Women with caring responsibilities: is there a genuine place for them at university?

This chapter draws on qualitative Australian research which expands understanding of how women with caring responsibilities narrate their engagement as university students. Drawing on narrative biographical interviews, case studies, and detailed surveys, this chapter not only explores the embodied nature of this movement into and through higher education but equally draws attention to the complex negotiations that these students undertake to manage the 'homeplace' and the university 'space'. In presenting these richly descriptive insights, the need for a more inclusive approach by universities emerges; an approach that seeks to understand and accommodate the realities of the lives of adult students with caring responsibilities.