Report

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

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.

Success in higher education

15 October 2025

Summary

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. Drawing on collaborative work with six universities, the study applies a theory of change framework to understand how these approaches operate in practice, the mechanisms through which they are expected to achieve impact, and how they can be effectively evaluated.

Aims

Whole-provider approaches seek to move beyond isolated interventions for specific student groups, instead promoting systemic cultural and structural change within higher education providers. This project aimed to: develop theories of change that articulate how whole-provider approaches are implemented and expected to reduce equality gaps; and identify shared causal pathways, challenges and lessons to inform future design and evaluation across the sector.

Approach 

TASO collaborated with six higher education providers – Buckinghamshire New University, University of Bradford, Lancaster University, Sheffield Hallam University, Teesside University, University of York – to co-produce theories of change for their institutional approaches to equality, diversity and inclusion. Using a case study and comparative analysis design, the project identified common causal pathways underpinning whole-provider approaches and the context informing their development at the providers.

Key findings

Across the case studies, the overarching aim of the whole-provider approach is to embed inclusion, transform institutional culture, and improve outcomes for all students. Six interlinked causal pathways were identified as central to achieving these aims:

• Cultural change through leadership: visible senior commitment legitimises and prioritises equality work.
• Cultural change through institutional momentum: staff engagement builds collective ownership and long-term change.
• Institutional coherence: alignment across policies and departments ensures a consistent student experience.
• Capacity and confidence building: staff development equips people to integrate equality into everyday practice.
• Student engagement: co-creation and representation strengthen belonging and trust.
• Evidence-driven improvement: data and evaluation underpin learning and continuous improvement.

Recommendations for developing whole-provider approaches

1. Use a theory of change to frame the whole-provider approach
2. Be intentional about areas of focus and level of detail
3. Embed the provider’s context
4. Collaborate with staff and students
5. Adopt an iterative process

Reflections on evaluation 

• Consider how interlinked components have a collective impact
• Intentionally combine methods to measure impact and implementation
• Focus the evaluation on one aspect of the whole-provider approach to start with

See the recommendations in full

Project background

At TASO, our mission is to close equality gaps in higher education by building evidence on what works and by driving the use of evidence-informed practice. Across the higher education sector, equality gaps are commonly addressed by delivering and evaluating targeted interventions for groups who are underrepresented in higher education. In addition to these localised interventions, providers are increasingly recognising the importance of taking a ‘whole-provider approach’ to addressing risks to equality of opportunity in higher education. 

The whole-provider approach aims to support students to access, succeed in, and progress from higher education. It does this by aligning institutional policies and engaging stakeholders, from senior leadership to staff and students, around the shared goal of reducing equality gaps for students. The development of whole-provider approaches is driven in part by regulatory requirements set out by the Office for Students (OfS), which requires providers to include a section on their whole-provider approach in their access and participation plan (APP). 

In practice, higher education providers vary in how they define and implement their whole-provider approaches, and have tended not to evaluate them. Previous research conducted by Thomas (2017) has explored variations and commonalities, informing a toolkit to support providers to conceptualise and review their whole-provider approach (Thomas, 2024). 
This project builds on Thomas’s research by adopting a theory of change framework to better understand how whole-provider approaches are implemented in practice, how they are expected to achieve their aims, and how they might be evaluated. Using a case study approach, we worked collaboratively with six higher education providers to develop theories of change for their whole-provider approaches: the University of Bradford, Buckinghamshire New University, Lancaster University, Sheffield Hallam University, Teesside University and the University of York. 

Here, we summarise the key findings and recommendations resulting from our work with the six providers. We expand on these findings and recommendations in two accompanying reports:

• A scoping report, which includes broader reflections on the concept of the whole-provider approach, including the rationale for its creation, a broad application of theory of change, and considerations for evaluating whole-provider approaches.
• A case study report, which includes a comparative analysis of the six provider case studies and their individual theories of change. 

Key findings

Aim and rationale of the whole-provider approach

The broad aim of the whole-provider approach – for all case study providers – is to embed inclusion, reduce inequality across the student lifecycle, transform culture and improve outcomes for all student groups. The rationale for a whole-provider approach is that aligning institutional policies and engaging stakeholders in the goal of addressing equality gaps is more effective than delivering individual interventions. 

Across the case studies, the whole-provider approach tends to focus on the success stage of the higher education journey more than on access or progression, although their connection is considered. This may reflect the APP’s historic emphasis on access to higher education, whereas the whole-provider approach shifts attention to student success and, by its nature, places greater focus on what is happening within a provider.

Causal pathways that drive the aims of the whole-provider approach

Across the providers’ case studies, there is overlap in the key activities and outcomes that drive the aims of whole-provider approaches. We have summarised these activities and outcomes in six causal pathways:

1. Cultural change through leadership: Visible commitment from senior leaders legitimises and prioritises equality-focused work, driving wider engagement and institutional reform.
2. Cultural change through institutional momentum: Growing staff participation in inclusive practice generates peer influence and cultural momentum, embedding long-term institutional change.
3. Institutional coherence: Cross-departmental collaboration and policy alignment reduce silos, creating a more consistent and supportive student experience.
4. Capacity and confidence building: Professional development and knowledge-sharing equip staff with the skills and confidence to address inequality of opportunity in their everyday work, ensuring that the impact of strategic policies trickles down to students’ experience of higher education.
5. Student engagement: Increased student co-creation and representation empower students to shape decisions, which builds trust, belonging and student-centred provision.
6. Evidence-driven improvement: Consistent, robust evaluation and data use enable teams to better identify risks to equality of opportunity and to track progress in addressing them, strengthening interventions and embedding evidence-informed practice.

For more information on causal pathways, please refer to the accompanying scoping report.

Case study examples of practice

The table below provides examples of practice from the case study higher education providers that contribute to the causal pathways identified above.

For more information on the provider case studies, please see the accompanying case study report.

Recommendations for developing whole-provider approaches

1. Use a theory of change to frame the whole-provider approach: A theory of change can help providers to identify the key causal pathways and outcomes of their whole-provider approach. This helps develop a coherent whole-provider approach that works towards an agreed aim and forms the basis of evaluation planning. Consider narrative and diagrammatic formats to communicate the theory of change effectively.
2. Be intentional about areas of focus and level of detail: Use the whole-provider approach toolkit to help identify and address strengths and areas for development. Clearly differentiate between student-facing interventions, institution-wide changes, and business-as-usual activity. Create more detailed theories of change for specific initiatives where needed.
3. Embed the provider’s context: Ground the whole-provider approach in the provider’s context, informed by student and staff input, institutional data, student demographics, risks to equality of opportunity, and alignment with the APP and wider strategies.
4. Collaborate with staff and students: Involve a range of stakeholders in developing the whole-provider approach to strengthen its relevance, build shared ownership, and ensure that multiple perspectives and needs are considered. Ensure that there is input from professional services staff, academic staff and students.
5. Adopt an iterative process: As whole-provider approaches continue to evolve in response to institutional changes, treat the theory of change as a living document, refining it over time through regular review, reflection and monitoring. This allows the approach to remain relevant and responsive to contextual change.

Reflections on evaluation 

Evaluating the impact of a whole-provider approach to reduce equality gaps in higher education is a complex undertaking. Whole-provider approaches achieve their impact through a range of interwoven initiatives and services that are susceptible to institutional changes, delivered over different periods of time to a range of stakeholders. 

The risk of focusing on just the impacts of individual initiatives is that the anticipated benefit of the combined components is overlooked. The potential impact of the interlinked components is the key benefit of a whole-provider approach, compared with delivering standalone interventions. Evaluating the impact of the approach as a whole therefore ideally requires providers to go beyond evaluating individual components of the whole-provider approach, and to consider how these components interact to have a collective impact. 

Evaluating within complex environments requires flexibility, openness to unexpected findings, and an overview of how different components of the whole-provider approach interact to trigger change. In practice, this requires careful and considered mixed-methods evaluation and synthesis of findings from across the provider over time, and the necessary time, expertise and resources to carry this out. 

Drawing on existing approaches to assessing change in complex environments can help providers  monitor and evaluate their whole-provider approach. An example is adopting a systems-change perspective to map out the whole-provider approach components  and how they link together and influence each other (Rogers, 2024). 

Methodological bricolage approaches to evaluation may also help providers intentionally combine and adapt evaluation methods and analysis approaches to suit the specific context of their institution (Aston & Apgar, 2022). Before delving into the evaluation of their whole-provider approach, we recommend that providers fully map out the approach and how it will achieve its aims, using tools such as the whole provider approach toolkit and a theory of change framework.

While TASO is committed to generating more robust evidence about what works to reduce equality gaps in higher education, using a diverse range of evaluation approaches, we are mindful of the practical constraints to evaluation within the higher education sector, including access to expertise and limited capacity. 

A starting point for evaluation is to monitor and evaluate one component or causal pathway of the whole-provider approach first. Ideally, this will be a component that is theorised to be particularly important for achieving the aim of the approach and supports equality across the provider. Providers will need to collect and analyse data to determine if the intended outcomes in the causal pathway have been achieved, and use findings to inform practice over time. 

However, providers should be cautious when interpreting evaluation results. It may be that no impact is found for one causal pathway, but that it is still impactful in combination with other pathways in the whole-provider approach. The evaluation of one causal pathway should therefore still consider its interaction with the wider provider context. In practice, evaluating a whole-provider approach (or parts of it) requires long-term evaluation planning and continuous monitoring .

This project has served as a scoping exercise to better understand the current status of whole-provider approaches in the higher education sector. Our aim is to help providers plan evaluations of their whole-provider approaches by applying a theory of change framework and focusing on the causal pathways that drive the aims of the approach.

References

Aston, T. & Apgar, M. (2022) The Art and Craft of Bricolage in Evaluation. Centre for Development Impact, Practice Paper 24. https://www.betterevaluation.org/sites/default/files/2024-06/The%20art%20and%20craft%20of%20bricolage%20in%20evaluation.pdf [Accessed 1st September 2025]

Rogers, P. (2024) Developing, representing, and using theories of change for interventions in complex systems. In: Koleros, A., Adrien, M.-H., & Tyrrell, T. (eds.) Theories of Change in Reality: Strengths, Limitations and Future Directions. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781032669618 

Thomas, L. (2017) Understanding a whole institution approach to widening participation: Final report. https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/media/a57bfc5e-bc68-49ee-8e79-0eed3f5be844/understanding-a-whole-institution-approach-to-wp-final-report.pdf [Accessed 29th July 2025].

Thomas, L. (2024) A whole provider approach to widening access and student success in higher education. Available at: https://www.york.ac.uk/education/research/cresj/news/2024/widening-access/ [Accessed 29th July 2025].