Each year we publish our Annual Report and Accounts setting out how we’re fulfilling our mission, to enable more people with care experience to access and progress successfully though further and higher education. Here is a summary of our published report covering the period 2022/23.
In the year 1 August 2022 to 31 July 23 we learned from and continued to develop our Quality Mark. We are pleased to have worked with the Student Loans Company to build in more detailed guidance around student finance and co-develop a template for institutions to use to record CPD on care experience as part of their evidence for the award.
In 2023 we celebrated reaching and exceeding our 100-member milestone. Overall member satisfaction with NNECL remains high with an average score of 4.41 out of 5.
Participation in the Quality Mark continued to grow during 2022/23 with a total of 36 visionary universities and colleges completing the award by the end of the year. To achieve our Quality Mark, institutions provide evidence of how they support the inclusion and success of care experienced students for review by an experienced assessor. Feedback from participating institutions remained consistently positive on the benefits of the change management programme.
Our Quality Mark guidance was updated to include more content on accommodation support and rent guarantor schemes aligning with The Office for Students new approach to Access and Participation Plans including a new Equality of Opportunity Risk Register.
A highlight of the year was the return of the in-person NNECL annual conference which were paused during the Covid-19 pandemic. Under the theme of Achieving More Together, over 100 delegates joined us in Manchester on 22 November 2022 for a packed programme of plenary sessions and workshops. Delegate feedback rated the conference very highly with a usefulness score of 4.7/5 and an overall satisfaction score of 4.8 out of 5.
We had 304 webinar bookings across the year and our programme covered the following areas: Improving the data on care experience; Student finance and the Quality Mark; Widening participation activity for care experienced learners; Trauma-informed and whole community approaches to supporting care experienced learners; and Effective practice in the Culture and Leadership section of the NNECL Quality Mark.
A webinar participant said, “I have particularly enjoyed, found useful and accessible the NNECL webinar programme which has covered some excellent topics over the past year. Please do continue with these as they provide examples of good practice to all institutions and give contacts which can be followed up for further details after the event.”
These were the last Annual Report and Accounts during which Patricia Ambrose was our Director. Patricia stood down at the of July 2023. For NNECL, Patricia built a solid foundation for a sustainable future, increased membership and successfully launched our NNECL Quality Mark. We wish Patricia well for the future.
Our Annual Report and Accounts are published on the Charities Commission website here.
NNECL Annual Report and Accounts 2022 to 2023