On 11 July 2013, The University's Widening Participation Team and IGGY hosted the prestigious Dux award visit.

The scheme launched last year and is a joint initiative organised by the Department for Education and the Russell Group put in place to reward each top-achieving Year 9 pupil from every state school in the country.

Selected pupils from 858 participating state schools are able to visit a Russell Group University and access free annual membership of IGGY as a benefit of winning the award. The Outreach work at Warwick aims to highlight the benefits of Higher Education and to raise aspirations of those young people who have the potential to enter university.

This year’s event was the most successful yet with 80 Year 9 pupils and their teachers attending from 40 secondary schools from across the country. The overarching theme for the day was ‘The Impact of Research in the Real World’. Pupils and their teachers enjoyed a rich and varied programme including contributions from: the Sub-Faculty of Languages, Warwick Business School, Chemistry, English, Computer Science, Mathematics and Classics.

Teachers attended workshops on IGGY, Student Funding and information, and advice and guidance on how to support pupils to make informed choices about their futures. The teacher programme inspired staff to begin promoting university to the younger years, and how to introduce university awareness to the pastoral curriculum.

As a follow-up to the event, Warwick has offered its continued support to these schools. Staff who attended expressed a keen interest in receiving information about any events (organised at Departmental or Faculty level) that their pupils may be able to access. As well as visiting campus, schools are also keen to welcome University staff and undergraduates into their schools to deliver workshops in subject-specific areas.

If any departments would like to find out more about how they could contribute to this kind or work and forge links with some of the Dux schools, please contact Annunziata Videtta in the Widening Participation team at A dot Videtta at warwick dot ac dot uk for further information.

IGGY is a social network designed to help gifted young people between the ages of 13-18 realise their full potential. It gives members access to great educational resources and encourages them to work with top academics and other gifted young people around the world.