First Year: Engagement and Empowerment

This Theme focused on student engagement and empowerment. In doing so, it considered the nature and purposes of the first year in higher education.

Work on the Theme began in autumn 2005.

Outcomes of the Theme work, including an overview and the work of the project teams, are available in the 'Outcomes' section.

The overview says in its final recommendations that the Enhancement Theme had concluded with a list of 'challenges'. Setting these out as high-level enhancement recommendations, these are to:

produce an explicit strategy for the first year
shift resources into an increased provision for the first year
improve the quality of the data about the first-year experience
raise the status of first-year teaching
define the overarching learning outcomes of the first year as 'academic literacy'.