Engagement and the first-in-family student: creating a manifesto for success

Increasing enrolment in university settings across the globe has led to a growth in the number of students who do not have a biographical or family tradition of participating in higher education. These first-in-family students have been reported as encountering additional and challenging barriers in relation to successful student engagement, leading to poorer educational outcomes and higher levels of attrition. This chapter outlines recent research on the first in the family student cohort, considering the ways in which engagement is both disrupted and supported at various stages of the student life cycle. Outlining ways to reframe how this first-in-family population is considered, this chapter reflects on approaches to better scaffold and support learners’ engagement throughout university studies. The concluding sections draw together recent research scholarship to provide an overarching ‘engagement manifesto’ designed to inform targeted initiatives for the first-in-family student population moving forward.