic achievement not as a neutral indicator of ability, but as a socially and relationally produced outcome shaped by gendered and socio-economic conditions.

The analysis highlights how girls’ educational trajectories are constrained not only by structural barriers, but by moral and affective labour in contexts of scarcity and uncertainty. In foregrounding lived experience, the paper challenges technocratic development frameworks that cast inclusion as a technical policy adjustment rather than a relational and situated process. It also demonstrates why higher education warrants closer attention as a critical site of gendered access inequalities, and how these inequalities reproduce - and rework - broader concerns about social justice across the life course.