By Becky Edwards, Senior Lecturer, University of Chichester
In 2019, UPP Foundation funded the early stages of the University of Chichester’s Adversity to University (A2U) Programme. Seven years on, we are delighted to publish a series of three blogs exploring how A2U came into being, how it works, the challenges that have been overcome and what the programme’s research reveals about its impact on participating students. Read the first two blogs in the series here and here.
As I look back on the Adversity to University (A2U) journey, I realise both the distance we have travelled and how far we still have to go. Often, from my office window, I watch A2U students as they walk between lecture buildings. Freed from their marginalised and stigmatised pasts, they sometimes look up at my window and wave, but mostly they are getting on with living their student lives, thinking about assignments, worrying about deadlines, planning their options for next year.
It is impossible to describe the sense of pride I feel as I watch them, the knowledge of how much they have had to overcome to get to where they are, of how much it means to them to be a student. But it is important to remember that university is only part of the solution to the societal injustice they have experienced; A2U is one step on their journey towards feeling accepted and included.
Addressing the cliff-edge
As they reach their final year, the looming cliff-edge of an uncertain future can cause real fear that they might once again face social exclusion, poverty or discrimination.
“I’ll probably just go back to living on the streets,” said one of the students, “because when I leave halls, I won’t have anywhere to live.”
I have learnt how hard it can be to escape our past, how quickly we can all revert to the previous versions of ourselves that are always there, just below the surface. To stop them from falling over the cliff, we work with each of our students as they near the end of their time at university. We link them up with our careers team, we act as referees, buy them cups of coffee, meet them before interviews, remind them of all they have achieved. We help them to remember that they are no longer defined by homelessness, criminal records or being a refugee but that they are graduates with good degrees, ready for employment.
For many this is the end of their official A2U journey, although some continue with us as mentors. As we have travelled with them, we have learnt that wrap-around support – meeting them before they join A2U, supporting them while they are at university, supporting them as they transition into the next stage of their lives – is essential to the programme’s success. This is also true for those who do not go onto university from the bridging course, continuing instead, into employment or volunteering. They will often come back to us to talk about problems or how to achieve their dreams. Our door is never closed.
Collaborating to solve problems
While it is always good to focus on the successes, it is important not to downplay the many challenges that we have faced and the ways in which the programme, the university, and external organisations have worked together to overcome them.
In the programme’s infancy it often felt as though every step was fraught with potentially unsolvable problems. The first were practical problems for the students: a lack of acceptable ID, a lack of computer access, the need for year-round accommodation, lack of money to complete a UCAS form, lack of understanding of the academic jargon that is often used on forms. Despite what we like to believe, our Higher Education System is not designed for those who would benefit from it the most.
Helping students tackle their greatest challenges
But the greatest challenge for our A2U students are not practical or extrinsic problems but intangible and intrinsic ones: their fear that they are not welcome in the university, that they are not academic enough, that they will be judged, that they do not belong, and will never be good enough. To help with this, we include content which addresses these worries and concerns. We include a session on resilience, on personal development. We explore identity and transitions and imposter syndrome (always a favourite session).
One of the best days on each bridging course, is the day the students receive their student cards; a piece of plastic with their photo on, evidence of belonging, proof that they can call themselves students rather than “homeless” or “addict” or “prisoner”. The university has worked hard with us to make these student cards possible. Despite universities having a reputation for being rigid and resistant to change (Hariri and Roberts, 2014) ours has worked tirelessly with us, and with external organisations, to find solutions to practical problems, accepting different forms of ID, offering year – round accommodation, loans of laptops from the library.
There is still work to do
We are still learning and improving, there are always things we can do better. Recently I realised how questions asked in registration forms can seem incomprehensible or insensitive. All students joining universities are asked what their parents do or did. This can be a painful question for those who have been estranged from their families, for asylum seekers and refugees who have lost or have had to leave their parents, for those care leavers who have never been parented.
“My parents just planted enough for us to eat,” said one refugee. “This is not one of the options on the list. Does this mean I cannot come to university?”
These are the unintended consequences of apparently innocent data-gathering questions; the generic queries with such personal impact. This is a question that we are required to ask by the OFS but understanding a problem is halfway to solving it and often pulling on one thread can lead to an unravelling somewhere else. And so, slowly, some of the internal structures that might have prevented access and participation in the past, are being re-shaped by the students who would once have been excluded.
How we have changed
As a lecturer, I have had to learn not to take things personally; to understand that a student has not left the course because I have failed them but because it is not right for them, or at least not yet. As a university, we have had to learn the importance of being flexible and what it really means to be inclusive. As professionals, we have had to admit that we, like everyone else, are biased and often hold stereotypically prejudiced views. But we have worked together as a university and in collaboration with external organisations to solve problems and pre-empt difficulties.
There are still many systemic barriers that are not within our power to change: the fact that when someone receives a student loan they lose all their benefits including housing benefit, the ending of funding for those who are 60 and over, the complications in accessing student finance when you are a non-traditional student. But we travel hopefully.
Our continued mission
Everyone has the right to an education It is not just that it is written into the Global Sustainability Development Goals (2017), it is a simple truth. A2U proves the transformational potential of education to change lives and begin to rebalance social inequality. It is not lack of ability but lack of opportunity that prevents many from accessing the education they deserve. If universities are not part of the solution, then they are part of the problem.
Each year A2U faces the constant struggle to find funding. Without UPP Foundation’s initial support, we would never have started. Through the generosity of private funders and collaborative bids with local community groups and councils, we have managed to keep going. Our future is always one of precarity, but we will never stop fighting.
True solutions take time and effort, kindness and courage, tenacity and resilience… and if there was ever a time when the world needed more of these, it is now.
