Edge Hill University (Edge Hill) consistently outperforms many of its peers in GSL Index scores for sense of community and belonging. It won Best Moving-In Experience at the GSL Awards in both 2023 and 2024 and also took home the Best Value for Money award in 2024. In addition, Edge Hill was voted the UK’s top choice for student accommodation for the third year running in the 2026 Uni Compare UK rankings, based on positive student testimonials and ratings. GSL News recently sat down with Edge Hill’s Student Life Manager, Danielle Barnes, to learn the secret to Edge Hill’s success.
A positive moving-in experience is key
Building community at Edge Hill starts the moment students arrive on campus, where new students are met by an army of support. Over 100 staff (many of whom do not normally have a student-facing role) and around 80 student staff turn out for Welcome Weekend each year to help students move in – lugging suitcases, driving buggies, and generally offering a reassuring presence. Danielle explains:
“Over 100 staff members give up their weekends to physically help students move into their accommodation. They lug their bags up and down stairs. They drive buggies. So, from the moment new students land on campus, they feel part of that overall Edge Hill community, and they can see that it is not just their fellow students who care about them. They can see the staff care because staff are physically there.”
Alongside the physical support for new students, Welcome Weekend includes pop-up games, giveaways, an Information Hub and a free evening Welcome Event. This is a calmer, quieter version of the more traditional Welcome Fair that takes place later in the week, where students and their families can meet support services.
“The Information Hub does not have all the crowds, exciting freebies and giveaways of a traditional Welcome Fair, but all the services are there. It provides an opportunity for students and their parents or carers to meet the Student Support Teams and get answers to any questions or concerns they may have. If they’re into their fitness, they can go pay for their gym membership or sort out any wraparound support they might need. We run that on both move-in days. It’s a chilled-out neurodivergent friendly version of the Freshers Fair.”
A consistent focus on wellbeing
Edge Hill’s residence life programme is shaped around wellbeing and inclusion. Rather than being all about big parties or flashy events, the emphasis is on building trust and community through low-key, consistent, and meaningful engagement.
This is where Edge Hill’s Campus Connectors (CCs) play a key role. These paid student team members act as friendly guides, running regular events, promoting opportunities, and checking in with students who may need a little extra support.
One of their most effective strategies is monthly visits to halls with “What’s On” flyers and freebies in hand. “It’s a wellbeing check in for us more than a promotional opportunity,” explains Danielle.
These visits used to be done alongside accommodation officers, but students saw them as a type of residential inspection that could result in disciplinary action. Separating wellbeing and discipline has made all the difference. “Now the visits have become a safe space for students to open up to their peers and students even look out for their CCs and provide really positive feedback.”
One of Edge Hill’s Campus Connectors visiting students. Image: supplied by Edge Hill university
Thoughtfully designed events
Edge Hill’s events programme reflects the diverse needs of its students. All events are alcohol-free and completely free to attend – a deliberate choice, especially given the university’s high proportion of widening participation and mature students.
The programme includes:
- Saturday Socials – craft-based get-togethers tailored to student interests
- Weekly cooking workshops
- Monthly walks and trips – Including IKEA trips and local Christmas light switch-ons
- Get Connected – a weekly, low-key event in a smaller group for students who may feel isolated or unsure of where to start
- Student Life Arch – A daily lunchtime drop-in run by CCs in The Hub space, offering information and event signposting. This is also used as a chance to talk to students about the type of events they would like to see.
Every new student is also asked to complete a Getting-to-Know-You survey, which helps shape the programme each year. And while sports always rank high, and the same types of events are always the most popular, the themes of events change based on feedback.
Gamification
Edge Hill has also been exploring gamification to increase engagement with events. Through a points-based reward system, students earn entries into a prize draw every time they attend an event, with students who live on campus earning extra points for their accommodation. Danielle explains that the initial idea behind this approach was to encourage people to feel greater connection to and pride in their accommodation:
“Accommodation is a massive part of student’s sense of belonging and students at most institutions are able to represent their accommodation in sport. We have some of that here but we really want to make people feel proud of their accommodation whatever their interests are. Everyone is passionate about something, and if you are passionate about something, you want to be the best at it”.
In Danielle’s opinion, one of Edge Hill’s most successful social events is one where gamification was used to encourage students to compete for their halls. Edge Hill’s Halls Social is a five-hour event with free food, competitions, and a live leaderboard where students participating in activities are given tokens that they can then drop in their hall’s tube to earn points. “Initially, they were just coming to grab a burger,” says Danielle, “but once they found out they could earn points, they were like, how do I earn points? How many? How many times can I do it? And they would literally do a U-turn as soon as they knew they would be earning something for their halls – I think we had about 2,000 people through during that event.”
Data-driven approach
Edge Hill is also working to improve data collection to better track engagement with events. Danielle explains:
“Our data is much better now. We have a much better understanding of the level of engagement with our events and who those people are. In the past, we used to do head counts at events, but then that didn’t tell us anything about the students. We didn’t know what accommodation they were from or even if students from the accommodation were attending our events. Now, they scan a QR code at each event so we have live data of who is attending, and we have plans to really dig into that data to see what we can learn”.
The Student Life Team hope to be able integrate student life data with other data, such as Student Union data, in order to be able to better identify students at risk and understand the student journey:
“We hope to be able to see if, for example, a student came to Get Connected events four times but then fell off the face of the earth, is that student at risk? Or did they perhaps gain the confidence to join a society and move on? That’s our dream.”
The ultimate goal of moving students on
Speaking of moving on, success for Edge Hill isn’t about keeping students in their Residence Life events forever:
“We don’t necessarily want to see the same people coming to our events week in and week out. We want them to go out and experience university life and find their community elsewhere too. The reason that a lot of what we do is aimed at that lower-level wellbeing is because we know there are already loads of student groups doing amazing, big events throughout the year. Part of our job is to get students confident enough to turn up to those events.”
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Want to know more about supporting student connections and wellbeing in student accommodation?
Following the success of previous collaborations exploring the experience of international students in student accommodation and the experience of vulnerable students in student accommodation, CUBO and GSL have joined forces again this year to explore the topic of residence life. In this year’s report, Building Connections: The Power of Residence Life in Student Experience, we take a deep dive into the Global Student Living Index (GSL Index) data and draw on the experience of the residence life teams at Edge Hill University and UWE Bristol to provide actionable insights that help both university and private accommodation providers improve the student experience, foster inclusive communities, and support student success.
