WPeople : Amy York

Name: Amy York
Nickname: Yorkie (by school friends), Spud (by hockey friends)
Job title: Senior Access Officer (Policy and Development)
UCL Department: Access and Widening Participation

What does your job involve?

It’s about looking into policy in widening participation. A lot of my work focuses on researching current policy surrounding certain groups that we work with, including care leavers, estranged students and students from black and minority ethnic backgrounds. I look at what other universities and organisations are doing and work with my team to build an evidence led approach that allows us to really tailor our efforts and help support those specific groups.

What does a typical day look like for you?

Sometimes I have to go to different conferences and forums to share what I’m doing with others and work collaboratively with people from other universities. It’s really great to work together as it means we can share our thoughts and experience, and we’re not all trying to reinvent the same thing. If I’m at my desk, I’m researching the areas mentioned above, developing plans and exploring new ideas.

It’s National Care Leavers’ Week soon. Can you tell us a little bit about the things you’ll be doing to celebrate it?

I’ll be working with some other universities in London and an organisation called HELOA to host a Higher Education Awareness Day for Looked after Children (LAC) and Care Leavers. Care leavers and LAC can come with their social worker, their foster carers or their virtual heads and learn more about what it is like to study at university. We’ll be talking about how to choose a course, student finance, the support that is available and we will hear from some students from care backgrounds who are currently studying at London universities.

What kinds of things is UCL doing to help care leavers access university?

We have a main point of contact for care leavers in our Student Support and Wellbeing department. Her name is Tracey Smith, and she is there to make sure students who have experience of care have someone to talk to and to offer them support, advice and guidance to help them get the most from their time at UCL.

We also have some good finance packages and bursary schemes that students from care backgrounds can apply for. One of them is the UNITE scholarship, which offers free accommodation for 365 days a year, including all bills, for the duration of your degree – how amazing is that? It is pretty competitive so we can’t offer it to everyone, but if you do apply and get all of your evidence together we will do our best to make sure you get all the support available.

Can you tell us about your journey to university?

I was born and raised in Trowbridge, Wiltshire, and then I lived in Reading for a bit before returning to Trowbridge. When it came to choosing a university, I wanted to move as far from home as possible so I could get a completely new experience. I even looked at studying in Ireland and Scotland but I wanted to make sure I could still get back to see my mum fairly easily, so I decided on Sheffield. All of my friends headed to places like Bath, Cheltenham, Cardiff, Bristol, which are not far from Wiltshire, so I was the odd one out. I don’t regret it for a moment though.

What was it like to study so far away from home?

I really enjoyed it. I just wanted to start afresh with no ties and no one to influence what I was doing. Sheffield is so different, I’d never lived in a city before or anywhere in the north of England. I was just looking for somewhere new and I really enjoyed discovering a new place and a different way of living.

What did you study?

I studied Human Communication Sciences, which is basically a long way of saying Speech Science. I could become a Speech Therapist, but I’d have to do another two years of studying for that! I’m enjoying what I do now, but it’s good to know there is another career option if I decide I want to change.

How did you first get involved with Widening Participation?

My first ever job after uni was as a student finance presenter. Following the tuition fee increase, I was employed by Student Finance England and attended a bootcamp-style training session on how to deliver a student finance presentation. Whilst I was doing that and visiting different schools, I got talking to people who did “outreach” and their work really caught my attention, so I started looking into it and I’ve been doing it ever since.

Why do you think Widening Participation is important?

I think it’s really important that we have a diverse student body that better represents the whole population of the UK, and so that we have lots of students bringing new ideas and challenging the way we do things. That’s how progress is made. Also, I think it’s important to make sure that everyone has fair access to higher education. No one’s options should be limited because of circumstances out of their control.

I really wanted to work in a home for the elderly! I just really wanted to help, I even drew a picture about why caring for the elderly is important! However, as I got older and learnt more about career options, I came to the conclusion that it maybe wasn’t for me.

What’s one thing you wish you could tell your teenage self?

Probably to plan earlier. I saw the future as something to deal with when I came to it. I wish I’d done more research and been a bit more organised when looking at my university options. The whole reason I didn’t do a speech science degree is because I didn’t know it was a thing until I was applying, and by that time I hadn’t tried very hard in my biology and I hadn’t done any work experience. I think if I’d have done more preparation and maybe a little bit of work experience, I would have known a bit more about where I was going and made different choices.

Finally, as Halloween is coming up, what’s the weirdest Halloween costume you’ve ever worn?

Well, I was supposed to be a pumpkin one year but my boyfriend stole my outfit, so I decided to go as a scary carrot, or “scarrot”. I’m quite tall so I just dressed as a long orange thing with a green face. I decided it works since children are pretty scared of vegetables.