Building Momentum: What Three Years of Benchmarking Tells Us

At Envision, we know that Essential Skills don’t just happen by chance; they need to be developed with intention, rigour and the right kind of support. That’s why, for the past three years, we’ve partnered with dmh Associates and Skills Builder Partnership to benchmark the progress of young people on our programme against national datasets.

This year’s new evaluation strengthens the picture even further. Drawing on data from 552 young people across three cohorts (2022/23 – 2024/25), it provides the clearest evidence yet that Envision consistently supports rapid and meaningful skills growth, and that our impact is improving over time.

What the 2024/25 Evaluation Shows

1. Envision’s progress over time:

• Every cohort from 2022/23 to 2024/25 made statistically significant gains in Essential Skills.
• Skills growth was especially strong in Creativity and Communication.
• Later cohorts progressed faster than earlier ones, showing that as our model becomes more embedded, the quality of delivery continues to rise.
• Importantly, the proportion of young people reporting declines in their skill scores fell from 25% in 2022/23 to just 9% in 2024/25.

“This points towards the value of multi-year programmes with sustainable funding.” – Dr Chris Percy, dmh Associates

2. Envision compared with mainstream education

• Envision participants made progress far faster than peers in “business-as-usual” education settings.
• When benchmarked against Skills Builder’s anonymised respondent-level dataset, Envision participants achieved about 0.2 more units of progress on a 0–1 scale. This is the equivalent of more than one standard deviation of improvement.
• This is even faster than the six-times-faster figure reported last year, confirming that targeted, high-quality interventions accelerate skill development significantly.

3. The power of targeted Essential Skills provision

• Envision’s results were comparable to those seen in other high-quality, targeted interventions – reinforcing the importance of structured programmes designed with Essential Skills at their core.
• The evidence is clear: targeted skills interventions like Envision are far more effective than leaving skills to chance in mainstream education.

Why This Matters

For us, this evaluation is more than a set of numbers. It’s a reminder that:

• Essential Skills can be developed quickly when the right young people are given the right opportunities.
• Sustainable investment matters. The stronger results in later cohorts show what happens when a programme has time to refine, embed and grow.
• National change is possible. If programmes like Envision, and our partners across the sector, can deliver this level of progress, then it’s time for Essential Skills to be prioritised with the same funding and focus as academic learning.

Looking Ahead: What More Can We Learn?

While this year’s evaluation gives us our clearest evidence yet, there’s still more to explore. Future research could:

• Test how long skills gains last beyond the programme.
• Explore even more precise ways to measure progress, including small-scale retests to understand how well self-assessments reflect real skill growth.
• Refine benchmarking by comparing cohorts with similar school contexts or timing of surveys.
• Examine how the impact of slight programme adjustments, such as slight changes in delivery, might affect different areas of skills growth.

This ongoing research will help us strengthen the programme further and continue to ensure that every young person can develop Essential Skills with confidence.

What’s Next

We’ll continue to publish our evaluations because transparency and accountability are at the heart of our mission. The full report from dmh Associates is available to read here and on Our Impact page, alongside previous studies and evaluations.

This latest evaluation gives us confidence that we are moving in the right direction, but it also challenges us to keep going further. Because every young person deserves the skills to succeed, not just a lucky few.

Together with schools, employers and funders, we can make Essential Skills a right for every young person, not a privilege for a few. Get involved today!