1. Becoming not being:
What’s possible in a
transient programme

2. What is the Southern Universities Network (SUN)?
Network of south coast universities from Bournemouth across to Portsmouth
Third largest NCOP consortia – 28,000 learners (ONS data)
Transient – Objectives, funding, requirements, reporting
Government ownership and monitoring requirements
Naomi:
SUN is part of NCOP, national programme to rapidly increase HE participation in target electoral wards where GCSE attainment is high but Level 4 progression is much lower than expected
We are the third largest consortia in England with roughly 28,000 learners spread over 103 schools and 25 FE college
NCOP is currently funded up until July Phase 1 is due to finish in July this year and Phase 2, an expanded version of the project (which we will discuss later) will run from September 2019 up until July 2021
Monitoring and evaluation is branded by OfS as the cornerstone of this project and Phase 1 has key defined success measures

3. NCOP – Phase 1
Double the proportion of young people from disadvantaged backgrounds in higher education by 2020
Increase by 20 per cent the number of students in higher education from ethnic minority groups
Address the under-representation of young men from disadvantaged backgrounds in higher education
Naomi:
Two thirds of our aims are all measurable – they are quantifiable, binary and finite. We either have, or we haven’t succeeded.
The third is less concrete and open to interpretation. OfS has no defined outcome or measure of success so how will we know if we have achieved it? However; technically it could be argued it is still a binary outcome. If we have undertaken an intervention working specifically with young men from disadvantaged areas and gathered some data on their thoughts on progression, presented to our HEPs with suggestions, then yes – we have addressed the under-representation.

4. “Every system is perfectly designed to get the result that it does.”
Satisfied = Success
Deficit approach
Matt:
So, by the definition of an aim (the intention of achieving) if these are satisfied, the programme has been a success.
However, these aims are both broad and narrow, specific yet vague and written in the historical discourse of a deficit approach.
So does satisfying these aims result in a successful WP programme?
Are these aims designed to result in a successful programme?

5. “Every system is perfectly designed to get the result that it does.”
Satisfied = Success
Deficit approach
The “essence” of WP?
Matt:
Is there something more?
Are we talking, perhaps, about 3 separate things?
Some aims that may or may not be satisfied, a successful project and the very essence of widening participation.

6. Measuring success Matt:
Traditionally, if one is tasked with measuring the success of a project, be it WP, construction, organisational or other then some metrics are decided, KPI’s designed and a framework for measurement created.
This framework, often referred to as an evaluation framework in WP discourse, is logical, hierarchical and conformed.

7. “Binary logic is the spiritual reality of the root-tree.”
VERTICAL
KNOWLEDGE FROM KNOWN KNOWLEDGE
DEFINED ROLES
HIEARCHICAL STRUCTURE
Naomi:
Deleuze and Guattari speak of Western structures of knowledge, and knowledge creation, as a tree.
Unquestionable, hierarchical structures that form from a root, branches that stem from already known ways of being, growing vertically with our defined roles in our defined communities
“Binary logic is the spiritual reality of the root-tree.”

8. CONNECTED COMMUNITIES AND INDIVIDUALS
“any point of a rhizome can be connected to anything other, and must be”
ORGANIC BREAK
HORIZONTAL & VERTICAL
Naomi:
Rhizome is connected, we see the bits that want to be seen, underneath there are assemblages all equal, all different, all important. If a node fails, another will break away, the connections are vital to success and without these ever changing connections, the assemblage becomes null and void. The rhizome is therefore, always becoming, never being.
CONNECTED COMMUNITIES AND INDIVIDUALS
ASSEMBLAGE

9. WHAT CHANGE HAS TAKEN PLACE CAUSAL TO YOUR ACTION?
beginning
end
Measurement 1
Measurement 2
The evaluation tree in action is our go to = we think of a sequential logical timeline with a beginning and end which have each have a measurement point. We are measuring the impact an intervention has on the ‘growth’ or change of something due to an action. Our tools of measurement are bounded by the action, the timeline and the change only to answer the question.
WHAT CHANGE HAS TAKEN PLACE CAUSAL TO YOUR ACTION?

10. WHAT CHANGE HAS TAKEN PLACE CAUSAL TO YOUR ACTION?
INTERVENTION
Measurement
In an assemblage rhizome forces us to think wider than a timeline – the circle, nodes and black fuzz is a participant in a programme and all their ‘stuff’ i.e. assemblages. Our WP intervention forms part of this assemblage so, in this philosophical format, what change has taken place causal to your action? And, where, when, what and how do we measure to account for any change?
WHAT CHANGE HAS TAKEN PLACE CAUSAL TO YOUR ACTION?

11. The Rhizome
Matt:
The rhizome is interconnected, evolving and ever influenced and influencing.
It can be used to describe a community, a WP programme, an institution or a participant in a WP programme.
%It could be used to describe a participant in a program, an institution, the program itself, or something much, much larger.

12. The Rhizome
Matt:
As WP practitioners, we wish to measure the rhizome, so we apply our evaluation framework.
Here then, we have 2 bodies with wildly disparate structures.
Our classical hierarchy and our organic multiplicity.

13. The Rhizome
Matt:
When measuring our WP rhizome with our framework, we miss, we miss-understand and we miss-measure.
Our current tools are led by reporting requirements and therefore may not be fit for the purpose of measuring success or change in a rhizome.

14. The Rhizome
Matt:
Should we therefore seek to adapt our evaluation and our discourse to measure the knowns and acknowledge the unknowns?
If so, how do we describe and measure success in something that is never static and is ever becoming?

15. Dispersal of a transient programme
Rhizomatic
Changing - “better”?
Doesn’t fit a positivist discourse
Becoming not being
Naomi
So back to NCOP: We are ever changing, we are yet to ‘become’ and guidance for Phase 2 is providing further challenge for change and success measurement. Our Rhizomatic nodes are expanding in directions we are unsure of so how will we fit this within the ‘tree of evaluation success’?

16. Can we incorporate becoming in our policies, frameworks and discourses?
Naomi:
Our ending thought and question is, as a sector, and professionals working within this complex, organic environment – can we incorporate becoming, not being, into our discourses aligned with frameworks and policies? If so, how?

17. Thank you!