At Make Happen, our outreach team is committed to inspiring and supporting students across Essex and beyond to explore higher education opportunities. Working in close partnership with the University of Essex (UoE), Anglia Ruskin University (ARU), and the University of East London (UEL), we deliver engaging activities, resources, and guidance that help young people make informed decisions about their futures.
To mark the start of 2026, we asked colleagues from our three partner HEIs to reflect on the impact of working with Make Happen and how our collaboration continues to support students and schools across the region.
How has working with Make Happen supported or enhanced your university’s engagement with local schools and colleges?
UoE
By partnering with Make Happen, we are able to offer bigger campus visits to multiple schools on the same day, thereby emulating that fresher feel of meeting many potential future friends whilst exploring university life. Additional funding from Make Happen also enabled us to deliver a family fun day in Jaywick and Greenstead to support with key themes such as holiday hunger and supporting quality family time. 91% of attendees said the event was helpful and 95% learnt something new, while 86% said that what they learnt would help them make an informed choice about their future.
ARU
Working with Make Happen has increased our team’s capacity and helped build more consistent, meaningful relationships with local schools and colleges. As an example, Finance Your Future (a maths attainment-raising project) was delivered in partnership in 2024-25 which led to ongoing collaboration and greater trust in our outreach offer from the school. Overall, Make Happen continues to add real value to our work and our wider mission.
UEL
Essex is traditionally a difficult area for us to engage and target, but working with Make Happen has allowed us to expand engagement within Essex schools, widening the geographical scope beyond the traditional East London boroughs.
UEL has a long-standing relationship with Make Happen which has gone from strength to strength each year and has helped UEL to work with targeted groups of students and support their transition to HE.
Please share some examples of successful activities/projects that were strengthened by Make Happen’s involvement.
UoE
By leveraging Make Happen support, we have been able to explore pilots for activities for campus visits that go beyond the standard encounter. For example, to support schools in providing modern work experience opportunities we have worked with Make Happen to provide students with a realistic and engaging experience of workplace roles by simulating how a university Students’ Union team supports and represents students, helping them develop transferable employability skills such as teamwork, problem-solving, communication, and decision-making.
In 2025 we also delivered our residential summer school collaboratively welcoming over 25 students onto our campus for a sleepover. Students took part in a full academic programme and enjoyed their evenings at our onsite cinema, cooking (supervised!) in their flats and taking part in a quiz.
ARU
Make Happen’s expanding involvement in the Service Children’s Progression (SCiP) Alliance Hub has added valuable expertise, sector insight, and strong networks. Make Happen’s contribution has helped drive momentum and raise the profile of support for service children across our region, such as Festival of Friends.
Similarly, Make Happen led a full on-campus experience day within ARU’s Chelmsford Science Festival, attracting 7 schools and 164 students to the campus. Their coordination of school engagement and programme design significantly expanded the festival’s reach and impact, with both teachers and students reporting a positive experience; one student said “Today was a great day from the beginning till the end, it was very fantastic, and I would love to come another day”.
UEL
Gear Up (Easter School) was nominated for the Best Practice Collaboration Award in 2024 and came highly commended in the Widening Access and Partnership Awards 2022.
In 2024/2025, we co-delivered this year’s Your Future Summer School. The partnership helped secure student attendance from the Essex area for our 5-day non-residential summer school. This has strengthened our pipeline among young people in Essex through the Make Happen team. We wouldn’t have achieved this impact without the partnership, and it has laid the foundation for future growth. Co–delivery from the Make happen team added invaluable content for the programme; they delivered two successful sessions.
How has the partnership helped you reach new schools/colleges, deepen existing relationships and/or address gaps in your outreach work?
UoE
The partnership has supported a much more joined-up approach to working with schools and colleges across the county. By coordinating activity, we’ve been able to reach new settings while also strengthening existing relationships, ensuring schools receive coherent, well-timed support rather than multiple unconnected offers. This has helped avoid both duplication and gaps in provision, making our outreach more strategic and easier for schools to engage with. Overall, the partnership has improved visibility, consistency and impact across our work with young people.
ARU
ARU utilised Make Happen’s student project with white boys as a foundation and to inform the development of ARU’s Beyond the Label teacher CPD, addressing a key gap in ARU’s portfolio and responding to Access and Participation priorities.
Make Happen’s partnership with schools, particularly those that have taken part in the Festival of Friends project have played an important role in supporting ARU’s recruitment for Creative Forces Day by strengthening engagement and widening the pool of participating students.
Similarly, Make Happen’s strong connections with schools have enabled effective recruitment for the Chelmsford Science Festival which was a key collaborative project between the two organisations.
We have also been able to promote a range of opportunities to students through Make Happen’s regular newsletters which has enhanced attendance at events such as ARU’s Amplify Your Summer programme.
UEL
Working with Make Happen supports us in targeting white students from IMD Q1 and Q2 backgrounds, which is a priority group as part of our APP 2025-29.
Gear Up, a joint collaboration between Make Happen and UEL, has been running since 2022. In total, 40 schools have been engaged and over 120 students taken part. On average 80.8% of all students taking part have since 2022 have derived from IMD Q1/Q2 backgrounds.
Looking ahead, what opportunities or developments are you most excited about for the future of the partnership with Make Happen?
UoE
Looking ahead, we’re particularly excited about the opportunity to work collaboratively on a joined-up Summer School in 2026, building on shared learning and impact. We’re also keen to explore a pilot project focused on increasing participation of boys in health-related courses, which aligns well with shared priorities around addressing skills gaps, widening participation and challenging stereotypes. These developments offer real potential to deepen the partnership further and deliver targeted, meaningful outcomes for learners.
ARU
Looking ahead, ARU is enthusiastic about the opportunities arising from its partnership with Make Happen. Make Happens support has enabled ARU to reach teachers in schools and deliver CPD that strengthens classroom practice and extends the programme’s impact beyond direct student engagement. This work is designed to complement Make Happen’s existing efforts with white boys in schools, ensuring a coherent and joined-up approach that responds to local needs and maximises outcomes for underrepresented learners.
UEL
This year, we have two Make Happen Officers based at our Docklands campus! This means they will be able to run their own campus visits for local schools/colleges and get even more involved in the collaborative projects like Gear Up and Summer School. We look forward to building on our relationship and developing future initiatives.
Interviews by Ash Poole, Deputy Head of Make Happen