Written evidence submitted by Children’s University

Executive Summary

 

  1. Children’s University is a national charity geared towards addressing and closing the gaps and inequalities that are faced by children from disadvantaged backgrounds. We work with a growing network of schools, businesses, communities, organisations and institutions of all sizes to provide children with valuable learning experiences and opportunities outside of the classroom. These experiences are crucial to providing children with the necessary tools, skills and social and cultural capital to succeed and drastically improve their life chances; tools and skills often neglected or not provided by mainstream, curricular education.

 

  1. The growing Children’s University movement currently consists of more than 20 Universities and Higher Education Institutions, over 1,000 schools and more than 5,000 public places of learning. Together the opportunities we offer are accessed by over 110,000 children who last year alone took part in excess of 3.6 million hours of learning beyond the classroom. We are submitting this evidence as we believe that our programme shows real promise in addressing a number of the issues the inquiry pertains to. In particular, our work sees positive impact on social mobility, educational attainment, and community engagement. We also believe we have valid suggestions regarding how the space outside of the classroom, where the activities this inquiry is addressing occurs, operates and is viewed by the government.

 

  1. As an organisation, we encourage participation in all activities and experiences outside of the classroom where learning can happen, be they sport based, cultural, or centred around any other sector. At present, our programme offers a balanced provision of both sport and culture, with 39% of the activities we offer being sport oriented and another 39% centring on cultural institutions and experiences, including museums, libraries, shows and entertainment. It is this combination, we believe, which allows us to have the positive impact that we do. Of the five themes identified in this inquiry, our programme demonstrates positive impact on at least three.

 

  1. Regarding social mobility, the Sutton Trust Life Lessons Report offers solid evidence that participation in learning experiences outside of the traditional curriculum can have a great impact. The report highlights how extracurricular activities can help in the provision of ‘life skills’ that are often neglected in curricular education in favour of academia. These life skills range from the ability to communicate effectively with peers to a sense of general confidence and motivation, and are not only recognised as having a positive impact on achievement in school but also held in high regard and seen as more important than academic achievements by 94% of employers and 97% of teachers. Furthermore, young people themselves argue much the same, with the report noting that 88% of them believe that life skills are more important than grades, yet only a fraction of them believing their curricular education provides these skills.
     
  2. Similarly, a report into the efficacy and impact of our programme by the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) found that children across a number of particularly disadvantaged areas in the UK, namely Lancashire, Blackpool, Blackburn and Darwen and Middlesbrough, reported higher levels of communication, resilience, empathy, self confidence and happiness after participating in Children’s University. In providing children with these skills, our programme has the potential to impact social mobility in a huge way by equipping those who normally fall behind with the tools crucial to their ability to excel and realise their potential.

 

  1. In providing activities in both sport and culture, organisations such as our own are equipping children with skills imperative to success both in school and later life; skills that are often neglected by mainstream schooling. The Sutton Trust report likens the provision of these skills to the provision of good ‘character’ in private education and demonstrates the value of offering tools such as confidence to children. These tools directly impact social mobility as they allow for greater employability and aspiration amongst those equipped with them. The Sutton Trust report, however, also highlights the way in which many children who need these skills the most are excluded from participating in the very activities that provide them. According to the report, only 46% of disadvantaged children access learning activities outside of the classroom, compared to 66% of their better-off contemporaries. Children’s University is directly addressing this, working with a vast number of public learning destinations across the country to increase access and reward children for their participation and attendance. In doing so, our organisation is directly affecting the number of those receiving the skills essential to success and, subsequently, allowing those same children who were once excluded to access valuable opportunities. Specifically, this is demonstrated in areas such as Hull, where 46 of the 65 primary schools we work with rank in the 2% most deprived postcodes in the country, where opportunities are usually sparse.

 

  1. In relation to education, the Children’s University model has been proven to raise attainment amongst children in some of the most deprived and worst performing areas in the country. The aforementioned EEF’s evaluation of our programme again demonstrates this, showing that participation in Children’s University can improve children’s academic and non-cognitive outcomes in school, and improve their attainment and overall educational performance. Specifically, the report states that participation in Children’s University during the trial led to positive impacts on KS2 Maths and Reading akin to 2 months’ additional progress, with children eligible for Free School Meals (FSM) making a further 1 month’s additional progress in Maths. The evaluation also showed that children participating in Children’s University were more likely to select professional occupations as their future aspiration.

 

  1. In addition, an internal report conducted on our impact in Sheffield, where over 39,000 children have now participated in Children’s University activities, found similarly positive impacts on educational attainment amongst both primary and secondary students. For example, 51% of secondary school Children’s University participants achieved A* - C in both English and Maths, compared to a regional average of 42.5%. Similarly, the report notes that those who had accumulated enough hours to be eligible for awards (at least 100 of participation) exceeded both the Sheffield and national average for this same threshold, suggesting that the more a child participates, the more the programme helps with their educational attainment.

 

  1. The work Children’s University does to encourage participation in sport, cultural, and more activities is also having a positive impact on community, vastly increasing engagement in public activities and destinations amongst children across the country. As a local branch network led organisation, we rely on a movement of local activities and learning destinations to deliver, at present, 5,836 learning opportunities, including 2,465 sporting and 2,460 cultural activities. In doing so, we’re connecting children to a vast array of opportunities in their local areas, building community connections between children in need of the benefits these learning experiences offer and those who can provide them. This reach has been well evidenced throughout various data and reports, but its impact is perhaps best highlighted through anecdotal responses from parents and participants themselves. One such response details Children’s University’s impact on the life of an SEN child who’s experience of bullying led to low self-esteem and mental health issues that resulted in his being home schooled. Through participation in our programme, this child was able to reconnect with his community and begin experiencing a number of opportunities he had not been able to partake in previously. Through Children’s University, according to his mother, ‘’He can now almost swim, ski, rock climb, kayak, ice skate, and scoot to name a few, and he’s found a passion for the theatre.” Through participation in these predominantly sporting activities, this child has been able to combat his mental health issues and become a participating member of his community.
  2. Increasing diversity and developing talent amongst young people are also key areas where the Children’s University model has a positive impact. By our own calculations, children spend only 9% of their time in a classroom by the age of 18. This means that the remaining 91% of their time is spent outside of a learning environment, potentially not learning at all. We believe that the government must focus more on working with people who operate in the space of this 91%; a space which offers huge potential for developing talent and skills crucial to success in later life and beyond those of academia. One way in which Children’s University helps in the development of such talent is in the way we work with both schools and businesses, building bridges between the two and connecting children to potential employers throughout their time with us. There is a growing correlation between encounters with employers and employability amongst young people, and we must recognise that what children cannot see, they cannot aspire to. By broadening their vision of work and employment, we better equip children to make informed and realistic decisions about their futures. Specifically, according to the Careers and Enterprise Company’s Thomas Graham, ‘Four chance encounters with employers increases a young person’s chances of earning a higher salary by 20% and makes them 50% less likely to be NEET’. By increasing encounters with employers from an early age, we have the ability to make these statistics a reality and allow children to aspire to careers and futures beyond their previous conception.

 

  1. In doing so, our programme also addresses the issue of diversity. By offering encounters with employers outside of many children’s direct communities, we enable them to aspire to careers and futures they may not have otherwise considered, and thus increase the number of currently under-represented demographics in many workplaces. We believe this echoes much of what Justine Greening stressed during her time as Education Secretary, during which she highlighted the need for encounters with employers, offering her own experience of growing up in the industrial North as an example of how one aspires to what one grows up around and sees. Our organisation goes one step further by including our chancellors at graduation ceremonies; Chancellors who consist of authors, Paralympians and artists to name a few. Encounters with these people increases visibility amongst children. It allows them to see beyond their direct experiences of employment and futures, often limited to that of their parents for example, and opens a new world of opportunities to aspire to. 

 

  1. Our organisation sees the success that it does partly due to the way in which we view the extracurricular space and how we operate within it. Reflecting this, we believe that, rather than considering the sports and arts sectors as separate entities, the government and indeed organisations themselves must abandon their current silo mentality and recognise that they all play a part in the aforementioned 91%. Resultantly, each has a great deal to offer when it comes to social mobility and, if working in conjunction, can provide children with an unrivalled multiplicity of life skills we already know are not only crucial to success, but valued by young people themselves. As a thematically agnostic organisation, Children’s University sees success because we do just that. Rather than focusing on one kind of activity, we offer opportunities and access to all, not only allowing children to participate in activities within their comfort zone and understanding, but enabling them to move beyond a polarisation of participation and begin embarking on new and rewarding experiences. As previously discussed, we currently have over 2,000 opportunities in both the sporting and cultural sectors. These are complemented by a growing number of activities and opportunities in various other sectors and areas, including 319 STEM activities and over 300 uniformed groups, the latter of which have been shown to improve children’s relationships, boost their life skills and increase employability. It is benefits such as these, benefits which are provided through a multiplicity of experience, that make the need to co-operate as one network within the extracurricular space so imperative.

 

  1. In an environment where this can occur, art, sport, culture, and everything else in between complement and feed off one another. This is where the potential for the 91% can truly be seized. Rather than recreating and duplicating organisations and initiatives, existing ones should work in unison to provide a multiplicity of experiences and opportunities that recognise the shared value of all activities, experiences, and opportunities.

 

 

February 2018