Outreach team

Our Outreach Team at the University have won an award for a collaborative project to support working class boys’ progression to higher education

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In partnership with Arts University Bournemouth and the University of Winchester, the Outreach Team in the Marketing, Advancement and Communications Department received a Higher Education Liaison Officers Association (HELOA) Best Practice Collaboration Award for:

  • Co-delivery of a teacher and advice continuing professional development (CPD) series, focusing on key challenges impacting working-class boys’ attainment
  • Organising a national Higher Education (HE) Practitioner and Research Conference to share best practices and explore how practitioners can better support working-class boys’ attainment and progression to higher education.

Background to the Boys' Attainment Project

The project was set up due to the low numbers of working-class male students becoming educationally successful over the past decade, and has been cited as a cause for concern by successive UK Governments. Drawing on data from the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (2018), the report highlighted that progression rates for white working-class males within the 2016-17 university admissions cycle was just 12.2% and 17.6% for females nationally, significantly lower than that of students from other ethnic groups. 

Student in classroom

The project aims to see what can be done to better support working-class boys’ educational attainment and progression to higher education.

Raising attainment is also becoming an increasing priority for the Office for Students, yet in 2019 a review of Access and Participation Plans suggested that of the 838 targets set relating to university access, success, and progression by higher education providers, only 11 gave specific mention to working-class males.

Collaboration

In September 2022 the partnership hosted the Learning to ‘Level-Up’? Supporting Working-Class Boys’ Progression to Higher Education Practitioners Conference, which brought together over 80 practitioners and researchers from 55 different universities and organisations from across the UK, to provide a space to share research and learn from evidence-based practice.

Next steps for the Boys' Attainment Project

To continue the development work need to help level-up support for working-class boys, next steps include things like:

  • Forming a Boys Impact Coalition as a national network to continue the discussions, to champion for the setting of APP (Action and Participation Plan) targets within higher, education, and to support school practitioners with the research and tools to address attainment–raising with disadvantaged boys in Portsmouth.
  • We've launched an action research project with teachers and school staff across primary and secondary schools, aiming to upskill teachers while exploring the themes underpinning the educational disengagement of working-class boys. With the hope that will inform future intervention strategies at both the school and university levels.
  • Arts University Bournemouth is working with young working-class men on an innovative and creative student voice project exploring the themes of masculinity and identity.

Want to join the action research group?

The Outreach Team at the University of Portsmouth supports widening participation through work with a number of disadvantaged and underrepresented groups

If you work in primary or secondary education and want to get involved in exploring some of the themes around the attainment of working-class boys, and adding your thoughts to the discussion, please contact our Outreach Team via upforuni@port.ac.uk.