Executive Summary

What do you want your project to achieve?

Provide an understanding and awareness of what departments are currently doing to ensure continued accessibility (not access to entry) and retention in accordance with WP; issues WP students face; what is or could be beneficial to students going forward so the department and University can work together to alter current practices or implement new ones.

How many students will your project reach?

The number of actual focus groups that will take place is still to be determined. We aim to have a representative sample of WP students from various departments. Focus groups will range in size from 6-8 members.

Which stakeholders will you involve?

A diverse group of four undergraduate students will have the opportunity to enhance their research skills, experience and employability by undertaking primary data collection. They will be responsible to organize (with the project manager) and conduct focus group interviews and transcribe recordings.

The undergraduate researchers will be responsible for engaging with a diverse mix of WP students from Warwick's four faculties.

Widening Participation Officers from the various departments across the four faculties will be involved to provide information on what their respective departments do (and if so to what extent/any future plans) to enable accessibility to various resources within their department and wider University, as well as any retention initiatives aimed at current Warwick students. Many of the current programs partner with outside community members in terms of WP and access to HE – we want to understand what happens once these students have become enrolled as students at the University.

What is the intended legacy of your project?

The intention is to enhance and carry discourse on WP retention forward and to provide practical solutions to findings and recommendations made by both the interviewees and researchers.