Introducing our manifesto for the new Director of Fair Access and Participation

Today, the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) and Brightside have released a new report, Reaching the parts of society universities have missed: A manifesto for the new Director of Fair Access and Participation. The ideas contained in the report are as diverse as the voices and, beginning today, we will be featuring each entry in a dedicated blog series – showcasing two ideas per day.
To begin the series, Paul Clarke (Head of External Affairs at Brightside) introduces the report and our rationale behind it.
A crucial part of widening participation work is helping prospective students plan for their future: to embrace change with confidence and see the opportunities beyond the apparent obstacles in their path. This has been a challenge for the widening participation sector itself, ever since the Dearing Report in 1997 launched the modern widening participation agenda. A year later, tuition fees were introduced for the first time, beginning a series of policies which have left higher education in a state of continual flux. More...