Summary
UAL Academic Enhancement presented how student data on UAL dashboard is interpreted to understand the impact of teaching and assessment on attainment gaps, informing their work and relevance in the curriculum.
Starting with warm-up activities, we then looked at examples from the data dashboards, discussing terminology and sources used to compile the results. The session ended with a declaration of an action each of us will take to apply the learning, and further questions.
In the ‘Data-informed practice’ presentation, it was revealed that the attainment gap has been growing since previous years, but improved during Covid pandemic years. We discussed possible reasons for this, but also how the basis is speculative and ought to remain anonymised to stay detached from personal experiences clouding objective truths.
Reflection
It was re-iterated that closing the gap is the responsibility of everyone working at UAL, which was important for me to take on in the context of the national ‘Graduate Outcomes’ survey. Given the national importance of Graduate Outcomes data in shaping university reputation and policy (Office for Students, 2023), understanding how attainment gaps may echo into post-university trajectories becomes essential in supporting graduate futures.
From my experience of calling graduates, I shared how some are classified as ‘Home’ but are in fact ‘International’. Therefore, our data and understanding of how many ‘B.A.M.E’ or underprivileged graduates we support is warped, and most likely larger than documented.
As framed in the Professional Standards Framework (Advance HE, 2023), engaging with institutional data to inform and evaluate practice reflects a commitment to inclusive, evidence-based teaching
Next steps to apply learning
I declared in the ‘action pledge’ part that after the session, I wanted to ‘close the data loop’ with the graduates I support. Which to me means having graduates become more aware of how their input shapes and informs our delivery, which by design is responsive to their needs and the changing graduate job market, which I look further into in my case study. Closing the feedback loop with graduates also mirrors principles from Universal Design for Learning (CAST, 2018), which advocate for the dynamic shaping of practice in response to learner experience and context. This idea aligns with Universal Design for Learning (UDL)’s emphasis on responsiveness and flexibility, ensuring learning environments adapt based on learner variability and feedback.
However, it may also mean being transparent and sharing the UAL specific data results, and what that means when handling graduates from that course, or going into certain industries. Next steps will include presenting my ideas to management on the benefits of looping our stakeholders into our content design, and crediting them better, but also deciding how honest we want to be in sharing the Graduate Outcomes survey results to best represent the job market for UAL leavers and creative industries in general.
The project leads for UAL’s ‘Rethinking Employability’, designed to embed employability into the curriculum to improve graduate outcomes results, may hold the answer on if there is a link between attainment gap and positive career outcomes, based on the data, and be open to devising ideas on how we may work together to combat this going forward. As Fry, Ketteridge and Marshall (2015) argue, curriculum design should be underpinned by both reflection and evidence, ensuring that employability is embedded meaningfully and equitably.
References
Advance HE (2023) The Professional Standards Framework (PSF 2023). Available at: https://www.advance-he.ac.uk/teaching-and-learning/psf#psf2023 (Accessed: 4 April 2025).
Office for Students (2023) About the Graduate Outcomes Survey. Available at: https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/advice-and-guidance/student-information-and-data/graduate-outcomes/ (Accessed: 4 April 2025).
Sant, R. (2023) UAL Rethinking Employability. Available at: https://canvas.arts.ac.uk/documents/sppreview/d420e3c1-2726-47b8-8bdf-cd20281d1841 (Accessed: 4 April 2025).
CAST (2018) Universal Design for Learning Guidelines version 2.2. Available at: http://udlguidelines.cast.org (Accessed: 4 April 2025).
Fry, H., Ketteridge, S. and Marshall, S. (2015) A Handbook for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education: Enhancing Academic Practice. 4th edn. Oxford: Routledge
Arboine. J, Clay. S (UAL’s Academic Enhancement team) on ‘Data-informed practice’ (March 2025)
