Posted 11 November 2021

Go Higher West Yorkshire (GHWY), in partnership with Leeds Community Foundation, provided funding to eleven community organisations across West Yorkshire in the second round of Community Grants. 

The organisations each received between £1k-£20k to deliver projects that took discussions about Higher Education (HE) out of the education context and into communities and families. They were designed to support young people aged 13-19 to progress into HE from areas where rates of progression are currently low. 

Delivered between March 2020 and March 2021, the projects were all significantly affected by Covid-19. Despite this many of them were able to creatively address the challenges, responding quickly and flexibly to local needs. Overall they engaged with 392 individuals of whom 238 were 13-18 year olds, 19 were 19-25 year olds, 117 were parents, and 19 were carers. 

There were two key foci for this funding round, the first of which was working with parents/carers. This helped to test the Programme Theory that supporting them with appropriate information, and improving links with schools, will influence the young person to take the step into HE. 

The second focus was the use of role models. This enabled the testing of one of the core Programme Theories underpinning the work of GHWY Uni Connect: that using positive role models to raise awareness of HE will support a young person to take the step forward.  

An evaluation report into the programme will be published soon, with initial findings suggesting it enabled GHWY to work with communities that would have otherwise been under-served by HE outreach due to cultural, language or other barriers. 

The funded projects were: Artworks; Bradford Study Support Network; Brathay; Fagley Community Association; ISpace5; Karmand; Keighley Association for Women and Children Centre; Moonlight Trust; Phoenix Radio; Radio Asian Fever; and Womenzone.