By Gareth Roberts
On a sunny Thursday in Manchester, we were joined by a wide range of eager participants from across the UK HE sector for our Data Driven Student Engagement conference. This was the first Simac sponsored conference, and we were happy to see so many people join us for what turned out to be a fantastic and thought-provoking event.
With representatives from over 30 different institutions in attendance, there was a great buzz around the venue as everyone arrived for coffee and took their seats for the start of the day. Following a warm welcome from our own Tony Vicente, we kicked things off with a fascinating keynote from the wonderful Tom Lowe of the University of Westminster who challenged us to think about ways of identifying best practices for effectively engaging Generation Z students. With group discussions and an eagerness to explore this area of practice, we were off to a great start that has hopefully continued as ideas have played around in the heads of our attendees.
Following a coffee break, we heard from the University of Leeds’ Louise Banahene to reflect on the approaches, strategies, challenges, and opportunities involved in delivering meaningful change at scale for the benefit of student communities in higher education. After Louise’s presentation, we heard from Dr Nathaniel Pickering, University of Greenwich to talk about how evaluation can act as a crucial bridge between student outcomes and institutional key performance indicators (KPIs) and drive meaningful institutional change.
After a break for a delicious lunch and some networking, we reconvened to hear from Elle Stockdale of the University of York who told our attendees about how the University of York is using data to proactively support student welfare and wellbeing, sharing practical insights into the strategies and tools helping the university better understand and respond to student needs.
We were then treated to a great session from Helen Kirby-Hawkins of the Manchester Metropolitan University who talked to us all about her interests in timetabling, habit forming and lifeload, asking us all to think about the reality that each of our students is more than just their studies and to be aware of the different and competing priorities that students may experience at any given time. We also had a think about the impacts of frequent and rapid changes to timetables in the early weeks of teaching.
Our final presentation of the afternoon featured Simac’s own Gareth Roberts taking a look at different types of student support provision from passive to re-active and pro-active considering how these different strategies can support, and be supported by, points discussed by all of our presenters during the day.
We wrapped things off with a thought-provoking panel discussion featuring Tom Lowe, Dr Nathaniel Pickering and Helen Kirby-Hawkins, chaired by Gareth Roberts where we re-examined some points from earlier discussions and considered some deeper ideas to take away with us for the future.
Work is already underway to plan the 2026 conference, and we hope to see you there!
