Introductory School Representation Training

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Introductory School Representation Training

Introduction

Welcome to the 2016 School Representation Introductory Training workshop. Dundee University Students’ Association (DUSA) would like to congratulate you on becoming a student representative and wish you the best of luck for the year ahead.

Both DUSA and the University of Dundee (UoD) are committed to making sure students have a strong voice at the institution and have the ability to influence and improve their learning experience. Key to this is our representation system and you have the chance to make a big contribution this year.

This training workshop is designed to give you the foundational skills and knowledge to carry out your main tasks as a School Representative. The training will cover a variety of areas such as the:

-Representation system

-Feedback

-Meetings etc.

Also don’t think this is all the support you will be given. You are part of a large network of student representatives from your fellow Class Reps, Associate Presidents, School Presidents and DUSA. This network will be there to help you achieve your goals.

Enjoy the training and your time as a representative.

You’re Experience

As a “student rep”, much of your role will be to assess and understand your fellow students learning experience; is it good or bad, are you receiving a high standard of education and are you getting the support and resources you need to achieve your educational goals?

A good place to start is thinking about your own learning experience. If you have just arrived at the University, you might not have a lot of knowledge of your courseand how it will be taught at this moment in time; however, you can think about what you know already from school or from another learning environment like a sports/activity course. Discuss in your group a time when you had a “great learning experience” and a “bad learning experience”:

Notes:

Student Feedback

DUSA and UoD provide a lot of opportunities for students to feedback on their learning experience. The key ones are:

Informal Feedback - this includes students and student reps ability to speak to staff directly about positive and negative aspects of their course throughout the year;

Module Survey – Module leaders will undertake regular surveys seeking student views on their module experience;

National Student Surveys – this includes National Student Survey which fourth years are asked to complete and others such as the International Student Barometer.

Programme Reviews – the University runs a series of annual and periodic programme reviews. DUSA Executive members join a “Review Board” which will interview a representative sample of students and members of SSLC’s will be included.

Student Staff Liaison Committees – this is where student reps and staff will come together regularly to review feedback and discuss solutions. Student reps will be expected to attend and contribute to them.

4 key stages: Feedback Loop

Having astrong sense of what you should be experiencing in your learning and knowing how to inform the teaching staff of issues and concerns is really important to improving your course.Being a representative in an academic School has four key stages:

Stage 1 – It’s vital that student reps make their classmates aware of who they are and how they can get in contact with them.

Stage 2 – At regular intervals a representative needs to speak to their fellow students and find out what’s happening. They need to collect that feedback and feed that back to fellow reps and staff.

Stage 3 – Student reps have the advantage of being students and have a good idea of what will improve things. A student rep is in a great position to advise School staff on how to make things better.

Stage 4 – Student reps are key in making sure students know what has/is happening. Feeding back to fellow classmates is vital.

This is often referred to as the “Feedback Loop” and your role is critical ingetting it right.

Representation Structure

As a “Rep” you are an important part of a big network of students who work with DUSA and UoD to make sure students can influence the development of their teaching and learning. The representation system is designed to allow each level of a School to receive student feedback.

Class Reps represent the module/programme level and they feed into their Associate Presidents who represent the academic disciplines (one Associate President per discipline). Associate Presidents work closely and support the work of the School President who is the lead representative in each of the Schools.

Though this outlines the basic structure there are some variations. Social Sciences for instance have three Co-Presidents who lead on the “themes” contained in the School. Each level needs to work with the other to ensure information is flowing back and forth.

There are a series of different committees which Reps are members of. Class Reps and Associate Presidents will mainly sit on the Student Staff Liaison Committee (SSLC) meetings with teaching staff and in some instances, colleagues from the Library and Learning Centre and other key departments. The SSLC’s feed into a School Board which the School President will attend with a DUSA Executive member. Were the SSLC will deal with positive and negative feedback in the classroom the School Board will mainly focus on wider School issues.

Each School Board also feeds into the University’s Learning and Teaching Committee which will then go onto Senate; the highest academic body at UoD.

Parallel to this DUSA runs the Student Representative Council (SRC) which is responsible for advising and directing the policy of the Students’ Association and each School President is a member of the SRC. The SRC is made up of elected students and the University management regularly attend meetings to get the SRC’s opinion on a host of topics.

Students can bring issues to the SRC through SRC Online and they can work with the group to bring about change on campus. The SRC is an influential body and if you have a problem that you cannot solve on your own, work with your fellow student reps to lobby the University for change.

Key Qualities

Understanding what your role is and how you fit into the structure is important but it is also essential that you think about what qualities you need to be effective. The role of a School representative requires you to be active and involved.

Work with your group and discuss what “qualities” you need to be an effective representative:

How are you going to do your job?

We have thought about the “qualities”a rep needs, now work in your group to think about how you are going to take these key tasks forward:

1)What’s the best way to let students know who you are?

2)At key intervals how are you going to collate their feedback?

3)Tell your fellow classmates what’s happening?

Student Learning Experience

The Student Learning Experience (SLE) is a tool developed by “Student Participation in Quality Scotland” (SPARQS) which is an organisation which supports Universities and Students’ Associations to get students involved in enhancing their learning.

The SLE will help you think about what to ask when you are looking for feedback from students. A list of questions has been provided for you in the appendix of this booklet.

Curriculum – asks you to think about the content of the course and how it is structured.

Learning resources – can be your textbooks to your access to computers.

Learning and Teaching Processes – is your learning accessible to all and is it the right teaching method for the subject?

Assessment and Feedback – it asks you to think about what feedback is given to you and how it is helping you improve. Also are the assessments the right kind for your course and are you getting time between them.

Student Progression and Achievement- this element asks you to find out how easy is it to progress through your course and can students evaluate their progression;

Guidance and Support – are your fellow students receiving support with their academic work is it clear where you go for advice?

Quality Enhancement and Assurance – this last element asks you to find out if students feel that the department is listening to their concerns and what improvements have been made.

Finding Solutions

One key stage we have not covered yet is developing solutions to the problems and issues you have been told about. As a student rep you are the expert in how to improve the learning experience and when you have collected your students’ feedback it is important that you work with students and staff to come up with answers. It is important though to remember, you might not know what’s best and don’t worry if you can’t find the best solution. That’s why working with staff and other students is vital.

A model you can use to help you come up with answers is to:

Cause – think about the underlying factors which are creating these problems; knowing where they are coming from can help you come up with effective answers.

Effect - understanding the negative or positive effect something is having will help you communicate it to decision makers and also help you understand if something is good or bad.

Solution – now you understand what it is your being asked to solve you can come up with your solution.

Effect – knowing what effect your solution will have will help you sell your idea and measure its impact.

It is really important that you use this process with others input. Work with your fellow students and reps to do this; don’t think you have to do it alone.

Working together come up with solutions to the issues you have been given:

ABCDE of Feedback

SPARQS has developed an approach which is called the: “ABCDE of effective feedback”. This will help you provide feedback in a way which will help you avoid conflict and aid creating good working relationships. It means that your feedback should be:

Accurate –your feedback should be based on evidence instead of a hunch or an opinion. If you can provide clear support for the position it will support your case. You can present this by saying:

“I have spoken to my class and (17/20) we agree that we need more practical work on …. This will help us …”

Balanced – the feedback should not always be negative, providing positive aspects are vital. You can present this by saying:

“The course materials are very helpful for the majority of the class but there are too many deadlines to close together and not enough time to revise.”

Constructive – this is where you can provide your solutions. Effective feedback also comes with effective answers. You can present this by saying:

“The class would like to see a review of the course as there is repetitive content between the modules. Would you be willing to do this?”

Depersonalised – keep the feedback about the issue not the person. Personal attacks will only lead to conflict. You can present this by saying:

“We discussed this and we believe that assessments are being returned to late for us to learn from our mistakes.”

Effective – The feedback needs to produce results. If nothing happens from it then you need to revise your approach and find a way forward. This is where other student reps can help.

Feed it back

Work with your group and look at the scenarios you have been given. You have the solutions and the evidence, how would you use the ABCD model to create statements to communicate it to staff?

Emails

You will probably send quite a few emails and effective email writing can be really helpful. There are some key techniques you can use:

Purpose: Know what the purpose of your email is. If you are not sure what you are asking for neither will the person you are writing too.

Stay on Track: Don’t add in unrelated information and try and say something in as few as words are possible.

Specific: Try and focus on one topic/issue per email; if there are lots of issues and information use the email to invite the person to a meeting where it can be discussed at length.

Benefit of doubt – If you get angry about something don’t let that cloud your approach. It’s ok to be firm but stay respectful. Also there might be a very good reason why something has happened that you’re not aware of.

Clarification – If you receive a reply that does not make sense to you, don’t be afraid to ask for clarification or more information.

Proof read – Make sure you review it before sending it.

Meetings

As a student rep you will be invited to attend or arrange quite a few meetings. Some of them will be formal and others less so but there are best practises that you can use in each one you have.

It’s important that you participate in the meetings and don’t let the opportunity pass you by. It’s always good to know when and where a meeting will be held but more importantly why it’s been arranged; what is its purpose.

When you attend a meeting know what you want to get out of it especially if you are feeding back on several issues. Have a clear idea of what result you want and how you want to get there.

Knowing who sits on a group or who will be attending the meeting is really important. This will help you build up positive relationships and know when and where is the best place to ask for something.

Meeting papers such as the agenda are very helpful and make sure you read and understand what is going to be discussed. Again ask for clarification if you are not sure. You should be able to ask for something to be added to the agenda if it is warranted. At an SSLC meeting for example you are there to specifically raise issues but if you are invited to another meeting you might want to ask for an item to be included. Take notes as well, this can be helpful for future discussions or feeding back to students.

It is really important that you don’t highjack a meeting or ambush a specific person or group. In the case of “high jacking” a meeting this might be that you bring something important up which hasn’t been agreed beforehand and take over the meeting with the one issue. Ambushing would be if someone comes to a meeting thinking it is about issue “A” then the person or group they are meeting changes it to a completely different subject and they are completely unprepared.

Bad behaviour like that can harm your working relationships with people and make it harder for things to happen. It is vital you remain respectful to people, even if you don’t agree. If you are getting nowhere then don’t get angry. Ask to meet the person or group after the meeting to discuss the issue further. Some student representatives are also tasked with chairing meetings. There are some helpful tips to help you “Chair”.

Know the remit of your group (what it’s there to do) and know the rules. Don’t be afraid to use the rules also. A good Chair creates an atmosphere were discussion is positive and going someplace. If anyone is stopping that from happening by breaking the rules, enforce them.

Make sure you know the topics on the agenda and the papers that have gone out. This will help you plan the meeting and look out for problems such as the meeting running over time.

As mentioned the Chair plays a role in creating the atmosphere of the group, so the way you act can affect everyone else in a positive and negative way. Be approachable and encouraging. This also links into being fair and keeping the meeting moving. If someone is speaking too much, stop them and let others have their say. If discussion is going around in circles put an end to it and move on.

Work in collaboration not in opposition with your fellow committee members. A good Chair helps conversation and the group dynamic develop, not hinder it.

Support Services

There is lots of support on campus to help you help your fellow students. As a School rep your main tasks are to deal with things that are affectinglearning and teaching, but students might ask for more personal help.

For academic issues you can speak to the Centre for the enhancement of Academic Skills, Teaching, Learning and Employability (CASTLE). CASTLE can help with academic skills, numeracy and digital literacy. There is also the Careers Service on campus that can provide you advice, guidance and also specific career modules.

For more personal problems UoD also has Student Services which is dedicated to aiding students in need. You can find out more at the “Enquiry Centre” which you can find at the Union building.