{"id":185,"date":"2025-06-08T15:32:41","date_gmt":"2025-06-08T14:32:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/access-and-participation\/?p=185"},"modified":"2025-06-08T15:32:41","modified_gmt":"2025-06-08T14:32:41","slug":"automating-for-access-why-technology-matters-for-outreach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/access-and-participation\/automating-for-access-why-technology-matters-for-outreach\/","title":{"rendered":"Automating for Access: Why Technology Matters for Outreach"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Supporting students on the journey to higher education has always been deeply personal. Conversations, reassurance, advice,\u00a0 these are the moments that help students imagine new futures. But as demand grows, and as we work with more students from more backgrounds across more spaces, we face a familiar challenge: <strong>how do we scale support without losing that human connection?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>At Bath, we\u2019re using automation not as a replacement for relationships, but as a way to protect and prioritise them. By streamlining the processes behind our outreach, we can focus our energy where it matters most: building trust, removing barriers, and making higher education feel possible for every student.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Creating Space for Human Connection<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Widening access is relational work. It\u2019s built on trust \u2014 not transactions.<br \/>\nBut every meaningful interaction sits on a mountain of practical logistics: data collection, bookings, confirmations, monitoring, reporting. Without support, these tasks can quietly consume the time and attention that should be spent with students.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s why we\u2019ve automated key parts of our delivery:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Data handling<\/strong>: Using Power Automate, we transfer data from booking forms into spreadsheets instantly \u2014 so staff aren\u2019t stuck retyping.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Parent and teacher communication<\/strong>: Students\u2019 bookings trigger automatic, tailored emails to their schools and families, keeping the support network engaged without delay.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Event management<\/strong>: SharePoint allows us to track and manage outreach events centrally, ensuring no detail \u2014 or student \u2014 is missed.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Secure digital access<\/strong>: We generate university usernames for students attending online programmes, adding the right safeguarding settings automatically and enrolling them directly into MS Teams groups.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These aren\u2019t flashy innovations. They\u2019re quiet, deliberate choices that give us back what matters: time with students.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Making Data Work for Students, Not Just Systems<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>We\u2019ve also invested in building smarter, more connected data systems, not to collect information for its own sake, but to understand and improve the student journey.<\/p>\n<p>Using Power BI, we integrate spreadsheets from programme delivery, SharePoint records, CRM participation data, and national datasets about schools. This joined-up approach helps us:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Track how many students from outreach programmes go on to apply to Bath.<\/li>\n<li>Identify which schools and areas are engaging and where gaps remain.<\/li>\n<li>Tailor future outreach strategically, rather than relying on assumptions.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Data isn\u2019t an end point. It's a mirror: showing us where we\u2019re succeeding, where we're missing students, and where we need to do better.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Extending Personalisation Without Stretching Staff<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Personalised support is often what makes the difference for a student considering university.<br \/>\nBut true personalisation is labour-intensive and without help, it risks becoming patchy or unsustainable at scale.<\/p>\n<p>By embedding automation into our communications particularly through CRM systems we ensure that:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Students booking onto events get timely, relevant information without delay.<\/li>\n<li>Outreach participants receive follow-up nudges based on where they are in their journey.<\/li>\n<li>Schools hear back quickly when they engage with us.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>This isn\u2019t about sending more emails. It\u2019s about sustaining relationships\u00a0making sure no student feels forgotten, and no school feels overlooked.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Why It Matters<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Technology in outreach isn\u2019t about efficiency for its own sake. It\u2019s about equity.<\/p>\n<p>Students from underrepresented backgrounds are already navigating systems that can feel opaque, inconsistent and overwhelming. If we can make their interactions with us smooth, timely, and supportive, we remove unnecessary friction from their journey.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>When a student receives a confirmation instantly after booking, it reassures them they belong.<\/li>\n<li>When a parent gets information without needing to chase, it builds trust.<\/li>\n<li>When a teacher sees streamlined communication from us, it strengthens a partnership and credibility.<\/li>\n<li>When our staff aren\u2019t bogged down in admin, they can spend more time offering real guidance, encouragement, and connection.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In short: <strong>automation creates the conditions for access work to be human again.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>It allows us to treat every student not as a number in a spreadsheet, but as an individual with potential even as our reach expands across thousands of interactions and hundreds of schools.<\/p>\n<p>At Bath, we believe that scaling outreach doesn\u2019t mean diluting its impact. It means designing systems that lift the administrative burden off people\u2019s shoulders \u2014 so they can extend a hand to students instead.<\/p>\n<p>The future of widening participation won\u2019t be built on forms and processes. It will be built on trust, relationships, and opportunity and technology, used thoughtfully, can help us get there.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Supporting students on the journey to higher education has always been deeply personal. Conversations, reassurance, advice,\u00a0 these are the moments that help students imagine new futures. But as demand grows, and as we work with more students from more backgrounds...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":330,"featured_media":186,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-widening-access-activity"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/access-and-participation\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/175\/2025\/06\/automating-scaled.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pd4PBT-2Z","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/access-and-participation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/access-and-participation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/access-and-participation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/access-and-participation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/330"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/access-and-participation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=185"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/access-and-participation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/access-and-participation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/186"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/access-and-participation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/access-and-participation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/access-and-participation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}