The University of Worcester has been shortlisted for University of the Year in the UK Social Mobility Awards 2019.
The Awards recognise best practice and innovation and celebrate excellence and achievement among organisations across the UK working to improve social mobility.
Worcester is well known nationally for its pioneering approach to promoting inclusion and social mobility, successfully championing the whole university approach to widening participation in higher education long before it became adopted as best practice nationally.
Earlier this year the University was named as number one in the UK for Quality Education in the inaugural Times Higher Education University Impact Rankings. The rankings are based on universities’ records in contributing to achieving the United Nations’ globally agreed Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SDG for Quality Education is to ‘Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all’.
Community volunteering and work-based placements and projects are very strong features of student life at the University of Worcester – an approach to social mobility which has led the University’s graduates to be in the top 10 for sustained employment for 1, 3 and 5 years after graduation, according to the government-published Longitudinal Educational Outcomes data.
The University is always looking for ways to improve and is currently pioneering a campaign to secure free train travel for University Open Days, which has won support right across the spectrum.
Vice Chancellor and Chief Executive, Professor David Green CBE, said: “We are very proud to be shortlisted for University of the Year in the UK Social Mobility Awards. Every student who comes to the University enjoys the opportunity to make more of their own precious human potential through high quality education and participation in a dynamic, supportive University community, City and region.”
Professor Green continued: “As a university we are committed to helping individuals who in previous generations would not have had the opportunity to benefit from higher education, working with Colleges and high quality educational organisations to provide programmes in many parts of the UK in such vital but neglected areas as Child and Adolescent Mental Health; Learning Support, Early Years and Parent Education.
“We believe passionately in education as a force for good and that a university education both transforms the lives of individual students and the society in which we live.”
Earlier this month the University was rated among the top 10 English non-specialist universities in the National Student Survey (NSS) with 88.2% of Worcester final year students saying they were satisfied overall.
The University has been committed to developing facilities that are open to the community, raising aspirations from the earliest age to aid social mobility. These include The Hive, Europe’s first integrated university and public library, the University of Worcester Arena, Britain’s first inclusive indoor sports hall purpose-designed to include the wheelchair athlete, and the recently opened Art House.
The UK Social Mobility Awards will be announced on October 10th at a ceremony in London.