Sophie Pender grew up on a council estate in north London and worked hard at school, becoming the first in her school’s history to get all A* grades at A-Level.
She then became the first in her family to go to university, at Bristol. But upon getting there, she discovered that her peers came from very different backgrounds.
“I found that it wasn’t that inclusive for people who didn’t come from families that have a long history of going to those places. So, I set up a Facebook group to start, which was like a student society just for state school students,” she says.
The group she began as a 19-year-old eventually became the 93% Foundation, a charity that provides employability events and community support for university students from state-schools, five years later.
Lack of support ‘felt like having the reins cut’
Pender received support herself from another charity before she went to university, but when she got there, it stopped.
“The trust didn’t have any infrastructure to support me whilst I was there. So, it kind of felt like having the reins cut a little bit, which is why I built the 93% Foundation.”
Pender registered the 93% Foundation, which draws its name from the proportion of the British population that goes to state schools, as a charity in 2020 when she was 24. There are now 38 of its clubs in universities across the UK.
It helps provide state school students with a network of friends and peers, which those who went to fee-paying schools are more likely to have already, Pender says. It also holds events to improve these students’ employability after university.
“We make sure our students get a free professional headshot, we do mock interviews with them and we prepare them for the job they want to get, but ultimately it’s about going to university and meeting like-minded people,” she says.
Pender describes the foundation as moving away from the historic “Victorian benevolence structure” of the charity sector and towards more of a “movement” for students.
“I think the 93% Foundation is a really good case study in how you can run a charity differently. How you can be a bit bolder and a bit more young and exciting.
“The old charity model was raising millions of pounds from rich people and families and basically drip-feeding that down in some sort of programme, which is not bad. But I do think the 93% Foundation reinvents the way that beneficiaries interact with their charity.”
Setting up a charity at 24
Pender, whose day job is as an associate at a law firm, runs the charity with other volunteers.
She says that being a young leader in the charity sector can present advantages and disadvantages.
“I’m still quite junior in my career. So, I still struggle with the things I’ve tried to help other people through, which I think is a bad thing, because I think sometimes when you’re leading something you feel you need to have everything figured out.
“But I think it’s also a good thing because I’m always tuned in to what our beneficiaries actually need. And because I’ve got lived experience, it means that the stuff that students get out of the 93% Foundation really does go to the areas that need it the most.”
As a younger person in the sector, Pender says she has “put her foot in it sometimes”.
“I’ve walked into rooms before with people that I really should know and they all seem to know who each other are. I put my foot in it and I’ll mention someone’s name and that’ll be the person I’m sat next to.”
Pay the biggest barrier to working-class representation in the sector
Pender says she thinks pay is the biggest barrier to working-class people entering the charity sector.
A study from Pro Bono Economics last year found that charity sector workers are on average paid 7% less per hour than their counterparts in the wider economy.
“It’s not that the charity sector is not appealing. People who are from working-class backgrounds, we are brought up with the strongest sense of community you can imagine – we’ve always had to help each other. We want to help people but how can you help people when they’re paying you peanuts?”
She said she thinks working-class representation in the sector will go up when pay does.
“The charity sector needs to be better paid, it needs to be proportionate to the amount that the charity is delivering because it’s such a stressful job.
“You never know whether your organisation’s going to go under at some point or whether you’re actually doing the right thing because as a charity, you don’t have to just also think about the financial impact you’re trying to deliver.
“Charities have to juggle ‘this might make a lot of money for charity but isn't the right thing for my beneficiaries’ and that is a lot of mental load to have to balance.”
She adds: “If you’re a working-class individual who’s not only got to make money for themselves, but their family probably rely on you, how are you ever meant to think that's a good proposition for you?”
‘It sometimes feels like we’re putting a plaster over a bigger issue’
She says the 93% Foundation has a good relationship with other social mobility charities such as the Social Mobility Foundation and the Sutton Trust and avoids trying to copy what they do.
“It’s always been part of my ethos that if there’s a charity doing great work in a space and we should leave that to them and support them in that goal,” she says.
What makes the 93% Foundation different is that it supports students through their experiences at university, Pender says.
One of the charity’s ambitions is to reach young people before they attend university to ensure they “know they belong” from the get-go.
“I think there’s so much that we can do as an organisation, but it always sometimes feels like we’re just putting a plaster over the bigger issue, which is what all charities feel like.”
Aims for the future
In the 2021 calendar year, the charity had an income of just under £50,000 with an expenditure of just over £6,000.
The majority of its income comes from its partners which support their student employability events, Pender says. However, she said it received a one-off £2,000 donation from one supporter that year.
It currently does not fundraise from the public, but it would like to do so in future as well as make bids for grant funding.
Pender would like to start employing people and train them in fundraising, as the charity is currently run by volunteers.
Reflecting on her experience setting up the charity, Pender says: “On the whole, it’s been positive. It’s obviously been very, very challenging, but I wouldn’t change the timing of it. Maybe get some more sleep back. That’d be nice.”
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