Your personal supervisor

You will be allocated a supervisor who is a member of staff in the Department. Your supervisor is allocated to you when you arrive and is there to help and advise you on all aspects of life at University. Supervisors have three principle functions:

• to provide advice on and support for your academic progress;

• to support your personal development and acquisition of academic and employability skills;

• to provide general pastoral guidance, assisting you to identify appropriate specialist support should you require it.

You will meet your supervisor a minimum of once per semester to discuss your academic progress and to check all is well with you and your studies. Your supervisor will encourage you to develop your academic and personal skills and can also act as a referee for any applications you might make in the future.

They can advise what to do if things go wrong and refer you to the right people in the University for help with more personal matters.

More information on the role of the supervisor is available on the website.

Meeting with your supervisor

It is primarily your responsibility to book and attend appointments with your supervisor, and it is better to arrange these in advance either by telephone or email. These meetings may take place online (via e.g. Zoom or Google Hangouts) or in person, in line with University guidance. If you are unable to attend a supervisory meeting you should make reasonable attempts to contact your supervisor and to re-arrange the meeting. Records of your meeting will be kept by your supervisor – these may be accessed by other staff if necessary, for example, for continuity purposes if you change supervisor.

Procedure for changing your supervisor

Ideally, you should have the same supervisor throughout your time here but, if your supervisor is away for an extended period, you will be allocated a different supervisor. 

Occasionally, the supportive relationship that we hope will develop fails to do so. You are encouraged to discuss any difficulties with your supervisor to try to resolve these. However, if you find that you cannot communicate well with your supervisor, for whatever reason, then talk to the Chair of the Board of Studies, or if you prefer, contact one of the other support services. Undergraduate students can change supervisor without giving a reason.

Module leader

The module leader is responsible for co-ordinating module-specific learning activities and the provision of academic support and guidance regarding the module assessments. They are also responsible (along with members of the module team) for marking module assessments.