Since Student Hubs announced their closure in June 2024, our team have had time to consider the legacy we want to leave to the higher education sector, and the value of student social action.
Student Hubs was a social action charity established in 2007 after students from the University of Oxford identified that they could do more to provide opportunities for students to participate in social action projects, tackling social and environmental issues that were important to their community. We believe the need for social action within the university experience is vital as universities look to strengthen their graduate employability, their civic and community relations, and their approach as anchor institutions.
Unfortunately Student Hubs will no longer be part of this work, and the reasons for our decision to close were multifaceted as shared in our closure statement, but very much echo the reasons why student estrangement charity Stand Alone closed its doors last year.
They said:
In the context of rapidly changing circumstances and a challenging wider environment hampering our efforts to raise additional funding, we have had to make the hard decision to close.
In his article about Stand Alone’s closure, Alex Blower argued:
But what comes next nationally is very much up to us. Without timely, decisive action being taken we are currently on the precipice of losing the collective energy, commitment, and investment in the support of these students.
We feel similarly and would like to make a similar call for action as we close up our work.
Legacy
Since October, I have had the privilege of delivering several webinars and writing toolkits for the higher education sector which enshrine Student Hubs’ approach to social action, student opportunities, volunteering and delivering community partnerships. Over the past 16 years Student Hubs has worked with diverse institutions across England and Wales, and what they have shared is the transformative outcomes which students and communities can experience from participating in shared social action activities.
Developing confidence, skills and wellbeing of our student participants was central to our outcomes, and we saw this in practice with our 2023-24 impact report.
88 per cent of students agreed the activity enhanced their university experience, 84 per cent of students agreed that participating enhanced their wellbeing, 91 per cent of students agreed that participating increased their confidence in approaching challenges and 82 per cent of students agreed that participating developed their ability to organise, plan and prioritise work.
We hear this feedback from students too. A student who participated in our campaigning and advocacy training reflected on how the programme enabled them to develop core skills which they described as “essential for success.”
Participating] built confidence in being more proactive in all areas of my life. It provided skills that are transferable and very necessary for leadership, project management, resilience and analytical thinking. These are skills that are not taught in [the] classroom … The universities who are interested in creating social value through education should definitely sponsor [activities like these].”
Our partners also reflect on how student involvement in social action benefits their business whilst enhancing students’ skills. Lara at Creative Tuition Collective in Bristol described how social action programmes change perceptions of students.
University students are really great people to work with. They’re incredibly dedicated … [and] really fit in with what we also believe in, which is giving young people experience, nurturing their talent and giving them confidence to present and build their confidence … [ students] can be so inspiring if you give them a chance. I don’t think a lot of people give them a chance, or think they’re not qualified enough … [the team] did such a great job of interviewing people and investigating what I haven’t had capacity to. I’m using [their research] this year to change my business plan and strategise what funding streams I can have and how I do that.”
It’s our hope that student unions and universities will continue to work with local business partners to give students, but also those organisations, a chance to benefit from their personal development.
What now?
The sector is able to access our resources and webinar recordings on Student Hubs’ website until the end of 2025 and on the Civic University Network website as part of their legacy resources hub, which will be the resources’ permanent home. This includes resources and toolkits for university practitioners, students and community organisations.
If we had to summarise our takeaways from six months of developing and writing these resources, our advice to the sector implores colleagues to continue to develop and scale up opportunities for students to act as leaders within community activities and student unions play a vital role in these efforts.
It’s essential that institutions explore and understand the role social action can play in all parts of the university experience, including both in-curricular and extracurricular activities.
Finally, when completing this kind of outreach, universities embed an innovative approach to accessibility, inclusion and student development that allows social action to take place.
We want to encourage teams across universities to build a society in which every student participates in social and environmental challenges during their education, supporting them to become active citizens for life.
We still believe that social action can be part of the solution for solving many of the challenges which the sector faces including student retention, wellbeing, skills and employability, and meeting the civic and regional needs of our places. As Student Hubs closes, we leave this legacy to universities to implement the approaches and insight we have developed from sixteen years of delivering student social action.
You can access Student Hubs’ collected toolkits and resources for universities here.
