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Despite the changing demographic of many areas of Sussex, where the population is becoming increasingly diverse, data shows there is a low percentage of teachers who are visibly BAME. This results in a lack of positive role models for BAME pupils to identify with and look up to.”

The university’s School of Education and Student Services fund an ‘identity match mentoring programme’ for BAME teaching students and pairing them with BAME mentors who work or live locally.

Results show that the programme has impacted positively on BAME students’ employability, retention and the student experience.

Beth Thomas Hancock, the university’s Mentoring Manager, said: “Following the success of the identity match mentoring model for university students, a similar programme was piloted at a school in Brighton with 14 BAME university students mentoring 14 BAME school pupils.

“The programme showed that university students and the school pupils all felt their confidence and communication skills had improved. Following the pilot, funding was secured from the Sussex Learning Network through the National Collaborative Outreach Programme to deliver the programme in seven secondary schools across Sussex.

Beth Thomas Hancock

John Lynch

“Providing BAME role models as mentors is a simple and effective way to inspire young people to be the best that they can be. Students from the university volunteer to mentor volunteer BAME secondary school pupils.

“Mentoring takes place for one hour per week for five weeks and in the sixth week the school pupils visit the university campus with their mentors and have an informative and fun session about University.

“So far, 65 pupils have been mentored by 65 university students.”

Beth Thomas-Hancock and consultant John Lynch, who lead the programme, brought together  people from a range of sectors including universities, schools, councils, charities, community organisations, Sussex Police and The Premier League, to hear about the successes and listen to local and national experts on how we can improve experiences for all. Participants from across the sectors pledged actions to affect positive change in process, policy or practice within their organisations.