Success as FE Progressing Students Succeed to Their Chosen Universities.

Our FE students moving on to pastures new at university have excelled in securing their place in their chosen university. In total, 97.5% of Bournemouth and Poole College Uni Connect students secured their firm university choice.

Also, 100% of Bournemouth and Poole College Uni Connect students secured their firm university choice or their insurance university choice, meaning all of our progressing students will be taking their next steps into Higher Education!

Some of their destinations include: Bournemouth University; Cardiff University; Arts University Bournemouth and The University of Southampton.

One such student, Noah, started at the college when he was 16, studying Performing Arts Level 1 because he was previously home-schooled and didn't have any GCSEs. But afterwards – he skipped directly to Level 3 due to the good grades he had gained whilst studying here and finished at 19. 

Noah says “I had the same tutors across the three years who were always brilliant. They were professionals working in the creative industry outside of college, which definitely transferred into the quality of education we were given. However, I always felt that the department could have used funding for even more staff. I loved that the course was very practical; we were almost always working on some kind of performance and learning while we did it. I've never not struggled with written work, but my tutors were incredibly proactive and always helped me through it so I usually did a lot better than I expected to - I was happily surprised with a DMM on results day.”

He adds: “I've always been interested in activism and participated in the local anarchist community in Bournemouth, which in combination with my love of theatre and the arts has led me to Contemporary and Popular Performance at Rose Bruford in London. The primary focus is circus skills, but it also covers things like activism through theatre, queer theory, and many other styles of alternative performance. 

“I never thought I'd find something to do that fit me so well and am practically itching to get there at this point. I'm genuinely not sure if I would have gotten there without Hollie - the already tedious application process was made significantly more difficult by me being a care-leaver and she helped me through the entire thing.”

Hollie Craig, Southern Universities Network (SUN) Progression Mentor at Bournemouth and Poole College said: “I am elated to announce a 100% success rate from my cohort of Uni Connect Level 3 students. These results mirror the nationwide increase in those from underrepresented backgrounds accessing Higher Education. This demonstrates the importance of widening participation initiatives in tackling educational inequity and raising student aspirations within BPC. I am very, very proud of my 2023-2024 cohort and wish them luck in their next steps.”

Uni Connect is focused on providing targeted outreach to young people living in geographic wards where progression to higher education is lower. Within college, this translates to holding sustained and dedicated 1-1 sessions and workshops to introduce students to the opportunities higher education can open.

 Uni Connect - Office for Students.