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The salience of education for better life outcomes is well accepted, but people with disabilities continue to be underrepresented in higher education. Building on Weedon's approach to the intersection of impairment with socioeconomic factors, this paper identifies the facilitators and barriers encountered and/or experienced by young people with disabilities along their diverse pathways to and through higher education in Sweden. The data comes from longitudinal ethnographic case studies of persons with ADHD. While the findings show similarities in impairment-specific barriers, such as transition and inadequate support available at university, they make even more visible the existing heterogeneity among people with ADHD and the inadequacy of support structures at higher education institutions. Parents, economic security and individual factors, such as ease of learning and belief in one's own capacity, were found to be strong facilitators. ADHD and socioeconomic disadvantage together magnified vulnerabilities and hurdles faced while aspiring to and accessing higher education. The article concludes by highlighting the urgent need for universities to change entrenched structures that perceive students with disabilities as a homogeneous group and disability as an individual problem, in order to enable participation of all. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]