First-year student numbers rise

Overall student numbers are above two million

The number of students starting undergraduate degree courses in the UK has increased by more than 30,000.

In 2003-04 - the most recent year for which data are available - the intake rose by 8.6% to 431,235, the Higher Education Statistics Agency found.

The total number of people beginning higher education courses, including postgraduate and vocational ones, passed one million for the first time.

Female students outnumbered males by almost three to two.

There were 1,012,215 higher education starters in 2003-04 compared with 977,010 in 2002-03 - a rise of 3.6%.

Of these, 58.8% were female students and 41.2% male.

This disparity increased from the previous year, when the figures were 58.1% and 41.9%.

The total number of undergraduates and postgraduates in higher education in 2003-4 was 2,247,440, up from 2,175,115 the previous year.

Overseas students accounted for 13.4% of these.