Best practices to address inequities in academic support in the university access program

Abstract

Even though access to higher education (HE) has increased drastically among many institutions globally, some challenges persist, among which are impediments to student success. These challenges could potentially hinder students’ success and impede their smooth articulation to the preferred HE degree. Data were collected through focus group discussions that the Free-Attitude Interview technique facilitated. This study proposes potential strategies for implementing “best practices” to improve students' academic support in the University Access Program (UAP), particularly in the South African context. The proposed “best practices” are based on students who experienced challenges. Among these best practices are that students and tutors need to have regular meetings once or more per week, groups should not include more than fifteen first-year students, a student learning-centered approach should be employed, and students should be partners in the co-creation of the curricula and the co-evaluation of subject-related matters.