This paper examines school principal responses to the policy discourse of widening participation in higher education. As a critical analysis of how policy is produced, read and responded to by principals [Bacchi, C., 2009. "Analysing policy: what's the problem represented to be?" New York: Pearson], the paper questions the assumptions underpinning policies aiming to widen participation of young people in schools where families have traditionally not viewed higher education as a possible or desirable option [e.g. Bok, J., 2010. "The capacity to aspire to higher education: 'It's like making them do a play without a script'". "Critical studies in education," 51 (2), 163-178]. Policy is adopted, adapted, ignored or countered by principals and teachers due to "situated necessity" resulting from the history, location, pupil and parental social mix, staffing, material and economic conditions of the school and community infrastructure [Braun, A., et al., 2011. "Taking context seriously: towards explaining policy enactments in the secondary school." "Discourse: studies in the cultural politics of education," 32 (4), 585-596]. The data are drawn from principal interviews undertaken when researching a Year 8 Mentoring and Tutoring programme, one component of a three-year Access Express programme, a federally funded Higher Education and Partnership and Participation Programme, developed by a collaboration between a Victorian university and 7 secondary schools. Access Express' focus on university-school partnerships captured the trend in Australia, the UK and USA during the 2000s to facilitate transitioning out-of-school through long-term university-school partnerships [Armstrong, D. and Cairnduff, A., 2011. "Building university-school partnerships." In: D. Bottrell and S. Goodwin, eds. "Schools, communities and social inclusion." South Yarra: Palgrave Macmillan, 268-279].