Plugging the Leaks

At the start of November we had the pleasure of supporting the first Plugging the Leaks workshop at the University of Southampton – an inspiring start to a partnership project that’s tackling one of the most important challenges in our sector.

This initiative, funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), explores the “leaky pipeline” in Environmental Science subjects – focusing on the barriers that people of colour and those from low-income backgrounds face as they progress from GCSEs to A-Levels (and equivalents), into university and beyond.

This first workshop brought together a diverse group of university staff and students to reflect on our own journeys and identify:
* Enablers – what has helped us succeed academically or professionally
* Barriers – the challenges that can hold people back
* Unknown unknowns – the things we know now, but wish we’d known earlier

It was a thought-provoking and collaborative day, setting the foundation for developing meaningful interventions that can help make Geography, Earth and Environmental Studies (GEES) subjects more inclusive and accessible.

Future workshops will continue this work – including taking the conversations directly into schools and colleges – as we build partnerships across the education and employment landscape to truly “plug the leaks” in the progression pipeline.

Huge thanks to the University of Southampton team and all the partners involved for creating such a welcoming and reflective space. We are really looking forward to seeing how this project evolves and the positive change it will help bring about across our sector.