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Hidden Gems is designed to answer a simple question:
"What is useful, welcoming or interesting for me, right now?"

The feature brings together local data sources, community input and AI-assisted discovery to help users confidently explore university life—especially beyond the obvious or well-known options.

Hidden Gems focuses on four core dimensions:

• Spaces – study areas, quiet spaces, walks and places to pause
• Societies – student groups and communities
• Events – university, society and community events
• Campus Life – practical tips, stories and guidance to help students navigate university life

The experience starts simple and becomes more personalised over time through use.

Feedback from students consistently shows that:

• It can be hard to find spaces and activities beyond the well-known ones
• Many students feel uncertain or disconnected, particularly early on
• Useful information exists, but is spread across multiple systems

Hidden Gems explores whether a community-led, AI-supported discovery experience can:

• Increase students’ sense of belonging
• Improve engagement with spaces, societies and events
• Make the campus and city easier to navigate with confidence

Hidden Gems is embedded directly into the iLancaster app, providing a seamless experience rather than a standalone tool.

At this Proof of Value stage, current capabilities include:

• Users can explore and favourite content
• AI supports discovery and search refinement
• Recommendations are guided by preferences rather than tracking
• No continuous location or movement tracking is used

All development follows Lancaster University’s Responsible AI principles and governance processes.

Status: In scope for PoV

Students can:

• Explore spaces, societies and events
• Set preferences during onboarding
• Use AI-powered search and filtering
• Save favourites across all dimensions
• View detailed pages for each item

At this stage:

• No behavioural or location tracking is used
• Recommendations are based on stated preferences and context provided by the user

Future phase, subject to PoV review

Planned enhancements include:

• A personalised home experience
• Notifications when relevant items appear
• Ability for societies and JCRs to contribute events
• Moderation workflows for contributed content
• “Because you liked this…” style recommendations

Future phase, subject to governance and opt-in

Potential features include:

• Optional GPS-based suggestions
• Time-aware recommendations
• Nearby space and event prompts
• Device-level cards and alerts

All location-based features would be strictly opt-in and reviewed through governance.

Future Phase:

• Contributions will be made by various teams to develop practical tips on campus life, the city, and student living.
• Seasonal tips will be provided at relevant times based on the academic calendar.
• Guidance on settling into halls will be offered to students during their first month upon arrival, with various departments contributing.

Future Phase:

• The planned “Plan My Day” feature aims to assist students by allowing them to enter natural language requests (e.g. “plan tomorrow for me, I want quiet study and something social”) to generate suggestions based on their input and schedule. Further details will be confirmed as development progresses to ensure it meets student needs effectively.

Hidden Gems is a discovery feature within iLancaster that helps students explore spaces, events, societies and Campus Life content that may be relevant to them. It combines university data, community input and AI-supported personalisation.

It is designed to make it easier for students to find relevant spaces, activities and communities, particularly when they are new to university life. The project is exploring whether this can improve engagement, confidence and sense of belonging.

The Innovation Hub designs and delivers new digital experiences in collaboration with staff and students. They lead pilots like this to test ideas before they’re scaled more widely.

Recommendations are drawn from a combination of university data sources, such as events and societies systems, together with crowdsourced community contributions. This creates a rich, community-curated resource.

Initially we’re aiming to trial this with the student community, with an initial focus on new Bailrigg students. Any wider rollout would depend on the outcomes of the Proof-of-Value and governance review.