Care Experience: why our National Ambition still matters

Photos: UHI Perth, University of Glasgow

Care Experienced Week 2026 is an opportunity to celebrate the achievements of care-experienced people, but also to remind ourselves why improving their experiences and outcomes remains such an important part of the work of the Scottish Funding Council (SFC).

SFC’s National Ambition for Care Experience has a deliberately simple vision: by 2030, there should be no difference in outcomes between care-experienced students and their non-care-experienced peers. Behind that lies a set of ambitions to improve the intake and outcomes for care experienced students, including articulation pathways.

That ambition matters because access to college or university is only part of the story. We want care-experienced learners not just to enter tertiary education, but to have the opportunity and support to stay, succeed and progress.

There is a lot to celebrate. The latest insights from SFC’s data analytics team show our ambitions on college and university intake have been exceeded but also remind us why a continued national focus is important; there remain gaps in successful completion and retention.

That is why SFC is currently refreshing the National Ambition to 2030 and seeking feedback from the sector, specialist agencies and care-experienced people on what the next phase to achieve our vision should look like and how we can support institutions.

SFC cannot achieve this alone. The National Ambition gives us a shared direction, but progress depends on colleges, universities and national partners working together. Our Care Experience National Policy Group has provided an important forum for bringing that expertise together, including representatives from colleges and universities and partners such as Who Cares? Scotland, CELCIS and SAAS.

Care Experienced Week gives us a chance to celebrate progress, share practical support and recognise the work happening across Scotland, but ultimately our National Ambition is about something bigger: keeping our collective attention on the outcomes that matter and working towards a tertiary system in which care experience does not determine a learner’s chances of succeeding.

Fiona Burns, Assistant Director – Student Interests, Access and Quality
27 October 2026