You and Student Support The Student Support coordinator

You and Student Support • The Student Support co-ordinator is your central and initial contact point – She will make arrangements for your 1 -2 -1 meetings with your Personal Tutor – She will inform you of the timings and places for Group meetings – She will listen to you, assess your situation and direct you to the best sources of help or advice – She will administrate your records and monitor your support, acting in your interest to ensure you are enabled to succeed.

You and Student Support • The Student Support co-ordinator looks after the following: – – – guidance on degree regulations and requirements information on submission deadlines and procedures requests for deferred submission of course work requests for Special Circumstances for degree course work or exams processing of degree programme transfers / interruptions procedures for applying to study abroad requests to change Personal Tutor UK Border Agency or other visa issues, including the School level census (where applicable) references to confirm student status (e. g. for flat rental) advice on support for personal or health issues advice on support for accommodation problems

Personal Tutor Role • Each of you will have been allocated a Personal Tutor • You will need to see your PT as soon as possible this week. Reading and think about your choices! • Role is to support students in: – Reviewing academic progress through a complete programme of study by providing: • welcome at the beginning of each academic year • guidance on course choices, degree path(s) • advice on study difficulties • overview of progress – Reflect on long term development • based on learning inside and outside the formal curriculum – Fostering a sense of belonging to a learning community

Personal Tutor Role The PT will provide: • • • advice on course choices advice on study skills advice on feedback and academic progress guidance on careers related to degree programme guidance on exam and other assessment techniques advice on essay and field / laboratory report writing skills academic advice on changing degree programme advice on studying abroad (academic matters) an academic reference, on request from you, where appropriate The PT will NOT: • contact your LEA on your behalf re funding and fees matters • Do your work for you! The PT will support you by assessing how best to develop your skills and learning strategies.

You and Student Support • Your Responsibilities in engaging with us: – Reflect on academic performance – Understand how learning supports longer-term aspirations • reflect, engage, take an active approach to your development, write records – “Engage as a one of a community of learners” • ie - not as a passive recipient (or not!) of content

You and Student Support • Your Responsibilities in a Practical Sense: – Attend initial interview, armed with all information and sensible, researched course choices for discussion – Attend individual meetings, one each semester, as arranged – Attend and participate in the Group Meetings facilitated by your PT or their representative. – Complete any tasks assigned to you by your PT – Enter notes into EUCLID to maintain and develop an engagement trail and keep your Support Team informed. – Respond quickly and clearly to requests for information – Maintain records and ensure you have supporting documentation for special circumstances. – Keep yourself informed regarding your funding – Keep yourself informed of the times and sites of examinations, and assessment hand-in dates and times for all courses

Personal Tutor Tasks and Advice School of Geosciences

The Tasks of a Personal Tutor • Meetings: – One individual meeting per semester (and others by appointment) – Group meetings – Brief students on any preparatory and follow-up work • Respond promptly to student requests for contact: – Normally within 3 working days – Liaise with Senior Tutor/Student Support Team if problems • Share personal (pastoral) responsibilities with Student Support Team: – Refer to central services and specialist sources of guidance as appropriate • Maintain accurate and appropriate records via EUCLID • Undertake training and CPD associated with role

Individual Meetings • Tailored to individual student: – time of year, year of study, student’s progress • Focus on core purposes and any student concerns • Student led preparation and follow up – http: //www. ed. ac. uk/schools-departments/instituteacademic-development/undergraduate • Guidance, advice and resources for Personal Tutors in preparing for and running 1: 1 meetings – http: //www. ed. ac. uk/schools-departments/instituteacademic-development/learning-teaching/academicpastoral/support/resources/individuals

Group Meetings • Considerable flexibility in timing, topic and structure – Opportunity to link to specific elements of the degree programme (e. g. preparation for placements) – To deal more effectively and efficiently with specific topics (e. g. study skills) – To work with other personal tutors across different year groups or support particular cohorts (e. g. joint degree students) • Guidance, advice and resources for running group meetings – http: //www. ed. ac. uk/schools-departments/instituteacademic-development/learning-teaching/academicpastoral/support/resources/groups

Support for Personal Tutors Central Support Services • Student Disability Service http: //www. ed. ac. uk/schools-departments/student-disabilityservice/staff • Advice on helping distressed students http: //www. ed. ac. uk/schools-departments/student-disabilityservice/staff/supporting-students/help-distressed-students • Student Counselling Service http: //www. ed. ac. uk/schools-departments/studentcounselling • Careers Service (employability and careers) – http: //www. ed. ac. uk/schools-departments/careers/staff • A to Z of Student Support Services – http: //www. ed. ac. uk/staff-students/studentservices

Support for Personal Tutors • IAD web resources and guidance for personal tutors http: //bit. ly/QIg 7 h. K – Links to academic advice and procedures – Links to advice on personal support for students – Resources for personal tutors – Information on Central briefing events and CPD: • Personal Tutor IT tools • Personal Tutors: students mental health workshop • Personal Tutors: running lively and useful group meetings • School documentation and contacts • Coming shortly – briefings on specific needs – “etiquette” and confidentiality in note-taking – students with disabilities?

e. Tutor - IT tools • Minimise administrative overhead and ensure easy access to information • Create an enriched, personalised and dynamic supplement to the student record • Enable Tutee / PT / Staff to create notes related to their discussions • Ability to add a file and link to other digital material and resources • Provide appropriate information to relevant staff in support of our students • Enables students to request a meeting

IT tools - Phase 1 • IT tools fairly simple in Phase 1 – Take record of meetings – Take record of notes/discussions – Ensure students are not forgotten (e. g. failed/ignored emails) • Student records/notes accessible by all with EUCLID account • But notes can be marked confidential – to Dean of Students/ST/PT/SST/Student/Originator • Route in – login to EUCLID and on left-hand-side you will see a tab “Personal Tutor” 14

EUCLID is your Friend !? • Login to EUCLID • Click on “Personal Tutor”

Personal Tutor ‘My Tutees’ Up comes the list of “My Tutees” This may take some time to arrive, but we are promised more speed. . Note “Full record” and “Notes/Meetings”

Personal Tutor ‘My Tutees’ If you click “Full record” you’ll get to normal EUCLID “Courses” screen Note new tab “Meetings/Notes” that takes you back to the meetings and notes page

Personal Tutor - Meetings If you click “Notes/ Meetings” you get to this screen Here you set up meetings Unfortunately no dummy students to play with Take them in order. . .

Personal Tutor - Future Meetings “Record a future meeting” tells the student that you want a future meeting and “opens” it “Meeting type” is important Note “Confidential” flag Note that nothing can be deleted or edited once saved

Personal Tutor Recording Meetings “Record recent meeting” is probably the most useful, and records a meeting that has already taken place This must be completed to “close” an individual meeting

Schedule a meeting

Notes of Meetings

Working with Notes “Add a note” allows you to record any “random” individual meeting

Working with Notes are arranged in order of date, latest at the bottom Comments on notes (children) go under the initial note (parent) A parent can have unlimited children Confidentiality propagates down There is no way to “close” a discussion The requirement for an S 1 or S 2 individual meeting is met by the first comment on a future meeting, or by the record of a past meeting

What goes in notes? • Comments on meeting outcomes – From PT: brief comment – From student: expanded comments – From PT: feedback on student comments • Any other communications from anyone that should be on the record (all staff can add notes) – Praise is good! – Feedback like “Progress on project not good enough” 25

What goes in notes? • SCC stuff (but be careful) – Can be marked confidential • … but confidentiality not that great: Dean of Students, ST, PT, SST – Confidentiality should improve in Phase 2 – If the student tells you something very confidential you may wish to keep notes somewhere else • The “somewhere” else should be accessible if the bus gets you • Note that un-disclosable information may not be used in SCC 26 – May have to “cover yourself” with a note here. “student has told me something I may not disclose further. I have told him that if I can’t disclose it I can’t take it to the SCC or make allowances. He has accepted this. ”

‘Personal Tutors’ email notification matrix Ref Action by Notification to Create 1: 1 meeting SSO Create 1: 1 meeting PT Create 1: 1 meeting ST Create 1: 1 meeting Other staff Create SSO meeting SSO Create SSO meeting PT Y Y Create SSO meeting ST Y Y Create SSO meeting Other staff Y Y Request Meeting Student Y Add meeting comment SSO Y Add meeting comment PT Add meeting comment ST Y Y Add meeting comment Other staff Y Y Add note Student Y Add note SSO Y Y Add note PT Y Y Add note ST Y Y Add note Other staff Y Y Add note comment Student Y Add note comment SSO Y Add note comment PT Add note comment ST Y Y Add note comment Other staff Y Y Assign Personal Tutor Any PT SST Y ST Comment PTE Y All types of 1: 1 Y Y All types of 1: 1. (However, other staff won’t do this). Y Applies to all types of meeting Y Y Here we see who gets an email under what circumstances Note that emails contain no information except a link to the notes The ST has a different system that fires an alert if requests are not dealt with, or meetings Covered in separate note - see K: EuclidIS_SharedProject not held. ESSand closed WorkSSG 001 - PT Phase 1 Change Tutor Notifications. doc

Assign Myself to Students

IT - New stuff • Software does not (yet? ) arrange meetings – – It must be used to record attendance at individual meetings It can be used to notify student of future meetings A meeting can only be “closed” by inserting a note it will not record attendance at group meetings (this must be done manually at this stage) • Note taking – All PT-type feedback to students via these notes – Anything needed to “cover yourself” via these notes – Long-term indelible record

IT - New stuff • If a meeting is requested by a PT (student) the student (PT) will get an email with a link to the notes • If a PT gets a meeting request or receives a note from a student it must be responded to within three working days - if not it’s flagged to ST (then Dean of Students) • Student contribution expected • FAQs at http: //www. euclid. ed. ac. uk/staff/User_Guides Personal_Tutors/PT_FAQ. htm#General

Frequent issues • • • Mental health/depression/stress Medical/Special Circumstances Lack of motivation (in tutees) Relationships Transferring Course/School/College

Infrequent issues • Chronic illness/condition (e. g. Dyslexia = special arrangements) • Family • Financial • Legal – (e. g. been arrested!) • Drug/alcohol abuse

Positives to Discuss • • Personal development Career development Choosing courses CV writing Study skills Time management Presentation skills (verbal/written) Praise and encouragement

What not to Discuss! • Visas etc → Advice Place • Community charge etc → Advice Place • Funding → Advice place

PT Attributes and Conduct • • Patience Listening skills “Appropriateness” (eg keeping oneself safe!) Managing the PT/student relationship (distance vs chumminess) • Compartmentalising PTs’ problems (more distance) • Note and record-keeping • Confidentiality

Progression rules • Full-time students are expected to take and pass courses worth 120 credits each year • PTs are permitted to deal with students without referral to the Senior Director if they: – – have passed 100 or more credits last year have not failed any course that appear in the relevant DPT have not failed any course 4 times and have not been referred to the Senior Director before

Progression rules • Normally, these students will be allowed to proceed to the next year of their programme, re-taking the failed course(s) “assessment only”. – In some cases, the student may wish to retake the course “in full attendance” - this is allowed. – If an “outside course” (i. e. a course not named in the DPT) has been failed, then a new course can be substituted (in full attendance) • A Progression Form should be submitted to the SSC (not Simon!), but the student will not normally be interviewed by the Senior Director or the Head of Deggree

Progression rules • All other students must be referred to the Senior Director, using a Progression Form (sent to the SSC, not to Simon directly) • Interviews will not take place before Freshers’ Week – Get tutees to book an interview ASAP! – Students who have any chance of continuing should be encouraged to take the appropriate classes but should not be signed up for them in EUCLID • If a student is not progressing to the next year of the programme, they should be referred to the Senior Director (this is particularly important where international students are concerned)

Finally • Keep in contact with the SSC • Maintain records and contact through EUCLID • Use the ‘notes’ section for your reports of meetings • Contact your SSC or the Senior Tutor for advice on unusual or difficult cases • Look out for material on Individual and groups sessions, both from the ST and IAD

New policies for 2012 -13 (1) • Student Withdrawal and Exclusion (revised) – Form – Template communication to student • Assessment Regulations – minimal changes to Taught Assessment Regulations – significant changes to Postgraduate Research Assessment Regulations (to align with Taught) • Degree Regulations – revised and restructured to make them easier to use (see link for UG changes) • Part-time / Full-time study – clarification from Registry on what constitutes FT/PT (EASE authentication needed) 40

New policies for 2012 -13 (2) • Academic Standards and Guiding Principles (revised) • Feedback Standards and Guiding Principles (revised) • Collaborative activity – new forms, clarification on authority to approve, new Global Partnerships Protocol for international collaborations • Online distance education • External Examiners – new Code of Practice and Report Forms 41