At the heart of Widening Participation is the need for us to offer a platform for young people to be able to thrive in their future pathways. Our overarching target is to provide equality of opportunity. However if you look up equality in the Oxford dictionary, it says this…
“the fact of being equal in rights, status, advantages and treatment”
In general terms, this encapsulates our mission as WP professionals; to allow young people from any background to access Higher Education.
It could be argued though that the same level of support doesn’t help all young people in the same way. The barriers which students face vary widely and are different. As a result, students often require different types of support to succeed. Therefore, an aspect of equity also needs to be accounted for:
“a situation in which everyone is treated equally”.
Now this is all well and good to say in idealistic terms. Practically speaking though, logistics, funding limitations and project design often get in the way of providing an offering which can be described as equitable.
A notable barrier for the groups of young people we work with are the barriers to learning and subsequently attainment. Government statistics indicate that students with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) progress to higher education (HE) at a significantly lower rate than their peers. In 2023/24, progression to HE occurred in only 9.4% of students with EHCP plans in place and 25.4% of students in receipt of SEN support. Comparatively, over 50% of students with no SEN provision progressed. This disparity highlights the barriers faced by this specific group of learners, whilst also raising concerns about those whose needs may be unidentified and insufficiently supported.
Against the backdrop of evolving policy such as the 2026 Schools White Paper on SEND reform, outreach practice has increasingly sought to respond to these diverse, and often intersectional, barriers. However, the wide-ranging nature of SEND presents a persistent challenge in seeking a balance between individualised, specialist support whilst providing inclusive delivery. How do we adequately deliver high-quality outreach content when student needs vary so widely – from behavioural and social differences to literacy, processing or concentration difficulties?
To respond to these challenges, Make Happen launched a project called Picture Your Potential. Make Happen is the Essex based partnership of the Uni Connect programme, focused on exploring the benefits and realities of Higher Education with those from under-represented groups.
Picture Your Potential engaged students with SEN who lack the confidence and resilience to progress. Working alongside the SENCO at each school, we selected a small cohort of 15 students to take part. Using the insight from these school contacts, we were able to respond to the broad and diverse needs of the students. Through 5 x in school sessions and 1 x Campus Visit, we worked with the participants on topics like student life and apprenticeships. Over the course of the project’s first year, we have engaged with 6 cohorts of students.
The content of each session was flexed and adapted based on our existing content. This was done in a way which prioritised hands on practical tasks like Tower building when exploring transferable skills. We also changed the focus of some sessions to be more tailored to the needs of the group. Through focusing on the Disabled Students Allowance in our Student Finance session, we were able to explore the range of support on offer at university.
Sessions were also adapted to utilise dyslexia friendly slides and resources. This involved adapting existing content into dyslexia friendly colours and fonts.
At the end of each session, students were given an “exit ticket” which assessed how they felt about progressing to university. Through this, we were able to assess the impact of each session and track how their thoughts and beliefs changed. Evaluation data from the first cohort of students demonstrated that by the end of the final session, 80% of students agreed that they could go to university if they wanted to.
This evaluation method was combined with a more traditional post-event survey too. This allowed us to compare the impact of the activity with the others we deliver. We’ve identified that whilst this gives us a good insight into student’s views from the event, we have the capacity to go further. In the future, we intend on developing our evaluation practice to become more inclusive and suit different communication styles. Methods such as Focus Groups and Listening Rooms would be a good way for us to provide a platform for students to offer us verbal feedback in a more informal manner.
Project feedback has demonstrated to us how outreach programmes can help SEN students develop key skills and competencies required to progress to HE. Through providing bespoke support for these students, outreach activities can help provide better access for students who may be neglected within the education system in 2026 and beyond.
In the future, we intend to continue the project with similar targets. We are continuing to recognise the nuances of working with students with additional needs. Therefore, we will be actively adapting and shaping our content to ensure that it’s supporting the wide spectrum of students participating. Part of this process will be engaging further with school staff, who work with the students day in, day out. Through having more meetings with careers leaders and SENCO’s beforehand, we’re hoping to better identify the needs and requirements of the students before they join us for the first session.
Looking ahead, we hope to continue being a part of students progression to education and career options in a meaningful way. Through addressing these barriers and challenges in a nuanced way, we hope to provide students with SEND the confidence and tenacity to pursue their own unique pathway to success.