Department & course representatives

Academic representation is a partnership between the Student Unions and University departments. Together, we aim to ensure that students and learners contribute directly to the processes of reviewing, maintaining and enhancing the quality of the academic experience here.

You can go to your academic Representatives with any feedback about best practice, concerns or suggestions about how the department or aspects of your programme are run.

There are three types of academic Representatives:

 

You can apply to be a Department or Course Representative if you’d like to represent the views of your fellow students and learners and have a say in how your programme is run. These are delivered by the Student Unions in collaboration with the department.

 

Department and Course Representatives are also members of the Board of Studies, which is the main decision-making body within the Department. Representatives are invited to attend the Board of Studies meeting each term. Course Representatives are also responsible for ensuring that students and learners are properly represented in regular monitoring of quality within the Department, including the ‘Annual Programme Review’ and ‘Periodic Review’ every 5-6 years.

 

For Department Academic Representative information visit our Student and learner Representation webpages.

 

Student-Staff Forums are informal meetings which are arranged for all Department and course Representatives to meet to raise issues with members of staff within the Department whose roles involve supporting the student and learner experience and maintaining the quality of the teaching and learning provision. The Forums have been divided into pre-registration and postgraduate groups to enable issues relevant to different students and learners to be raised.

 

If issues are relevant to all students and/or learners then they can be brought to the Board of Studies meeting for wider discussion. The Student-Staff Forums report to the Board of Studies to ensure that concerns are minuted and responded to appropriately. In response to the University requirements regarding the operation of Student-Staff Forums, minutes from the pre-registration and postgraduate Student-Staff Forums are received by the Departmental Board of Studies and copies of the minutes are forwarded to the Student Unions and the University Academic Support Office at the end of each academic year.

 

All of our Department and Course Representatives are valued by the Department and we therefore aim to support you to perform your role fully. If you are attending a committee meeting as a Department or Course Representative, you can count this time as practice hours provided that you would otherwise have been in practice at the time. You cannot count attending meetings as practice hours if you would otherwise have been in a theory session or undertaking private study at the time. Please note that only the time spent in the meeting should be counted and not time spent travelling. The minutes of the meeting will demonstrate that you were present. You should identify how attendance at a meeting might relate to a practice learning outcome or proficiency and include evidence of this in your eMORA. Your programme leader will be able to advise whether attendance at a specific meeting can be counted as practice hours.

 

An academic representative notice board is also located in the Student Services resource area.

 

All student and learner representatives will be given regular departmental support and resources to support their role from a named contact within the Student Services team. This is provided during the recruitment process, induction and through the term of each role.  Please contact Student Services for more information.