Participation in higher education (HE) has increased over the past 50 years at an unprecedented rate (Marginson, 2016). However, notable disparities between cohorts in rates of participation and achievement outcomes remain, with students who have been historically underrepresented in HE often disadvantaged compared to their peers (Li et al., 2023). Pursuing approaches to teaching and learning that deliver better outcomes for students from diverse and non-traditional backgrounds in HE is therefore a persistent and important equity issue for institutions worldwide.
This presentation reports on how one public university in Australia has sought to produce more equitable outcomes for students from underrepresented backgrounds through institution-wide curriculum reform. Across the university, the traditional model of semesters, lectures and examinations has been replaced with an immersive block model underpinned by active learning pedagogy, where students study a maximum of two units at a time over 6-week terms (Roche et al., 2023).
With the aim of exploring the impact of the immersive block model – known as the Southern Cross Model – on students from underrepresented backgrounds, academic achievement data (N = 30,108) were collected from units over a three-year period. Inferential statistical tests were conducted to compare outcomes in the immersive block model with those from the traditional model.
Statistically significant improvements to academic success were observed for students identified as: low socio-economic status; first-in-family; regional/remote; Indigenous; or registered with a disability. The findings indicate that the more focused and interactive learning enabled by immersive block models may be an effective way for creating more inclusive universities, where students from diverse backgrounds can achieve greater academic success. Attendees at this session will gain an understanding of the core pedagogical principles underpinning immersive block models, and how and why these principles might be leading to improved academic achievement among underrepresented students in HE.