The team behind a widening participation programme led by Keele University are celebrating after winning a prestigious award for their work with a local professional football club.  

Higher Horizons, a government-funded programme which aims to widen participation in higher education among under-represented groups, were named Partner of the Year at the recent Port Vale Foundation Awards, following a project they collaborated with the League Two club on earlier this year. 

The team worked with Port Vale FC to help broaden the aspirations of academy players who don't go on to play professional football, with Associate Director Ant Sutcliffe giving the young players a talk on the benefits of higher education and football-adjacent degree disciplines they could pursue as an alternative such as physiotherapy, sports and exercise science, and journalism. 

Ant also drew on his own experiences of having played, himself, for Port Vale’s academy in his youth, before pursuing his undergraduate degree at Keele, and working with the academy and education squad the team introduced the young people to the benefits of higher education, providing them with university experiences, and answering questions around the application process, student finance and life as a student, while pursuing a career in football. 

Ant said: "We are delighted to have won the Partner of the Year at the Port Vale Foundation Awards. When two organisations come together with the same goals, we can achieve great things for our wonderful young people from Stoke-on-Trent and beyond. I know first-hand how difficult it can be to be told at 16 you’re not going to make it as a professional footballer, when you have lived and breathed it for so many of your formative years.  

“Our team have done a great job, not just in this project but in all the programmes that we run with Port Vale. We are thrilled to see lots of those we have engaged with enrolling on courses at Keele, University of Staffordshire and Reaseheath – all of which have contributed towards the programmes.”