Our students exist within a societal system of inequality. Our mission is to create individual change at the crucial stage of education to help individuals break out of negative systemic cycles.

The barriers to higher education

The Universify programme focuses on supporting students to develop in the three main areas we identified young people require to reach higher education.

• Educational confidence and goals

• Educational attainment

• Self-belief, i.e. overcoming the assumption that university is not a place for ‘people like me’

Developing educational confidence and goals

Almost all students gained knowledge about university through the programme.

After attending the week-long summer residential, 97% of Cohort 7 (2022-23) ‘agreed’ or ‘strongly agreed’ that the course had given them a better understanding of university.

Increased likelihood of applying to a highly-selective university.

Following the students in Cohort 6 (2021-22) receiving their GCSE results in August 2022, we surveyed teachers about how the programme has affected their students. 85% of teachers ‘agreed’ or ‘strongly agreed’ that students were more likely to apply to a highly-selective university after completing the year-long programme.

Very significantly high applications to Oxbridge and the Russell Group universities.

Data provided from UCAS shows very high statistical significance in applications to university,  and in particular markedly for applications to high-tariff universities such as Oxford and Cambridge. 78% of Cohort 3 applied to university compared with UCAS’ benchmark for similar applicants of 60%.

Raising educational attainment

Increased GCSE attainment

After completing Universify’s 1-year programme, 86% of teachers of students from Cohort 6 (2021-22) ‘agreed’ or ‘strongly agreed’ that Universify benefitted the student’s GCSE attainment.

Almost double the number of students reached higher education than expected based on their background.

Our students are reaching higher education at far higher rates when compared to an expected progression benchmark constructed using the proportion of students facing certain ‘disadvantages’ (i.e. FSM, pupil premium and POLAR4).

The expected progression to higher education of Cohort 3 (2018-19) based on the proportion of students with Pupil Premium and Free School Meals (FSM) status is only 29% whereas 66% of Universify students reached higher education - over double the expected progression rate and almost double the rate based on geographical metrics (POLAR4 35%).

150% increase in progression to high-tariff higher education than expected based on Free School Meals status.

Our students are also progressing to high-tariff higher education at far increased rates when compared to an expected progression benchmark constructed using the proportion of students receiving Free School Meals. 25% of Universify Cohort 3 students progressed to high-tariff higher education - 2.5X the expected progression rate of 10% for a population of students with the same proportion of FSM status.