What is Widening Participation

Our work

The Widening Participation team works to widen access and participation in higher education for groups who have been traditionally underrepresented in higher education. We aim to ensure that all those who could benefit from higher education have the opportunity to do so. 

Our work is underpinned by commitments made in the Goldsmiths Access and Participation Plan 2020-25 (PDF), Civic Mission and Race Justice Strategy, and is shaped by an understanding of the data and evidence in this area. Our activities encompass several key areas, including:  

• Schools and colleges engagement (with a focus on working with local schools and colleges, and those with high proportions of Pupil Premium students).
• Intensive programmes and projects, for example, the GoldFutures Year 9 Mentoring scheme, supporting the innovative Alchemy project.
• Partnership work with organisations like The Brilliant Club, Aimhigher London and the Care Leavers’ Covenant.
• Working with Goldsmiths academic colleagues to facilitate, support and promote their outreach activities and diversify their student bodies.
• Priority group work to improve access and transitions for key groups, such as mature or care-experienced students.

We are always seeking to improve and develop our approaches in response to evaluation and developing evidence. The Widening Participation team is part of Goldsmiths Student Success department, and we work alongside our departmental colleagues to ensure that students from all backgrounds are enabled to access the university and succeed while they are here. Our work focuses on UK students at the undergraduate level.