What Works? Student Retention and Success Programme

What works? Student retention and success programme

Jointly funded by HEFCE/Paul Hamlyn Foundation; see www:actionaccess.org.

Overview of staff videos – personal tutoring at Reading and beyond

Maria Gee - Reading

An engaged tutor who’ does her own thing’ because of a perceived lack of support and structure within the School, and the personal tutoring system generally, since the demise of PARs.

Maria talks about:

Following her own structure of personal tutoring with a particular focus on getting to know the student in their first year; discussing CVs and jobs in their second year; talking about exams in their final year – plus offering problem solving support throughout.
Engagement from both sides being the key to a successful tutor/tutee relationship; needing to be proactive in getting to know the tutee as an individual and reactive to issues that arise.
Having too many personal tutees making the role less rewarding as she is not able to get to know them properly as individuals, but feeling that she would be missing out on keeping in touch with what’s going on in the School if she were no longer a Personal Tutor.
Feeling that the lack of PARs has led to a sense of there being no institutional support for Personal Tutors, and that a personal tutoring structure seems to have disappeared from her School as a result. The role is not valued – it has got ‘lost’ as there aren’t any systems/structures in place to give it visibility.
Not finding personal tutoring difficult, and being able to keep her distance from students’ problems; knowing when to ask for help, and where to ask for it from, i.e other support services/colleagues. Being aware that she cannot solve their problems.

Julian Park - Reading

An engaged former tutor who highly values individual contact with students and feels personal tutoring is embedded at the University.

Julian talks about:

How valuable the interpersonal relationships built up through personal tutorials are in terms of benefits to the student and to lecturers/teachers; that they are a good mechanism for picking up issues that aren’t discussed in the normal course of teaching and therefore offer insights into how things can be improved departmentally/institutionally.
The importance of meeting tutees early on in their academic career and establishing an open, friendly relationship without prying through regular, informal meetings.
Helping students ‘settle down’ academically and socially being one of the most important parts of personal tutoring – and being sensitive to how this might affect different kinds of students, e.g mature students.
The University having a good support system in place, and always feeling able to talk to other colleagues – in particular the Senior Tutor – when necessary.
That there is a good back-up tutorial system embedded at the University, and this differentiates us from other HEIs – although we could do more to recognise the value of the role.
Continued contact with tutees after they have graduated is evidence they value the tutor/tutee relationship; although some students prefer not to engage, the system is there for those that do.

Clare Furneaux - Reading

An experienced and fully engaged tutor who regards her personal tutoring as the most rewarding aspect of her job, and believes Personal Tutors are crucial to student success.

Clare talks about:

How personal tutoring promotes a vital two-way exchange of information between staff and students that informs positive change and progression.
Being a Personal Tutor as an integral part of her academic role on the teaching and learning side, and one of the most fulfilling aspects of this role.
Personal Tutors providing a unique sense of continuity for students, as there is nobody else students meet regularly with throughout their time at University for the kind of support offered by Personal Tutors.
Managing contact with parents can be an issue, and she is careful to maintain boundaries of confidentiality unless the student concerned has expressly given their permission for her to discuss matters with their parent(s).

Richard Mitchell - Reading

A former SDTL and now Senior Tutor within his School who believes students must be encouraged to take responsibility for maintaining contact with tutors, and more could be done to reward the personal tutoring role.

Richard talks about:

Getting an enormous sense of personal satisfaction out of seeing students develop and helping them overcome problems, as well as enjoying the insights into their interests/new technologies they may be adopting.
Only chasing non-attenders to a certain extent, but aiming to put the ball in their court as far as maintaining the tutor/tutee relationship is concerned because they are adults and must be treated as such.
Being aware that certain members of staff struggle with the need to balance research and teaching, and perhaps don’t do enough in terms of striking this balance; and perhaps the University could do more to incentivise best practice in personal tutoring – promotions currently only being made on the basis of a Senior Tutor role.
Feeling the Uni should continue to promote the personal tutoring system, and that there is great value for students in having someone in the School who knows something about their course who can help with academic and personal concerns.

Alan Renwick - Reading

A keen and motivated young lecturer, who believes showing you take the tutor/tutee relationship seriously promotes high levels of student engagement.

Alan talks about:

Feeling his prime responsibility is helping students navigate the transition from being children to being adults and guiding them through the process of taking responsibility for their own decisions.
Having a high level of engagement from tutees, which he attributes to organising regular meetings with a clear agenda that students can quickly identify as useful. Students coming to recognise that reflection is useful and leads to good results.
Taking the tutor/tutee relationship seriously as key to promoting attendance, even among those students who initially seem reluctant to engage.
Taking a structured approach to every meeting, covering: academic progress; life strategy, i.e discussing a post-University plan; whether the tutee is ‘happy in the moment’, i.e their personal wellbeing.
Understanding that it is important to know your limits as a Personal Tutor, and when to ask for help or guide a tutee towards another support service.
Feeling well supported by his Senior Tutor and the institution generally – and appreciating that the personal tutorial system seems to have a high profile at the University, in recognition of the increasing expectations of its students.

Martha-Marie Kleinhans - Reading

A Faculty Director of Teaching & Learning with many years’ experience as a personal tutor, who believes more could be done at local level to recognise the contribution of committed Personal Tutors.

Martha-Marie talks about:

Trust and commitment as the cornerstones of the tutor/tutee relationship; trust being important to promote sharing of information and building the relationship; commitment on both sides to promoting a successful learning experience.
The importance of recognizing that while tutors should not ‘hold their hand’ though the university experience, students do not enter university as independent learners and adults, and so need to be guided towards this independence.
Her perception that while the institution has a strong commitment to personal tutoring, the support mechanism on the ground does not value the role as much as it should in terms of workload models etc; that heads of School and Faculty should have the ability to recognise the commitment of individual tutors – whose contributions to teaching and learning often get missed because it is just ‘part of the day job’.
That not everyone is suited to being a Personal Tutor, and mechanisms should be in place at School level to be able to decide who should and shouldn’t perform this role, as it is to the detriment of the student to be assigned to a member of staff ill-suited to it.

Jan Huyton – UWIC

PDP and Personal Tutoring Coordinator for the School of Education at UWIC, who expresses reservations about maintaining consistency within one-to-one tutorials and believes students might be better served addressing their problems through collective support activities.

Jan talks about:

Her research involving 10 Personal Tutors from across the UK revealing that personal tutoring can be a very solitary and isolating experience, where tutors lack reference points for practice and often struggle to know whether they are doing the right thing.
The ethics of different approaches – how some tutors prefer and open door policy, as they feel guilty if they don’t see students on demand, but then feel overwhelmed; other tutors use email as a form of triage to assess whether a particular problem warrants a face-to-face meeting; her personal preference for an appointment system as the fairest way to ensure every tutee gets a chance to see her.
Feeling the best way to create even provision for students is for course teams to meet regularly to discuss policy and practice, thus ensuring all staff take fair share of personal tutoring and operate within similar boundaries and practice ethos.
Her view that if students were able to answer their support needs via collective peer processes, such as peer support groups and group tutorials, there may be less need for personal tutorial meetings – which should move towards developmental work and away from a deficit model whereby tutors respond to student problems on demand.

Jo Peat – Roehampton

Senior lecturer in Learning and Teaching in Higher Education and Co-ordinator of the RU Cert LTHE at Roehampton University, who does not currently have personal tutoring responsibilities, but has many years’ experience as a Personal Tutor and has enjoyed the role and believes it is essential for monitoring students’ performance and progression.

Jo talks about:

Finding it difficult to separate the pastoral side of personal tutoring from the academic side, as pastoral issues tend to impact so significantly on students’ academic studies and she is uncomfortable in passing a student who has come to her for help with a personal issue on to a welfare officer, or similar.
Identifying the keys to a successful tutor/tutee relationship as availability and empathy; acknowledging that availability is a particular bugbear for staff and students alike, as students can have unrealistic expectations of when staff should be free to see them, which can be problematic for tutors who are keen to show willingness to engage with their tutees.
Her institution having relatively high numbers of students who might need extra support in balancing personal and academic pressures, such as students who have parental or caring responsibilities, or first generation students whose families have little or no insight into university life and academic study.
Feeling the role of Personal Tutor is supported and valued at and by her institution, with the university realising staff are giving a lot of their time to supporting students; and that tutees alsovalue having a named person to go to for help – an observation that is backed-up by recent research she has conducted which indicated the majority of students at the university do engage with their Personal Tutors.