Social Impact
Social impact has always been at the heart of what we do at Oxford Scholastica. Our passion is to change young people’s futures, and in doing so to change the world.
We want to give our students the edge to enable them to succeed, but also find their purpose and make a difference.
Many of our students will go on into leadership positions in business, government, NGOs etc, and a big part of our social impact is about inculcating them with a sense of social responsibility, and a roadmap of how to achieve this.
Our Masterclasses, including our Social Impact and Change the World Masterclasses, guide our students to reflect on their place in the world, and inspire them with practical examples from social enterprises and charities who talk about the impact they generate and challenges they have faced.
£15,000 – donated to charity this year
Future ambitions – our three year vision is to provide over 10,000 hours of free support for students from disadvantaged backgrounds
Our Projects
We also think it’s important to live out our commitment to social impact in other ways, not just through the curriculum. So, for example, we have a charitable Foundation which provides funding, advice and publicity for projects our alumni are involved with, whether they have started something up themselves, or volunteer or campaign for another cause close to their hearts. All our alumni are empowered to choose which projects the Foundation funds.
We’re proud to have supported a number of good causes, ranging from Be The Vibe, a social enterprise selling jewellery to fund clean water projects in Rwanda, to Cloudy Mind, a not-for-profit providing peer-to-peer teenage mentoring for students facing mental health challenges.
We also think it’s important to reflect on our responsibilities as an education company in other ways. We are conscious that, for many students, our fees are out of their reach.
In the past, we ran what we believe to be one of the largest private scholarship programmes in the UK, with nearly 50 students attending our residential Oxford summer school in the three years before the pandemic (worth around £200,000). This programme was targeted at students in Oxfordshire from disadvantaged backgrounds.
We now run our scholarship programme online, as part of our commitment to provide over 10,000 hours of free support for students from disadvantaged backgrounds over the next 3 years.
In addition, we also fund good causes close to our team’s hearts, with £15,000 donated to charities and social enterprises this year. Part of this goes to Jacari, our sponsored charity for the year.
They are a local Oxford student charity providing free, 1:1 tutoring for disadvantaged migrant, asylum-seeking, and refugee children aged 6-16 who have English as an Additional Language (EAL) and are struggling at school.
Earlier this year, we ran a Social Impact & Development Internship, hosted by Jacari, with all profits going to the charity.
The Future
As we move towards our tenth year as an education company, we have big ambitions for the future, despite the challenges COVID-19 presents. Over the next three years we would like to:
- Increase the number of scholars attending our programme, with the ambition of providing 10,000 hours of free support for students from disadvantaged backgrounds
- Become carbon neutral
- Build partnerships with schools around the world to provide free access to additional support
We’re aware these are ambitious, and that we still have a lot to do. In many ways, we are just starting the journey towards ensuring OSA has significant positive impact at scale, and bringing about the change we would like to see in the world.
If you have any questions about our social impact, please contact us here and we would be pleased to answer.
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