Abstract

In January 2021, a group of higher education professionals heralding from five higher education institutions (HEIs) in the northeast, comprising the Three Rivers consortium of universities, came together to consider the plight of student engagement in higher education with the initial intention of presenting key insights at the Three Rivers Annual Conference in June 2021.

The context for the group to collaborate was the increased diversity in the cultural and educational backgrounds of students, accelerated more recently by the large-scale changes and challenges to teaching arrangements that have been prompted by the global pandemic and higher educations’ response to it. Institutions have responsibility to ensure that academic programmes and the student experience are shaped in ways that provide the opportunity for study success for all students, regardless of their backgrounds, experiences or mode of study.

In a collective response, and over the course of several virtual ‘gatherings’, colleagues from across a variety of professional roles (academic, leadership, student support) openly shared, reflected on and discussed their various practice experiences of engaging different groups of students. This reflection and exploration has revealed an increasingly complex reality for HEIs in which they need to be dynamic and responsive, recognising and addressing the varying needs of students as they impact on academic studies and the wider student experience, and adjusting their programmes and processes to accommodate differing student cohorts and modes of study.