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HomeAbout DofEWhat we doOur Advocacy WorkOur enrichment work

The DofE charity exists to help young people build the skills and capabilities they need to successfully navigate adult life and work – the kind of skills and qualities that you can’t learn in a textbook and exams can’t measure – but that every young person needs. This is why it’s crucial that we find robust ways to measure our impact.

What do we mean by ‘enrichment work’?

Enrichment activities and non-formal learning activities like sports, clubs, adventures away from home, volunteering, art and culture pursuits, and social action, provide opportunities for young people to develop essential personal, social and emotional skills, engage with education, build confidence and increase social interaction. However, enrichment opportunities are not spread equally across the UK.

Our 2024 Impact Report used open data methodology and examined how participating in DofE programmes impacted young people’s skills, social and emotional development, wellbeing and sense of belonging.

We analysed responses from over 4,000 DofE participants, our findings show a statistically significant positive impact on wellbeing, skills development, community ties and physical activity for young people doing their DofE.

Using best practice methodology set out in the 2021 HM Treasury Green Book, we’ve calculated that life satisfaction improvements experienced by DofE participants have estimated an average social value of £4,400 per person. In 2024-25 166,592 young people achieved their DofE Award and estimated total value of £33.4m volunteering hours given in support of others.

What we’re calling for: making the Enrichment Entitlement deliver for every young person

Now more than ever, young people need access to opportunities that help them build confidence, develop essential personal, social and emotional skills and feel excited about their futures. And while the Government’s commitment to a national enrichment entitlement is a hugely welcome step forward, after years of advocating for an Enrichment Guarantee, we know that access to enrichment is still uneven. Where a young person lives, the school they attend, or their family circumstances still shapes the opportunities available to them – and too many miss out on experiences that could be genuinely life‑changing.  

Our focus now is making sure the new entitlement delivers meaningfully and equitably, with schools and colleges supported to shape quality enrichment offers in every place. That means ensuring regular access to high‑quality non‑formal learning, with targeted support for young people who face the greatest barriers. We know this approach works. Between 2021 and 2025, targeted funding enabled 462 mainstream schools to deliver DofE programmes, supporting more than 35,000 young people. Independent analysis supported by State of Life, using data from over 1,200 participants, shows improvements in life satisfaction, happiness and community connection – particularly for young people from marginalised backgrounds. 

For us, enrichment means making sure young people can take part in the activities that help them grow: non‑formal learning, clubs and programmes, outdoor experiences, trips away from home, volunteering and social action. We see every day how these experiences transform young people’s confidence, wellbeing and engagement in learning. They help young people discover their strengths, feel part of something, and build the practical, work‑ready skills they need to thrive. 

The Government has taken a major step by committing to an enrichment entitlement and many other policy announcements in parallel to support young people to access enriching activities and trusted adult support. Our call now is to ensure it is implemented well, resourced properly, and truly accessible so every young person benefits, not just in principle but in practice.

Making this a reality

Our work to strengthen enrichment didn’t start from nowhere. It’s been shaped through collaboration across the youth and education sectors including, before its closure in 2025, through a partnership with NCS Trust, which had a long track record of delivering high‑quality non‑formal learning for young people. Together we built on existing research, strengthened the evidence base, and contributed to the early momentum that helped shape the national conversation on enrichment.

Early in this process we brought partners and policymakers together at a Ministerial Roundtable to highlight why enrichment matters and why the sector needed better data, clearer evidence and more consistent access for young people across both formal and non‑formal settings.

In 2023, we formalised this shared agenda through the Education and Enrichment Project, which brought together research, sector expertise and insights from young people to develop a set of practical proposals aimed at widening access and strengthening quality. These included:

  • Improved collaboration between schools and youth organisations to ensure more consistent access to high‑quality enrichment
  • Stronger local partnerships so education, youth and community providers can coordinate offers more easily and remove barriers to participation
  • Better recognition of non‑formal learning, ensuring young people’s achievements beyond the classroom are visible and valued by employers, training providers and further education institutions
  • Common benchmarks for enrichment, supporting the sector to measure impact consistently, from life skills and wellbeing to social action and community engagement.

These proposals weren’t intended as a standalone blueprint. They were developed with officials, sector partners and young people to provide a shared foundation for widening access to enrichment across the country. And in many ways, this groundwork helped set the conditions for the Government’s eventual commitment to a national enrichment entitlement.  

As the entitlement now moves into implementation, this body of work gives us a strong platform. It means we’re stepping into the next phase with a clear understanding of what young people need, what the evidence shows, and how the system can work together to ensure every young person benefits from high‑quality enrichment. 

Research aims and approach

Alongside sector partners including The Centre for Education and Youth and UK Youth we commissioned the Education and Enrichment report to show how schools and youth organisations can partner, collaborate and coordinate to widen access to positive activities beyond the classroom. A central finding was practical but important: coordination is hard — schools and youth organisations face real operational hurdles when forming and sustaining new partnerships.

Working with government, we began addressing those barriers together. Before its closure in 2025, NCS Trust was an important partner in this work, and we’re grateful for the experience and learning it brought to the table. Following the government’s decision to wind down NCS and close the Trust, the original partnership pot was expanded and repurposed into the Enrichment Expansion Programme, a £22.5 million fund supporting enrichment around the school day in up to 400 schools. This builds on sector learning including DofE and NCS’ joint delivery of the Enrichment Partnerships Pilots and shifts the focus toward locally led partnerships and practical delivery, with a view to sharing what works at pace and scale.

Enrichment framework

Another key finding from the Education and enrichment report was the need to develop a framework for enrichment provisions to provide schools and colleges with standardised best practice benchmarks on enrichment and personal development provisions.

In April 2025, the UK government announced that they will be developing the enrichment framework, along with new enrichment guidance and accompanying enrichment benchmarks. This builds on our current work and DofE has been part of the expert panel guiding this.

Policy changes and developments

Over the past five years, policy has shifted decisively towards recognising enrichment as part of a rounded education and youth offer. We’ve played our part in that shift — through our own reports and evidence, by working with Ministers and officials, engaging MPs across parties, and collaborating through the Back Youth Alliance (BYA) and the Enrichment for All (E4A) coalition.

A national Enrichment Entitlement - now a government policy

In November 2025, the Government committed to a core enrichment entitlement for every child, setting the expectation that all pupils should access civic engagement, arts and culture, nature and adventure, sport, and wider life skills as part of the refreshed curriculum.

We consistently made the case in public and in private, that enrichment improves attendance, wellbeing and engagement, and that access is uneven. Our work with E4A helped crystallise a broad sector consensus on what a guaranteed offer should include. Commentary at the time noted that emerging enrichment benchmarks were being informed by the E4A coalition’s framework.

An Enrichment Framework (with model benchmarks) to guide delivery

 The Department for Education began developing a national Enrichment Framework and signalled the role of benchmarks to support schools in designing and evaluating their offer.  

We co‑published practical Enrichment Benchmarks with partners (Big Education, Oasis, Rethinking Assessment), drawing on consultations with young people and school/community leaders, to inform the government’s framework work. These benchmarks mirror the successful Gatsby approach in careers education.

A Schools White Paper that embeds enrichment in a 10‑year plan

The 2026 Schools White Paper (“Every Child Achieving and Thriving”) positions enrichment as part of a broader, more inclusive vision for childhood, aligning it to the refreshed curriculum for first teaching from 2028.

We worked cross‑party to build understanding among MPs and peers about how enrichment supports attendance, wellbeing and aspiration, and we shared school‑level evidence from our programmes ahead of publication.

A 10-year National Youth Strategy that centres youth voice and access

The National Youth Strategy (2025–2035), co‑produced with over 14,000 young people, commits to broad access to enriching activities within and beyond the school day and a more coordinated national approach to youth provision. Within this, Government announced ambitions to halve the enrichment participation gap and give half a million more young people access to a trusted adult by 2035.

Through BYA and sector coalitions we argued for a stronger national settlement on enrichment and youth access, with young people’s voices at the centre and welcomed the strategy’s direction and accountability focus.

Scaling delivery: £22.5m Enrichment Expansion Programme

Following the Government’s decision to wind down NCS and close the NCS Trust (announced in November 2024; programme delivery concluded March 2025), government investment was repurposed and scaled into the £22.5m Enrichment Expansion Programme, supporting enrichment around the school day in up to 400 schools.

We worked with officials and sector partners to share learning on coordination and access barriers, including through DofE and NCS’ joint delivery of the Enrichment Partnership Pilots helping make the case for locally‑led partnerships and practical delivery models as funding moved into the new programme.

A Dormant Assets Scheme focused on enriching activities

The 2025 Dormant Assets Scheme Strategy set out the government’s ambitions to broaden the reach and amplify the impact of the funding pots available to charitable causes from dormant bank accounts. The distributor of the youth portion shifted from Youth Futures Foundation to The National Lottery Community Fund and £132.5 million was announced for the provision of services, facilities or opportunities to meet the needs of young people. 

Through the Back Youth Alliance, we worked with officials behind the scenes to advocate for investment in grassroots youth organisations most in need and a focus on access to enrichment activities and youth work support for all young people.  

Why this matters, and what we keep pressing for

These developments mean enrichment is no longer treated as “nice to have”: it is named in national policy, guided by an emerging framework and benchmarks, and supported by targeted investment to build capacity in schools and communities.  

Our role now is to keep making the case, alongside the Back Youth Alliance, E4A and sector allies for delivery that is: 

  • Meaningful (regular, high‑quality activities across the five strands)
  • Equitable (targeted support where barriers are highest)
  • Accountable (clear expectations and measures that track attendance, wellbeing and skills outcomes, not just inputs)

We’ll continue bringing the evidence: from our own programmes (e.g., outcomes from 35,000+ young people in 462 schools, with evaluation supported by State of Life) to wider sector research, because evidence moves policy and keeps the focus on what actually works for young people.  

 

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