Abstract
The National Scholarship Programme (NSP) is a form of financial support that
was conceived as a tool to safeguard access to higher education (HE) amidst increasing
university tuition fees in England. However, national NSP evaluations now reposition it as
an instrument for primarily achieving success and improving retention amongst its
recipients. This paper presents a case study of the University of Hertfordshire (UH) and
the delivery of its NSP award and has two main purposes: to examine this recalibration of
the NSP on an institutional level and to explore whether further transitional support,
delivered within the NSP’s structure, is effective at smoothing out transitions into UH for
students displaying lower than expected academic performance. Student survey and focus group data was collected across the Year 1 NSP cohort at UH during the 2013/14 year and its analysis supports the shift in policy of the NSP towards facilitating student success and retention. It also introduces an innovative mentoring programme that is successful in providing deeper transitional support within the NSP framework. The research should benefit both policymakers seeking to understand the institutional impact of national support models and student support researchers and practitioners interested in carving out new forms of support and understanding their impact on specific student groups.
was conceived as a tool to safeguard access to higher education (HE) amidst increasing
university tuition fees in England. However, national NSP evaluations now reposition it as
an instrument for primarily achieving success and improving retention amongst its
recipients. This paper presents a case study of the University of Hertfordshire (UH) and
the delivery of its NSP award and has two main purposes: to examine this recalibration of
the NSP on an institutional level and to explore whether further transitional support,
delivered within the NSP’s structure, is effective at smoothing out transitions into UH for
students displaying lower than expected academic performance. Student survey and focus group data was collected across the Year 1 NSP cohort at UH during the 2013/14 year and its analysis supports the shift in policy of the NSP towards facilitating student success and retention. It also introduces an innovative mentoring programme that is successful in providing deeper transitional support within the NSP framework. The research should benefit both policymakers seeking to understand the institutional impact of national support models and student support researchers and practitioners interested in carving out new forms of support and understanding their impact on specific student groups.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 60 |
| Number of pages | 73 |
| Journal | Journal of Widening Participation and Lifelong Learning |
| Volume | 17 |
| Issue number | 3 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Oct 2015 |
Keywords
- National Scholarship Programme
- academic support
- mentoring
- financial support
- transition into higher education
- student success