UAL Creative Mindsets: Modelling mindsets through co-production

One year ago, we posed the question, How can we make the UAL Creative Mindsets intervention sustainable at the University of the Arts London? In response to this directive, we upscaled the project by building a team of current students, staff and Alumni to co-facilitate workshops and ultimately co-produce materials. We focused on at least 3 courses per college (approx. 100 students per course) that were supported by the Academic Enhancement Model and delivered Induction week workshops for all, 1240 Year 1 students at London College of Communication. We will explore our efforts to embed UAL Creative Mindsets within the university to, in effect, change the culture, create buy-in and enthusiasm for the work and to address attainment differentials to develop growth mindsets, build resilience and reduce implicit bias.

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Eliminating Inequalities: Staff and students working in partnership to tackle differential outcomes

The SRHE Student Experience network, and The Changing Mindsets project presented a symposium focused addressing differential outcomes through staff and students working in partnership.

The Changing Mindsets project is one of 17 Office for Students funded projects focused on closing attainment gaps currently underway across the UK. Changing Mindsets is a student and staff workshop-based intervention that builds a Growth Mindset: the belief that ability develops through effort and by embracing challenge. Initially developed at the University of Portsmouth in 2012, the intervention aims to close the attainment gap in student experience, retention, progression, academic attainment and employability by changing mindsets and eroding stereotype threat (Osbourne & Walker, 2006) and implicit bias (Staats, 2014; Devine et al, 2012) as barriers to learning.

The symposium featured presentations of emerging findings from the quantitative and qualitative data collected so far across the project partnership as well as presentations focused on the different approaches each partner institution has taken to creating and enabling staff and students to work in partnership to tackle inequalities. In addition to presentations from the partnership, the day featured a student panel discussion to explore the question: “What should “working in partnership” look like in practice?” from the students’ perspectives.