Collaborative pledge offers support to estranged students 

Go Higher West Yorkshire (GHWY) will launch its collaborative Stand Alone Pledge 2022-23 with a social media campaign during Estranged Students Solidarity Week (21-25 November).

The resource, which was first produced last year, is aimed at students studying without family support. It raises awareness of the support available for them across our 13 member institutions including whether they have named contacts, dedicated web-pages, and additional financial support.

This year’s document has been updated to include a number of new features that are designed to make it even more informative and user friendly. This follows input from our members, as we seek to continually improve estranged students’ access to information on their entitlement to support in HE.

This year we have revised the support categories that our members offer to estranged students, with new check-boxes for support with graduation costs and whether the HE provider acts as a rent guarantor.

In addition, the document now includes a glossary of HE terms, quotes from estranged young people, and a refreshed list of top tips to help individuals on their HE journey. The design has also been overhauled to make it clearer and even more accessible.

The resource will be shared with our members, key stakeholders and Local Authorities across the region.

It will also be promoted with a presentation at Southern Universities Network’s Estranged Students CPD Conference on Thursday, 24 November. Tahera Mayat (Collaborative Outreach Officer) and Susan Darlington (Partnership Assistant) will discuss the benefits of collaborative pledges, outputs from the document, and share best practice.

Download a copy of our Stand Alone Pledge.