Widening Access and Student Recruitment

• The University is estimated to have invested over £5 million in student funding and bursaries in 2008 -9.
• Oxford linked with around 78 per cent of all post-16 schools and colleges in England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland in 2007-8, focusing on schools with small numbers of Oxbridge applicants.
• The University ran a two-week tour of schools in Northern Ireland in 2007-8, visiting 52 schools.
  
• In 2008-9, more than 1300 student outreach events will take place across the UK - more than 100 of these involving schools in Oxfordshire.
  
• Oxford is increasing its engagement with teachers and guidance staff and has run regional teacher conferences around the UK, in which over 600 teachers, mainly from the state sector, have been walked through the process of applying to Oxford and shown a mock-Oxford interview for a humanities and a science discipline. To date, more than 2,000 teachers across the UK have subscribed to the University’s e-newsletter.
  
• Target Schools – a scheme in which students go back to schools in their local area and talk to pupils about their Oxford experience - was set up by OUSU more than 25 years ago and is still going strong.
  
• Considered one of the most significant of Oxford’s access programmes, the FE Access Initiative supports prospective Oxford candidates from further education and sixth form colleges. More than 400 FE, tertiary and sixth-form colleges across the UK are now taking part, and since the project began, applications to Oxford from the FE sector have increased by 70 per cent.
  
• The University is committed to encouraging looked after children or care leavers who wish to apply to Oxford and was recently awarded the Frank Buttle Trust Quality Mark in recognition of this commitment. 

Uniq Summer Schools    Research from Oxford’s participation in Sutton Trust summer schools shows that 40 per cent of students who have applied to Oxford after attending a summer school here received an offer. In 2010, the University will launch its own ‘Uniq’ summer school. Starting with 500 places for state school pupils in 2010, by 2014, there will be a Uniq summer school course for every undergraduate degree offered by the University - 1,000 places in total. The summer schools will give high-performing pupils from state schools the chance to spend a week in Oxford – attending lectures in their chosen subject, living in college accommodation with other summer school pupils and student mentors, and finding out more about applying to Oxford.

TV Programmes like Inspector Morse and Lewis have given Oxford a reputation for murder.  In April 2009, 60 14 and 15-year-olds from the south east spent two nights at Pembroke College as part of the Aim Higher programme, which aims to encourage state school pupils from areas where university education participation is low to consider higher education. The participants were asked to investigate a murder in the college and discover the killer’s identity through a series of exercises, including a forensic examination of the victim’s clothes in a University chemistry lab.  The Oxford Imps, a group of student actors, acted out the murder scenario.

Exploring Oxford, in which state school pupils in years 9,10 and 11 visit Oxford, meet staff and students and get a taste of university-style study

Oxford Young Ambassador Programme, a four-year scheme for students in years 10-13 who are supported personally and academically throughout their final secondary education

Trading Places is an initiative that aims to encourage young people from underrepresented groups to pursue higher education and reach their full potential. The project involves alumni visiting an identified state school and talking to a class of pre-GCSE students. This gives pupils an opportunity to meet a graduate of the University who has achieved their career goals, thanks in part to their experience at the University. 

Here’s a snapshot of just some of the many outreach activities undertaken by Oxford colleges.

Trinity College recently celebrated the 10th anniversary of its Durham Outreach Programme, which gives state school students from the Durham region a taste of Oxford undergraduate life. Participants experience three-day residential visits, staying in typical undergraduate rooms and taking part in sessions with students and tutors.  Trinity and the University as whole have seen an upswing in the number of applications from this under-represented part of the UK as a result of this programme. Similarly, Lincoln College encourages applications from Lincolnshire, the north and north-east - areas historically underrepresented at Oxford - through its Lincolnshire Access Initiative, run on behalf of the University.

St Anne’s College is working with the National Black Boys Can Association to develop a sustained contact programme to inspire black boys to continue on to higher education, and to support them in reaching their full potential. The programme aims to support the boys over an extended period of their secondary school education, encouraging boys, their families, and their schools in a variety of events and activities.

University College recently established an Undergraduate Admissions Office to sharpen its focus on how it recruits and admits the best and brightest candidates from all types of background and school. Undergraduates become ‘Univ ambassadors’ to play a role in the college’s outreach work. The college has also established an e-mentoring programme for students in Humberside.