THE increasing number of students continuing to study after the first year is extremely encouraging, but we know there is more work to do.
We have taken major steps to improve the support available to our students at the University of the West of Scotland.
We’ve worked hard to fully understand why some students withdraw in the first year. That information has helped us to shape the type of support most needed.
It’s important to recognise some of the characteristics of our student population. For example, many of our students may be the first in their families to experience higher education.
We also attract higher levels of mature students who bring with them different life experiences and responsibilities, such as caring for family members or working alongside their studies. As a result, some may take longer or require a more flexible approach to complete their studies.
Our campuses, structure and professional support services offer that flexibility. One example is our School of Business and Enterprise’s new undergraduate programmes which have been designed to offer maximum flexibility to allow students more ways of completing.
We’ve also created a team of Student Enhancement Developers whose focus is in supporting students from pre-induction through graduation and beyond.
They seek to help students help themselves by building confidence and personalising and tailoring services to meet the needs of students.
Our schools and professional service departments are focused on ensuring our students are at the centre of everything we do.
The support for our students is tailored for individual needs and starts before the application stage, develops through the recruitment process to an improved induction programme which offers a buddy system to help new students settle in to academic life and extends well beyond those first few initial weeks of study, so that our new students have personalised support to draw on as they go through their studies.
We’ve structured that on a week-to-week basis with signposts for every type of support available from financial planning, counselling, and preparing for exams.
We are leading the way in meeting the Scottish Government’s objective to ensure more people from deprived areas go to university, but with this comes the responsibility of ensuring our students have the best possible experience and support.
Professor Craig Mahoney is principal of the University of the West of Scotland
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