King's students go back to school

Just after finishing a busy term in college, a group of King's undergraduates has gone on a journey to visit schools in North East England. The students ran Higher Education workshops in schools in Middlesbrough, Stockton-on-Tees, Redcar and Hartlepool. King's has formal links with schools in the North East through the Cambridge University Area Links Scheme and has been running the 'Access Bus' for several years now. The project is an annual trip designed to raise aspirations amongst state school students and it has again been a great success. Travelling to the North East together, nine volunteers from King's College split up into two groups and were thus able to visit 26 schools in 3 1/2 days, to share their experiences of Higher Education, and Cambridge in particular, with pupils in years 9 and 10. Through a set of activities, such as a 'True or False' quiz and listing as many subjects as they can think of that can be studied at university, students got to think and ask questions about about university life and the opportunities on offer. Manor Community Academy students had a visit on 21st March and they seemed to have enjoyed it very much. One of them said: "I liked all of the activities during the session and it was really educational." See the Manor Community Academy website for the full article. This year's Access Bus group was made up of second year student volunteers studying a range of subjects. They were lead by Access Officers Mica and Joanna and former Access Officer Fraser. Admissions and Schools Liaison Officer, Caro Schade accompanied the group and will meet many of the pupils again when they are in sixth form to discuss applications to Cambridge and other top universities in more detail. She said: "It is great to see what positive impact talking to current King's students has on pupils in Year 10 and that a lot of them now consider university as an option that is attainable for them."