Access

This section reports on the evaluations of the following activities:

• Evolve
• What's Now What's Next
• LUDUS Gold
• Contextual Admissions

This collaborative programme with the University of Leicester, De Montfort University and Pathways UniConnect works with Key Stage 3 learners (11-14 year olds) to support their attainment. It focuses on developing young people’s metacognitive skills and providing them with strategies to further engage and succeed in their learning across the curriculum.

In 2024/25, Loughborough worked with over 80 APP target learners in Years 7-9 from a local school, all identified by their school as likely to benefit academically from the experience. 21 sessions were delivered which included:

• Skills and confidence for communicating ideas.
• Strategies for managing time and academic studies.
• Dealing with setbacks and building resilience.

At the end of the programme, the learners were invited for a celebration event at Loughborough University campus. 

What we did:

As a partnership, the Evolve team administered pre and post surveys to gauge young people’s development and experiences on the programme, utilising validated scales from TASO’s ASQ. They also ran pre and post knowledge tests with the learners and collected delivery staff reflections.

What we found:

In 2024/25, we piloted ‘What’s Now, What’s Next’ (WNWN): a programme aimed at equipping learners with metacognitive strategies through the delivery of three in-school sessions and campus visit.

The aim is to improve their motivation for achieving their academic goals and increase their academic confidence and study skills. This has been identified as an approach to support learners from low income and deprived areas into HE (Go Higher West Yorkshire, 2025).

The programme was delivered with one Leicestershire school to 19 Year 10 learners who were eligible for Free School Meals or living in an IMD Q1 postcode area - characteristics that are underrepresented at Loughborough.

What we did:

Data was collected from 12 participants at the end of the project through a focus group and a retrospective survey.

What we found:

LUDUS Gold is a two-year progressive programme which supports and prepares young people for their transition and progression to a research-intensive university with online and on-campus activities and events. Eligibility is based on a combination of GCSE achievements (five GCSE’s 9-6) plus Free School Meal eligibility, home postcode in an IMD Q1 area and whether the young people are care experienced.

What we did:

Data was collected at the start and end of the programme through a mix of methods. 146 pre-programme and 44 post-programme responses were collected through surveys (unmatched).

Two focus groups were run with learners in the final year of the programme.

This was underpinned by application and entry tracking to Loughborough University.

What we found: 

There was a significant increase in learners applying to Loughborough University (+168%), but more work is needed to understand the contributing factors for this.

Data from the pre and post surveys provided the following insights:

• Learners have increased capacity to make informed decisions about HE - The number of participants reporting an increase in their knowledge in various topics about HE increased by around 20%.
• Learners develop metacognitive strategies and academic self-efficacy in readiness for university study – We found a 44% increase in the number of participants understanding university level study and a 17% increase in learners’ confidence in their academic skills.
• Learners develop some knowledge to successfully make the transition to HE – Participants expressed an increase in knowledge of student life (31%), with smaller increases in knowledge about university costs (+6%) and student accommodation (+9%).
• Learners increase their confidence to successfully apply to Loughborough University – The survey data showed a slight decline in overall confidence about successfully applying to university. However, applications from LUDUS learners to Loughborough rose by 168% on last year.  We acknowledge the lack of baseline confidence data specifically related to applying to Loughborough and recognise that other factors may have contributed to this trend.

Focus group data highlighted the importance and value of social interaction during the programme:

We are committed to making higher education accessible to all those with the potential to succeed. Our contextual admissions policy recognises the context in which prior academic qualifications have been achieved and can lead to an offer being made which is lower than the typical entry requirements. In our evaluation, we wanted to find out how this policy influenced applicants' perceptions of the university, and whether it had an impact on their confidence to apply to Loughborough.

What we did:

We worked with the consultancy organisation Alterline to conduct a primarily qualitative evaluation. We recruited participants from 3 groups who would likely be eligible for a reduced offer: prospective applicants, current applicants, and first-year students at the university. The project was conducted in two stages: a qualitative survey and an innovative online community, where participants could contribute their thoughts and engage with the reflections of others.

What we found:

• While most participants were aware of contextual offers, there were some gaps in understanding. Participants were less clear about the eligibility criteria for contextual offers and some learners were not clear of the difference between a contextual offer and a conditional offer.
• Loughborough's provision of information on contextual offers was generally easy to understand and provided the information that prospective applicants would need. Clarity could be improved on a few aspects, and there was scope for the information to be presented through alternative channels and formats.
  Schools and colleges were seen as key sources of information, with universities and UCAS also viewed as important.
• A number of respondents would have preferred to have learned about contextual offers earlier, before starting further education, as this would have helped them to make decisions about their education choices and career paths.
• The young people expressed positive attitudes towards the social purpose behind contextual offers and felt an institution with a contextual admissions policy would be more inclusive, supportive and diverse.