Oxplore Festival to head to Bradford and Warrington next month
The University of Oxford’s Oxplore Festival, a travelling two-day event designed to inspire and motivate young people to think about higher education and Oxford will take place in Bradford (9 and 10 July) and Warrington (15 and 16 July) next month.
Eight hundred 11-13-year-olds from local state schools in Bradford are expected to attend, as well as over 70 Year 12 students who will join an admissions talk with special guests, including Oxford alumni. In Warrington, the event marks the conclusion of Oxplore at TCAT, a unique five-year sustained contact programme with The Challenge Academy Trust (TCAT); around 600 11 to 15-year-olds from 5 local schools will attend over the two days.
The two-day festival will be hosted by Oxford staff, students and researchers and combines fun and interactive workshops and activities with a hands-on exhibition. Science workshops including games, experiments and even a small ‘volcano’ will bring Oxford research to life.
By providing a glimpse into university life and sparking academic curiosity, we hope to empower the next generation to explore possibilities and aim high.
Dr Samina Khan MBE, Director of Undergraduate Admissions and Outreach at the University of Oxford
In the exhibition, stalls will engage pupils on robotics, particle physics, and alternative pathways to medicine. Participants can try their hand at taking blood from an artificial arm; ‘step into Oxford’ with recreations of a student’s room, a tutor’s study, and a library; or take a whistle-stop tour of the Solar System in a mobile planetarium.
Oxford staff and researchers have been working with senior leaders, teachers, and pupils in both primary and secondary schools in The Challenge Academy Trust since 2019. The Oxplore at TCAT initiative aimed to develop pupils’ key skills through the creation of enrichment workshops that challenge pupils to think critically and creatively, and to widen access to higher education and especially to selective universities.
The Oxplore Festival also complements the University’s ongoing outreach efforts in the 2025 City of Culture; Oxford has been working with Feversham Girls’ Secondary Academy in Bradford since 2024 as part of BeUNIQ, a programme currently working with Key Stage 4 students from Bangladeshi and Pakistani heritage across seven schools in Birmingham, Bradford and Oldham.
The event launched in 2024 in Bodmin, Cornwall and is one of a number of new access initiatives introduced by the University to engage young people earlier on and in regions of the UK where fewer currently go on to Oxford. In 2023, students from Yorkshire and the Humber made up 5% of total UK undergraduates admitted to Oxford; students from the North West made up 8%.
Dr Samina Khan MBE, Director of Undergraduate Admissions and Outreach at the University of Oxford, said: ‘We’re delighted to be returning to both Bradford and Warrington this summer with the Oxplore Festival and to be celebrating five years of collaboration with The Challenge Academy Trust. The festival isn’t just about raising aspirations for Oxford – it’s about encouraging young people to see higher education as an exciting, accessible and achievable option. By providing a glimpse into university life and sparking academic curiosity, we hope to empower the next generation to explore possibilities and aim high.’
Mr A Moorcroft, Chief Executive Officer (TCAT), said: ‘We believe passionately all young people should have access to higher education and to the very best universities, if it is right for them. This belief underpins the unique partnership we have established between TCAT and Oxford University over the last 5 years. Hundreds of young people have benefitted from this partnership and the Oxplore Festival will be a wonderful celebration of this relationship and will provide many more young people with a valuable insight into higher education.’
The University recently launched Oxplore Teach, a free online platform for teachers in UK state schools to support their schools’ academic enrichment offerings – much of the content and activities have been developed out of the Oxplore at TCAT project in Warrington.
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Oxplore Festival to head to Bradford and Warrington next month