The Office for Fair Access (OFFA) is putting more and more emphasis on collaboration in Access Agreements. Joining NEON will count in your Access Agreement spend as investment in collaboration, which will complement and enhance the work you are doing regionally.
The NEON Summer Symposium, NEON Working Groups, Seminars, the Access Academy Training and our Postgraduate Certificate qualification in access practice, all provide a range of opportunities to support your staff to develop their knowledge and skills and for you to meet your commitment to their continuing professional development in a cost effective way.
Having a better evidence base to show that widening access investment works is essential if government support for this work is going to continue in the 2010s. NEON, through our Establishing Evidence and Impact Working Group, Publications and Access Academy Training, is the only national framework through which HEIs can improve their ability to show what works.
The best way for your institution to influence the environment in which widening access is defined and delivered is by being part of the only national ‘access mission group’. We have six different Working Groups in areas of access practice from working with student unions, to evaluating evidence and establishing impact. These Groups shape what widening access means in practice. Our weekly NEON News, our Policy Briefings and our Digital Community give you the ability to be part of the national dialogue on access.
HE providers are investing hundreds of millions of pounds of their budget in providing opportunities to enter HE to those from under-represented groups. The majority of this work is going unrecognised and this commitment missed by many outside and inside HE. Being a member of NEON, profiling your work in our weekly NEON News best practice feature and nominating your learners and activities in our annual Awards, will allow you to start giving your access work the profile it deserves.
