Projects

At TASO, we run a range of research and evaluation projects, on topics ranging from summer schools and data analytics, to small cohort methodologies and what works to reduce the ethnicity degree-awarding gap.

Current projects

View the insights and evaluation library

Project

Project | Developing theories of change for contextualised admissions

28 September 2026

TASO is working with six higher education providers to develop theories of change and strengthen approaches to evaluating contextualised admissions policies across different institutional contexts.
Guidance and resources

HEEL: Step-by-step guidance for submitting your evaluation

Step-by-step guidance for submitting an evaluation to the HEEL (Higher Education Evaluation Library). The HEEL is an online, freely accessible, searchable database of evaluations focused on access, success and progression interventions.
Project

Project | Reducing NEETness and barriers to opportunity: The Exeter exam centre project

22 September 2026

We are evaluating whether a GCSE exam centre set up by the University of Exeter can reduce NEET rates for children who are not in school

Attainment raisingEmployment and employability
Project

Project | Engaging students as co-creators and participatory researchers

14 September 2026

How can students help co-create interventions and participate in shaping and carrying out evaluations as part of equality-focused projects in higher education?
Guidance and resources

Higher Education Evaluation Library (HEEL): Guidance

Guidance for the HEEL – an online, freely accessible, searchable database of evaluations focused on access, success and progression interventions.

Evidence sharing
Project

Project | Higher Education Evaluation Library (HEEL)

5 September 2026

The HEEL will be an online, freely accessible, searchable database of evaluations focused on access, success and progression interventions.

Evidence sharing
Guidance and resources

Resources for small providers

Access resources and tools for small providers to help address challenges and support your evaluation work.
Report

Report | Student mental health in 2025: Patterns of mental health inequality among diverse student populations

12 August 2026

Using Student Academic Experience Survey (SAES) data, this report examines student mental health in the UK in 2025 and inequalities in experiences between student groups

Mental health and wellbeing
Guidance and resources

Theory of change: overview

A theory of change shows the parts of an intervention, the intended outcomes and impacts, and how the intervention is expected to bring about change
Guidance and resources

Administrative data guide

This Administrative data guide (hosted on GitHub) is a practical guide for those interested in utilising administrative data to conduct research or evaluate interventions designed to reduce equality gaps in higher education.

Institutional data
Report

Report | Improving student wellbeing using analytics

12 March 2026

This report summarises the findings of three randomised controlled trials testing the effectiveness of using analytics data to proactively identify and guide students with poor wellbeing towards support services.

Mental health and wellbeingOnline learning
Report

Report | Evaluating wellbeing interventions with small cohorts

12 March 2026

This report summarises the findings of two theory-based evaluations of wellbeing interventions involving small cohorts.

Mental health and wellbeingSmall cohorts
Project

Project | Evaluating ‘Tailored Transitions’

20 October 2025

We are partnering with Middlesex University and the National Institute of Economic and Social Research to evaluate the institution’s tailored transition support programme for first-year students.

Mentoring, counselling, coaching
Project

Project | Evaluating the ‘Launch transition’ programme

20 October 2025

We are partnering with the University of Nottingham and independent evaluation agency Verian to evaluate the impact of the university’s ‘Launch transition’ programme, a pre-induction programme to support students in their move to university life.

Low-income backgrounds
Report

Report | Making it everyone’s business: Developing theories of change for whole-provider approaches in higher education

15 October 2025

This report examines how higher education providers can embed inclusion and reduce equality gaps through whole-provider approaches – institution-wide strategies that align policies, practices, and people around shared goals.

Whole-provider approach
Project

Project | Evaluating ‘Succeed at Leicester’

14 October 2025

We are partnering with the University of Leicester and the National Institute of Economic and Social Research to evaluate the ‘Succeed At Leicester’ programme

Information, advice and guidance (IAG)
Project

Project | Challenging perceptions: letters to pupils from deprived areas, encouraging them to consider university

25 September 2025

TASO is working with King’s College London on a joint initiative to encourage pupils from deprived areas to try university.

Low-income backgroundsMental health and wellbeing
Guidance and resources

Theory of Change Builder

The Theory of Change Builder is a free online tool that simplifies theory of change development. It guides users step-by-step and makes it easy to move from a Core to an Enhanced Theory of Change in one platform.
Project

Project | Developing theories of change for whole-provider approaches

12 May 2025

TASO worked with six higher education providers to develop theories of change for their whole-provider approaches to reducing equality gaps in higher education, in collaboration with Professor Liz Thomas, Professor of Higher Education at the University of York.

Whole-provider approach
Report

Report | Pathways into and through higher education for young people with experience of children’s social care

5 March 2025

This report examines how those with experience of children’s social care access and progress within higher education.

Care-experienced students
Report

Report | Student mental health in 2024: How the situation is changing for LGBTQ+ students

20 February 2025

This report examines student mental health in the UK in 2024, with a particular focus on LGBTQ+ students, using survey data collected from thousands of undergraduates.

Mental health and wellbeing
Guidance and resources

Monitoring and Evaluation Framework (MEF)

The Monitoring and Evaluation Framework (MEF) promotes an impact-driven evaluation approach, interlaced with process evaluation, to determine which interventions work in transforming access and student outcomes.
Guidance and resources

Monitoring and Evaluation Framework (MEF): Step 1 – Diagnose

Step 1 when designing your evaluation is to map the components of your intervention and describe how you will achieve the desired outcomes.
←Back to the MEF overview
Guidance and resources

Monitoring and Evaluation Framework (MEF): Step 2 – Plan

In Step 2 of the evaluation process, you will need to use your theory of change to develop the questions that your evaluation will seek to answer.
←Back to the MEF overview
Guidance and resources

Monitoring and Evaluation Framework (MEF): Step 3 – Measure

Collect and analyse the data as specified in your research protocol.
←Back to the MEF overview
Guidance and resources

Monitoring and Evaluation Framework (MEF): Step 4 – Reflect

Share findings to enable learning across an institution.
←Back to the MEF overview
Project

Project | Randomised controlled trials to evaluate wellbeing interventions prompted by analytics

21 November 2024

TASO worked with three universities to participate in a project that evaluated their student mental health and wellbeing interventions (prompted by analytics).

Mental health and wellbeingInstitutional data
Project

Project | Evaluation of mental health and wellbeing interventions with small cohorts

20 November 2024

TASO worked with two universities to evaluate student mental health and wellbeing interventions delivered to small cohorts.

Mental health and wellbeingSmall cohorts
Guidance and resources

Report templates

Templates for researchers and evaluators writing a range of reports, including for economic evaluation reports, implementation and process reports, analysis reports and final project reports.
Guidance and resources

Protocol templates

The resources on this page provide useful protocol templates for researchers and evaluators. The templates cover protocols for trials, qualitative research, implementation and process evaluation, rapid evidence and economic evaluation.
Guidance and resources

Evaluation plan template

Find a comprehensive document that outlines the overall strategy and approach for evaluating an intervention.
Guidance and resources

Interactive Technical Guides

Interactive Technical Guides: a collection of interactive TASO resources to support your evaluation, data visualisation and coding practices
Guidance and resources

Data visualisation style guide

We have developed a data visualisation style guide for those who see the storytelling potential in data, offering guidance to enhance the impact of your information.
Guidance and resources

Data insights guide (DIG)

This guide helps higher education providers use their institutional data to identify equality gaps in student success and evaluate the effectiveness of interventions designed to reduce the gaps.

Institutional data
Guidance and resources

Causal evidence

Type 3 evidence focuses on ‘causal impact’ which means it tells us whether an activity causes a difference in outcomes.
Project

Project | Using quasi-experimental designs to evaluate mental health and wellbeing interventions

22 October 2024

TASO is working with three higher education providers to participate in a project that will evaluate their student mental health and wellbeing interventions using quasi-experimental designs.

Mental health and wellbeing
Guidance and resources

Resources | Theory-based evaluation

These resources focus on theory-based evaluation methods

Small cohorts
Guidance and resources

Quasi-experimental designs (QEDs)

A series of resources to help you plan quasi-experimental designs
Guidance and resources

Randomised controlled trials (RCTs): Theory, methods and practice

A series of resources to help you plan randomised controlled trials
Guidance and resources

Question time: Addressing common challenges in evaluation

In this video the TASO team take questions from the audience around any issues or challenges they may be facing in their impact evaluation work and share some resources which can help them address some of these issues.
Guidance and resources

Pre- and post-test design

Pre and post-event surveys are a commonly used evaluation measure, but knowing what data to collect and how to use it can be a challenge.
Guidance and resources

Survey design and validation resources
Guidance and resources

Designing Likert scales

We often use surveys to measure student aspirations, intermediate outcomes and specific constructs of interest, sense of belonging for example. Likert scales are one of the most commonly used survey designs. Find out more about how to design Likert scales.
Guidance and resources

Correlation versus causation

Video: Dr Eliza Kozman, Deputy Director of Research at TASO, presents a keynote session on correlation versus causation.
Guidance and resources

Research ethics guidance

Everything you need to know about ethics for research and evaluation projects.
Guidance and resources

Economic evaluation

Economic evaluation is an approach that helps to assess cost-effectiveness – in this case, the cost effectiveness of interventions in higher education.
Guidance and resources

Access and Success Questionnaire (ASQ)

The Access and Success Questionnaire (ASQ) provides a set of validated survey scales that can be used by the higher education sector to evaluate its access and student success activities. The scales cover a selection of key intermediate outcomes which are commonly measured in evaluations of access and success interventions.
Guidance and resources

Implementation and process evaluation (IPE)

The resources on this page will provide you with guidance for conducting implementation and process evaluation (IPE) in higher education.
Guidance and resources

Post-entry Mapping Outcomes and Activities Tool (MOAT)

The post-entry MOAT (Mapping Outcomes and Activities Tool) is used to assist you in the planning and evaluation of activities designed to support student success.
Guidance and resources

Pre-entry Mapping Outcomes and Activities Tool (MOAT)

The resources on this page will provide you with a consistent approach to coding outcomes and activities as you plan your widening participation outreach and evaluation.
Guidance and resources

Attainment-raising Mapping Outcomes and Activities Tool (MOAT)

The resources on this page will provide you with a consistent approach to coding outcomes and attainment-raising activities for your widening participation interventions.
Guidance and resources

Mapping Outcomes and Activities Tool (MOAT) resources

The resources on this page will provide you with a consistent approach to coding outcomes and activities as you plan your widening participation outreach and evaluation.
Guidance and resources

Enhanced Theory of Change

Find out more about TASO’s Enhanced Theory of Change, including guidance, templates and examples
Guidance and resources

Agent-based modelling

Agent-based modelling is a bottom-up modelling approach in which macro-level system behaviour is modelled through the behaviours of micro-level autonomous, interacting agents
Guidance and resources

Comparative case study

A comparative case study is defined as ‘the systematic comparison of two or more data points obtained through use of the case study method’
Guidance and resources

Resources | Enhanced Theories of Change for sandwich course provision

This page includes Enhanced Theories of Change from two higher education providers for activities aimed at supporting WP students in the access, and completion of, sandwich courses.

Attainment raising
Guidance and resources

Qualitative comparative analysis (QCA)

Qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) is a ‘synthetic strategy’ that allows for multiple conjunctural causation across observed cases
Guidance and resources

Most significant change (Transformative evaluation)

The most significant change (MSC) technique is a participatory, story-based method involving the collection and selection of significant change stories that have occurred in the field
Guidance and resources

Contribution analysis

Contribution analysis explores attribution through assessing the contribution a programme is making to observed results
Guidance and resources

General elimination methodology

General elimination methodology (GEM) is a theory-driven qualitative evaluation method that improves our understanding of cause and effect relationships by systematically identifying and then ruling out causal explanations for an outcome of interest
Guidance and resources

Process tracing

Process tracing: the analysis of evidence on processes, sequences, and conjunctures of events within a case for the purposes of either developing or testing hypotheses about causal mechanisms that might causally explain the case.
Guidance and resources

Realist evaluation

A realist evaluation is a theory-led approach to evaluation that seeks to understand what works for whom, in what circumstances, and in what respects an intervention is more likely to succeed
Guidance and resources

Guidance: Student mental health evaluation

Assessing the effectiveness of interventions designed to improve student mental health is complex. This guide has been developed as part of the Student mental health project, lead by TASO and a consortium of partners
Project

Mental health: glossary of terms

15 October 2024

Mental health and wellbeing
Guidance and resources

Core Theory of Change

Find out more about TASO’s Core Theory of Change, including guidance, templates and examples
Guidance and resources

Webinars: The four steps of the Monitoring and Evaluation Framework

Watch our webinars on the four steps of the Monitoring and Evaluation Framework (MEF): Diagnose, Plan, Measure, Reflect.
Report

Report | Understanding online mentoring delivered as part of multi-intervention outreach (MIOM) programmes

10 October 2024

Mentoring is often delivered as part of multi-intervention outreach programmes, but it can be difficult to evaluate. This report outlines analysis conducted on two online mentoring programmes.

Mentoring, counselling, coaching
Report

Report | Supporting disabled students: Mapping reasonable adjustments and transition support

10 October 2024

Exploring the implementation of transition support and reasonable adjustments for disabled students, this report examines the experiences of disabled students and higher education provider staff.

Disabled students
Report

Report | Learning about evaluation with small cohorts

10 October 2024

To help higher education providers learn about how to evaluate interventions with small sample sizes, this project involved testing evaluation approaches that are suitable for small cohorts.

Small cohorts
Report

Report | The current landscape of the delivery and evaluation of student mental health interventions

10 October 2024

With an increasing need for more support for student mental health, this report provides insights from those involved in the delivery and evaluation of current student mental health interventions.

Mental health and wellbeing
Report

Report | Addressing gaps in the participation of sandwich courses

8 October 2024

Sandwich courses can help reduce equality gaps, but disadvantaged students are less likely to enrol in them – this research maps out barriers and solutions for students participating in sandwich courses.

Employment and employability
Report

Report | Facilitating analysis of institutional data: practical steps for providers

24 September 2024

This report sets out recommendations and two new resources which will help higher education providers develop and use their institutional data more effectively when evaluating student success.

Institutional data
Project

Project | Institutional data use (IDU)

23 September 2024

A project to help the higher education sector use institutional data to generate evidence about which initiatives are effective in supporting student success and reducing equality gaps.

Institutional data
Report

Report | Education pathways: Equality gaps in earnings and employment

16 July 2024

Through analysis of the earnings and employment status of over a million people by education pathway, this report looks at the size of the equality gaps in labour market outcomes.

Employment and employability
Project

Project | Education pathways: Equality gaps in earnings and employment

16 July 2024

To better understand the various benefits of higher education, this project examined the link between educational qualifications and earnings and employment, in particular for disadvantaged young people.

Employment and employability
Project

Project | Supporting disabled students: a blueprint for transition support

6 June 2024

Find out more about our blueprint for multi-intervention transition support. The blueprint provides a set of evidence-informed activities and programmes to enhance disabled students’ transition into higher education.

Disabled students
Project

Project | Supporting disabled students: Mapping reasonable adjustments and transition support

11 April 2024

By mapping the kinds of transition support and reasonable adjustments used in higher education, this project increased understanding of the existing evidence on the effectiveness of these interventions

Disabled students
Project

Project | Theory of change to tackle ethnicity degree awarding gaps

13 March 2024

In 2023-24, we commissioned Staffordshire University and Advance HE to produce theories of change and evaluation plans for interventions designed to address the ethnicity degree awarding gap.

Race and ethnicity
Report

Report | From vision to action: harnessing Theory of Change to tackle ethnicity degree awarding gaps

13 March 2024

The report provides key recommendations and insights to support the sector in developing theories of change for interventions that aim to address the ethnicity degree awarding gap.

Race and ethnicity
Report

Report | Using learning analytics to prompt student support interventions

21 February 2024

Learning analytics can identify students at risk of withdrawing from their studies and prompt support interventions. This report details two randomised controlled trials of these types of interventions.

Institutional dataLearning analyticsOnline learning
Project

Project | Learning about evaluation with small cohorts: pilots to test the methodologies

10 December 2023

Higher education providers face challenges when evaluating interventions that have small sample sizes. This project involved the piloting of evaluation methodologies that are suitable for small cohorts.

Small cohorts
Report

Report | School’s in for the summer: interim findings on the impact of summer schools

28 November 2023

This report sets out interim findings of a randomised controlled trial on the impact of summer schools in getting students from disadvantaged and under-represented groups to participate in higher education.

Summer schools
Project

Project | Piloting methods to develop better evidence on student support

9 November 2023

A project exploring what works reduce equality gaps for disabled students in higher education, and how to improve employment and employability outcomes.

Disabled studentsEmployment and employability
Report

Report | Piloting methods to develop better evidence on student support

9 November 2023

To explore the effectiveness of using less commonly used evaluation methods to generate evidence, this report sets out the results of evaluations undertaken by four higher education providers.

Disabled students
Project

Project | Student mental health

20 October 2023

A range of open access digital resources to help the higher education sector improve support for student mental health

Mental health and wellbeing
Project

Examples of practice: student mental health support

16 October 2023

A range of examples of practice, addressing different interventions, target groups and being implemented by a range of higher education providers.

Mental health and wellbeing
Report

Report | Student mental health in 2023: Who is struggling and how the situation is changing

28 September 2023

Around one in six undergraduates now report experiencing mental health challenges, according to this analysis by The Policy Institute at King’s College London and TASO.

Mental health and wellbeing
Report

Report | Evaluating complex interventions using randomised controlled trials

13 September 2023

This report describes the different types of complex intervention and provides guidance on how to evaluate them using randomised controlled trials.
Report

Report | Student wellbeing over time: analysing Student Academic Experience Survey data for undergraduates and taught postgraduates

13 July 2023

This report analyses data to examine how the wellbeing of undergraduate and taught postgraduate students has changed over time, and how it varies according to demographic characteristics and circumstances.

Mental health and wellbeingInstitutional data
Project

Project | Approaches to addressing the ethnicity degree awarding gap

9 June 2023

A project to develop a typology and narrative of current approaches to address the ethnicity degree awarding gap.

Race and ethnicity
Report

Report | Approaches to addressing the ethnicity degree awarding gap

9 June 2023

The higher education sector has committed to tackling the ethnicity degree awarding gap; this report sets out findings from research on the different approaches being undertaken to reduce the gap.

Race and ethnicity
Report

Report | Evaluating multi-intervention outreach and mentoring (MIOM) programmes

17 May 2023

Partnering with three higher education providers, this report explores the impact of multi-intervention outreach and mentoring programmes, and the different ways these programmes can be evaluated.

Mentoring, counselling, coaching
Report

Report | The value of higher education

3 May 2023

This report explores the evidence on the value of higher education, and specifically the individual and societal impacts of disadvantaged young people graduating from higher education courses.

Employment and employabilityEconomic value
Project

Project | Theories of change for attainment-raising initiatives

13 April 2023

To help higher education providers do more to raise the academic attainment of school students, this project involved the development of six theories of change for pre-16 attainment-raising initiatives.

Attainment raising
Report

Report | The relationship between teaching and assessment methods and student outcomes during COVID-19

22 March 2023

This report sets out the results of a data analysis project to investigate the effect of teaching and learning changes during the COVID-19 pandemic on outcomes for disadvantaged students.

Covid-19
Report

Report | Online teaching and learning in the time of COVID-19

22 March 2023

The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the adoption of online teaching and learning in higher education. This research explored the impact of this on student outcomes, focusing on disadvantaged students.

Mental health and wellbeingCovid-19Online learning
Report

Report | What works to reduce equality gaps for disabled students

16 February 2023

A summary of an evidence review by the University of Lincoln, this report outlines the evidence on the effectiveness of interventions to address inequalities in higher education among disabled students.

Disabled students
Project

Project | Learning analytics

31 January 2023

Interventions that are prompted by data from university infrastructure systems are believed to be effective in improving engagement. This project aims to build a strong evidence base for these interventions.

Learning analyticsInstitutional data
Project

Project | The impact of curriculum reform on the ethnicity degree awarding gap

23 November 2022

We worked with two universities to establish whether reforming the curriculum to make it more diverse would reduce the ethnicity degree awarding gap

Race and ethnicity
Report

Report | The impact of curriculum reform on the ethnicity degree awarding gap

23 November 2022

A report summarising the evaluation of two curriculum reform interventions that aimed to narrow the degree awarding gap between Black, Asian and minority ethnic students and their white peers.

Race and ethnicity
Report

Report | Rapid Evidence Review: Intermediate outcomes for higher education access and success

2 November 2022

This rapid evidence review summarises 15 psychosocial intermediate outcomes, how they are measured, and the extent to which they are associated with higher education access and success outcomes.
Report

Report | Summer schools in the time of COVID-19

27 July 2022

This report shares interim findings of TASO’s evaluation of online summer schools taking place between June and August 2021 – the first of two randomised controlled trials of higher education summer schools.

Summer schoolsCovid-19
Report

Report | What works to reduce equality gaps in employment and employability?

4 July 2022

This report explores the existing evidence of what works to reduce employment and employability inequalities, and where gaps lie in existing research.

Employment and employability
Report

Report | The Wellbeing of LGBTQ+ Students

29 June 2022

This report explores the subjective wellbeing of LGBTQ+ students based on the analysis of data from the Student Academic Experiences Survey.

Mental health and wellbeing
Report

Report | Impact evaluation with small cohorts: Methodology guidance

17 June 2022

It can be challenging to generate effective evidence for widening participation interventions in higher education. This guidance looks at impact evaluation strategies which can be used with small cohorts.

Small cohorts
Report

Report | Typology of attainment-raising activities conducted by HEPs: Rapid Evidence Review

17 June 2022

This report is a review of the evidence on interventions and activities carried out by higher education providers to raise the attainment of school-age students.

Attainment raising
Report

Report | What works to tackle mental health inequalities in higher education?

17 May 2022

This report explores the factors affecting student mental health in higher education and provides an analysis of the interventions used to support them.

Mental health and wellbeing
Project

Project | What works to reduce equality gaps in employment and employability?

21 April 2022

This project explored how education providers can improve labour market outcomes for graduates from disadvantaged groups and address gaps in the participation in sandwich courses.

Employment and employability
Project

Project | Economic value of higher education

17 February 2022

To better understand the various benefits of higher education, this research examined the individual and societal impacts of disadvantaged young people graduating from higher education courses.

Employment and employabilityEconomic value
Project

Project | What works to tackle mental health inequalities in higher education?

17 February 2022

Some student groups are more likely to experience poor mental health than others. We examined which measures are most effective at improving student mental health in higher education.

Mental health and wellbeing
Project

Project | What works to reduce equality gaps for disabled students

17 February 2022

This project aims to help higher education providers support their disabled students more effectively and address inequalities in their experience of higher education.

Disabled students
Report

Report | Supporting access and student success for mature learners

21 April 2021

A report of a review undertaken to understand evidence around supporting higher education access and student success for mature learners, and a survey experiment on which institutional features are attractive to mature learners.

Mature learners
Report

Report | An investigation into the relationship between outreach participation and KS4 attainment / HE progression

31 March 2021

An analysis of the Higher Education Access Tracking (HEAT) Service’s dataset on the relationship between Key Stage 4 attainment and higher education progression.

Outreach
Project

Project | Teaching and learning in the time of COVID

18 February 2021

The COVID-19 pandemic prompted a rapid transition to online teaching in higher education. This project explored the impact of this on student outcomes, particularly for disadvantaged students.

Covid-19
Project

Project | Multi-intervention outreach and mentoring (MIOM)

18 February 2021

Outreach and mentoring programmes combining two or more student support activities are associated with positive attitudes towards higher education. This project aims to provide causal evidence of this.

Mentoring, counselling, coaching
Project

Project | Summer school evaluation

18 February 2021

Students who attend a university summer school may have a more positive attitude towards higher education as a result. This project looks at the link between summer schools and access to higher education.

Summer schools
Report

Report | Supporting access and student success for learners with experience of children’s social care

27 January 2021

A report summarising the findings from research assessing the evidence base on activities designed to support access and success in post-secondary education for learners with experience of children’s social care.

Care-experienced students
Report

Report | Understanding the impact of interventions to address inequality in the student experience

19 November 2020

A review of the evidence for interventions that higher education providers might use to reduce inequality gaps in the student experience.
Report

Report | The impact of interventions for widening access to higher education

23 January 2020

A report on research undertaken by the Education Policy Institute on interventions aimed at widening access to higher education for the most disadvantaged students.

TASO projects

View the insights and evaluation library

Project

Project | Developing theories of change for contextualised admissions

28 September 2026

TASO is working with six higher education providers to develop theories of change and strengthen approaches to evaluating contextualised admissions policies across different institutional contexts.
Project

Project | Reducing NEETness and barriers to opportunity: The Exeter exam centre project

22 September 2026

We are evaluating whether a GCSE exam centre set up by the University of Exeter can reduce NEET rates for children who are not in school

Attainment raisingEmployment and employability
Project

Project | Engaging students as co-creators and participatory researchers

14 September 2026

How can students help co-create interventions and participate in shaping and carrying out evaluations as part of equality-focused projects in higher education?
Project

Project | Higher Education Evaluation Library (HEEL)

5 September 2026

The HEEL will be an online, freely accessible, searchable database of evaluations focused on access, success and progression interventions.

Evidence sharing
Project

Project | Evaluating ‘Tailored Transitions’

20 October 2025

We are partnering with Middlesex University and the National Institute of Economic and Social Research to evaluate the institution’s tailored transition support programme for first-year students.

Mentoring, counselling, coaching
Project

Project | Evaluating the ‘Launch transition’ programme

20 October 2025

We are partnering with the University of Nottingham and independent evaluation agency Verian to evaluate the impact of the university’s ‘Launch transition’ programme, a pre-induction programme to support students in their move to university life.

Low-income backgrounds
Project

Project | Evaluating ‘Succeed at Leicester’

14 October 2025

We are partnering with the University of Leicester and the National Institute of Economic and Social Research to evaluate the ‘Succeed At Leicester’ programme

Information, advice and guidance (IAG)
Project

Project | Challenging perceptions: letters to pupils from deprived areas, encouraging them to consider university

25 September 2025

TASO is working with King’s College London on a joint initiative to encourage pupils from deprived areas to try university.

Low-income backgroundsMental health and wellbeing
Project

Project | Developing theories of change for whole-provider approaches

12 May 2025

TASO worked with six higher education providers to develop theories of change for their whole-provider approaches to reducing equality gaps in higher education, in collaboration with Professor Liz Thomas, Professor of Higher Education at the University of York.

Whole-provider approach
Project

Project | Randomised controlled trials to evaluate wellbeing interventions prompted by analytics

21 November 2024

TASO worked with three universities to participate in a project that evaluated their student mental health and wellbeing interventions (prompted by analytics).

Mental health and wellbeingInstitutional data
Project

Project | Evaluation of mental health and wellbeing interventions with small cohorts

20 November 2024

TASO worked with two universities to evaluate student mental health and wellbeing interventions delivered to small cohorts.

Mental health and wellbeingSmall cohorts
Project

Project | Using quasi-experimental designs to evaluate mental health and wellbeing interventions

22 October 2024

TASO is working with three higher education providers to participate in a project that will evaluate their student mental health and wellbeing interventions using quasi-experimental designs.

Mental health and wellbeing
Project

Mental health: glossary of terms

15 October 2024

Mental health and wellbeing
Project

Project | Institutional data use (IDU)

23 September 2024

A project to help the higher education sector use institutional data to generate evidence about which initiatives are effective in supporting student success and reducing equality gaps.

Institutional data
Project

Project | Education pathways: Equality gaps in earnings and employment

16 July 2024

To better understand the various benefits of higher education, this project examined the link between educational qualifications and earnings and employment, in particular for disadvantaged young people.

Employment and employability
Project

Project | Supporting disabled students: a blueprint for transition support

6 June 2024

Find out more about our blueprint for multi-intervention transition support. The blueprint provides a set of evidence-informed activities and programmes to enhance disabled students’ transition into higher education.

Disabled students
Project

Project | Supporting disabled students: Mapping reasonable adjustments and transition support

11 April 2024

By mapping the kinds of transition support and reasonable adjustments used in higher education, this project increased understanding of the existing evidence on the effectiveness of these interventions

Disabled students
Project

Project | Theory of change to tackle ethnicity degree awarding gaps

13 March 2024

In 2023-24, we commissioned Staffordshire University and Advance HE to produce theories of change and evaluation plans for interventions designed to address the ethnicity degree awarding gap.

Race and ethnicity
Project

Project | Learning about evaluation with small cohorts: pilots to test the methodologies

10 December 2023

Higher education providers face challenges when evaluating interventions that have small sample sizes. This project involved the piloting of evaluation methodologies that are suitable for small cohorts.

Small cohorts
Project

Project | Piloting methods to develop better evidence on student support

9 November 2023

A project exploring what works reduce equality gaps for disabled students in higher education, and how to improve employment and employability outcomes.

Disabled studentsEmployment and employability
Project

Project | Student mental health

20 October 2023

A range of open access digital resources to help the higher education sector improve support for student mental health

Mental health and wellbeing
Project

Examples of practice: student mental health support

16 October 2023

A range of examples of practice, addressing different interventions, target groups and being implemented by a range of higher education providers.

Mental health and wellbeing
Project

Project | Approaches to addressing the ethnicity degree awarding gap

9 June 2023

A project to develop a typology and narrative of current approaches to address the ethnicity degree awarding gap.

Race and ethnicity
Project

Project | Theories of change for attainment-raising initiatives

13 April 2023

To help higher education providers do more to raise the academic attainment of school students, this project involved the development of six theories of change for pre-16 attainment-raising initiatives.

Attainment raising
Project

Project | Learning analytics

31 January 2023

Interventions that are prompted by data from university infrastructure systems are believed to be effective in improving engagement. This project aims to build a strong evidence base for these interventions.

Learning analyticsInstitutional data
Project

Project | The impact of curriculum reform on the ethnicity degree awarding gap

23 November 2022

We worked with two universities to establish whether reforming the curriculum to make it more diverse would reduce the ethnicity degree awarding gap

Race and ethnicity
Project

Project | What works to reduce equality gaps in employment and employability?

21 April 2022

This project explored how education providers can improve labour market outcomes for graduates from disadvantaged groups and address gaps in the participation in sandwich courses.

Employment and employability
Project

Project | Economic value of higher education

17 February 2022

To better understand the various benefits of higher education, this research examined the individual and societal impacts of disadvantaged young people graduating from higher education courses.

Employment and employabilityEconomic value
Project

Project | What works to reduce equality gaps for disabled students

17 February 2022

This project aims to help higher education providers support their disabled students more effectively and address inequalities in their experience of higher education.

Disabled students
Project

Project | What works to tackle mental health inequalities in higher education?

17 February 2022

Some student groups are more likely to experience poor mental health than others. We examined which measures are most effective at improving student mental health in higher education.

Mental health and wellbeing
Project

Project | Teaching and learning in the time of COVID

18 February 2021

The COVID-19 pandemic prompted a rapid transition to online teaching in higher education. This project explored the impact of this on student outcomes, particularly for disadvantaged students.

Covid-19
Project

Project | Multi-intervention outreach and mentoring (MIOM)

18 February 2021

Outreach and mentoring programmes combining two or more student support activities are associated with positive attitudes towards higher education. This project aims to provide causal evidence of this.

Mentoring, counselling, coaching
Project

Project | Summer school evaluation

18 February 2021

Students who attend a university summer school may have a more positive attitude towards higher education as a result. This project looks at the link between summer schools and access to higher education.

Summer schools

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