Directory of activities

Search these pages to explore a selection of our directory of activities. You can use the keyword search and filter buttons to discover how we are addressing each of the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals and the five priorities in our Social Responsibility and Civic Engagement Plan. You can also filter activities by location and function.



searching subjects: Learning and students

Write on Point

Write on Point is a project which aims to widen participation to university by supporting students from under-represented backgrounds with their UCAS personal statements. It was developed by Tom Fryer, a PhD student from the University’s Institute of Education, after he noticed the wealth of research showing inequalities in access to support for getting into university. The project has supported over 1,400 students since it started in 2015, increasing university access and reducing the stress around the UCAS personal statement.

Manchester Access Programme

Manchester Access Programme (MAP) is the University’s flagship post-16 widening participation programme for Y12 students from Greater Manchester.  Every year, hundreds of students across Greater Manchester are selected for the programme that helps them gain a place at The University of Manchester, or another research-intensive university, through our online and on-campus events, workshops, and an academic assignment.

Undergraduate courses and the SDGs

Our University is working towards kite-marking all undergraduate courses with the relevant United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) they address. This will enable prospective students to immediately see which SDGs the course they are interested in links to and how that learning will make a difference in the world. Following the successful pilot project in our Faculty of Science and Engineering, work is now underway for all undergraduate courses to be kite marked within our Faculty of Humanities, followed by courses offered by our Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health.

Greater Manchester Graduates

Each year, over 17,000 students graduate from The University of Manchester, many of whom are already making contributions to our city and beyond through healthcare, education and protecting the natural environment.  At each graduation ceremony, we celebrate our graduates and ask them ‘how do they hope to make a difference following their degree?’ Watch our Greater Manchester Graduates YouTube playlist.

Heart Heroes

Each academic year, the Heart Heroes project at the University of Manchester recruits and trains a team of student volunteers to deliver ‘Basic Life Support (BLS) skills’ training to groups of students, staff, and external community members. The student volunteers deliver multiple sessions covering heart attacks and CPR, using Automated External Defibrillators (AEDs), assisting individuals who are choking, and placing someone in the recovery position. The sessions receive positive feedback, with participants often astounded that these volunteers, typically without a medical background, deliver such high-quality training.

Raheem Sterling scholarships

Our University, alongside King’s College London, are proud to partner with The Raheem Sterling Foundation to offer scholarships to support Black African and Caribbean heritage applicants from socio-economically under-represented backgrounds. The Raheem Sterling Foundation envisions a world where young people will always have the support they need in the pursuit of improving their opportunities, their future careers and their quality of life. The foundation aims to fund seven students on undergraduate degree programmes at The University of Manchester over the next three years. 

Fallowfield community project

Fallowfield community project is a long-term initiative to reduce the waste and fly-tipping issues and to improve recycling rates on the Fallowfield Brow. Students from our University volunteer alongside local residents, Manchester Student Homes, Manchester City Council and Biffa to remove litter from an alleyway, clear weeds and install new planters to make a positive impact on the local community and the environment.

Dentistry across continents

The Sri Lankan Civil War limited the influx of medical knowledge into the region for almost 30 years. Since then, healthcare practitioners of affected areas have been striving to update their practice to provide modern treatments for the local population. In 2011, the University of Manchester set up a continuous professional development (CPD) team in Sri Lanka, providing lectures to help improve healthcare knowledge and practice. Our academics visit each year and with support from our University and the Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust (MFT), have helped with capacity building, skill sharing programmes, student exchange opportunities and school community engagement projects.

The Staying Safe Programme

Our University is one of two pilot institutions for The Staying Safe Programme (TSSP), a new drug education initiative designed to educate students about drug use and minimise associated harms. This program marks a shift from a zero-tolerance approach to student drug use, favouring harm reduction policies and procedures instead. The harm reduction approach acknowledges that young people may use controlled drugs and aims to help them reduce the associated risks. In contrast, the zero-tolerance approach can create stigma and hinder access to support. Our approach is grounded in harm reduction principles, ensuring that students who engage in drug use are informed about the risks, equipped to make informed choices, and confident in seeking support without facing penalties. The University’s adoption of harm reduction policies aligns with the recent call by Universities UK (UUK) for universities to implement such practices.

Stonewall ranking

Stonewall is Europe’s largest charity for lesbian, gay, bi, trans, queer, questioning and ace (LGBTQ+) people and each year ranks organisations for their LGBTQ+ inclusion practices against other organisations. Up to 500 organisations take part in the annual Index, in which we have ranked in the top 100 for eight consecutive years. This year, our University scored 133 out of 197 in its Workplace Equality Index submission, ranked 7th overall, and also achieved a Gold award for meeting specific criteria around a number of identified measures for LGBT+ inclusion.

Talking Science Competition

Each year, the University’s Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health (FBMH) hosts the ‘Talking Science Competition’ where second year undergraduate students and above are invited to share their ideas on how science can create a healthier, fairer and greener world, creating a unique opportunity to talk about a subject that really matters to them.

University Living Lab

Our University Living Lab applies the expertise of students to real-world sustainability challenges through developing student research projects with external organisations to help meet sustainability goals.  Through the University Living Lab, the University has saved CO2 through active travel, shaped municipal climate change policy, increased biodiversity and enabled ethical consumption whilst empowering and equipping the future workforce of a net zero world. In 2022, the Living Lab was nominated for The Earthshot Prize for practical action on climate change.

School Governor Initiative

The University has one of the UK’s most extensive programmes of work with local state schools and colleges. In accordance with the University’s access and participation plan with the Office for Students, we deliver a School Governor Initiative that helps staff and alumni to find volunteering placements as governors in local schools.

Manchester Museum’s Carbon Literacy toolkit

We launched the first ever museum-sector-specific Carbon Literacy toolkit as part of Roots & Branches, a partnership between Manchester Museum, Museum Development North West (MDNW), and The Carbon Literacy project. The toolkit helps museum professionals and volunteers undertake training, to then certify as Carbon Literate. This foundational work supports staff, volunteers, and partners to build their understanding of climate action, so that they can make informed sustainable choices. The project also encourages museums to develop organisational pledges to act against climate change.

Q-Step data partnerships

We partner with small local charities in Manchester right through to major government departments through our Q-Step programme.

This places students on internships in organisations that require data skills and analysis and we’ve collaborated on projects with the Office for National Statistics on global, national and regional datasets used to measure progress on SDGs.

Student learning partnerships

We’re committed to empowering students with the knowledge, skills and opportunities to address all of the SDGs through partnerships with public, private and civil society organisations.

Our University Living Lab platform connects student projects with external organisations to address the SDGs.

Our Volunteer Hub acts to advance partnerships between hundreds of charities and our student volunteers.

And many academic programmes offer service-learning partnerships, where external organisations benefit from practical student interventions in areas such as dentistry, optometry, pharmacy, business and legal advice.

Justice Hub

Our Justice Hub allows students to explore and apply various arms of the law to make real change in our communities.

The Hub runs a free legal advice centre for economically disadvantaged people in areas such as family, housing and immigration law.

During the pandemic, our Justice Hub set up the Virtual Vacation Scheme, which aimed to simplify some very complicated areas of law impacted by the pandemic, and created an accessible and informative method of legal help for the community through workshops, videos, briefings and webinars.

Species conservation

Our Manchester Museum Vivarium is dedicated to the conservation of reptiles and amphibians.

We recently partnered with Panama Wildlife Charity PWCC on non-invasive research and conservation education involving local communities in the Santa Fe National Park in Panama.

This led to a world first in 2021: one of the world’s rarest toads, the Harlequin Frog, was successfully bred in captivity outside its country of origin, at our museum.

We also curate a world-famous FrogBlog and deliver a digital Learning with Lucy conservation programme for schools.

Manchester City of Trees

As part of our partnership with the local NGO, Manchester City of Trees, students can use our Volunteer Hub to sign up for one-off or weekly tree planting sessions or even become a Citizen Forester.

Our student volunteering is supporting their mission of planting one tree for every person across Greater Manchester, creating a healthier and more sustainable city region.

Making labs greener

Leading the way in achieving the University’s pledge to eliminate avoidable single-use plastic usage, staff in our School of Biological Sciences are reducing single-use plastics in the lab through adoption of a 6R approach.

This has included:

  • refining protocol and optimising waste management;
  • reducing single-use items;
  • re-using materials, plastic containers and gloves;
  • using recycled material;
  • replacing plastics where possible with glass, paper or wood.

Ocean warming and shark survival

Our undergraduate students have assisted a study into the effects of warming ocean waters on the small-spotted catshark embryo’s freeze response: a technique whereby the embryo stops moving so that predators won’t detect them.

The research found that with a 5°C water temperature increase there was a seven-fold decrease in the length of time the embryos froze for in the presence of a predator stimuli, indicating that as oceans warm, many shark and ray species may reduce in number due to increased predation.

Roots and Branches

Our Manchester Museum has been awarded Arts Council England and National Lottery Project Grant funding for an ambitious two-year partnership project in collaboration with Museum Development North West and the Carbon Literacy Trust. The project will accelerate the museum sector’s ability to respond to the climate crisis.

The Museum will host the ‘roots’: creating a nationally significant co-working hub of cultural environmental action that will bring together museum staff, educators, environmentalists, artists, researchers, third sector organisations and students.

Search