Dedicated staff in Kent Law School’s Skills Hub and Student Advice Office have been recognised for their provision of outstanding learning support to law students in the annual University Teaching Prizes .
Both teams have been awarded a £1,000 Barbara Morris Prize for work which has been deemed to demonstrate excellent practice and which has been shown to enhance the student experience at Kent.
The School’s Skills Hub team, comprised of Law School graduates Callum Borg, Jonjo Brady and Katia Neofytou (pictured above), work in collaboration with Skills Hub Director Dr Kirsty Horsey (Senior Lecturer) and Ben Watson (former Law Librarian and currently Accessible Information Project Lead with Student Support) to provide practical guidance and tailored support to law students. Support is delivered online (through a ‘virtual skills hub’) and in-person from an office based in Eliot College. The Skills Hub also has an active presence on Facebook and Twitter. The team monitors common student concerns throughout the year and feeds this back to other support services as well as to teaching staff responsible for module planning and design.
Last year, the Skills Hub team received a formal commendation from the University for the value of its work supporting students and this year the team has been praised by the judges for the innovative, “interprofessional and comprehensive learning support” it provides specifically for law students.
Skills Hub Director Dr Horsey said: ‘Our team works hard to respond to the individual needs of our students who arrive highly differentiated by previous educational experience. It’s extremely gratifying to see their work being rewarded and to see the hugely positive impact the Skills Hub continues to make to the student experience at the Law School.’
The School’s Student Advice Office is staffed by two Student Advisers, Hattie Peacocke and Dr Paul Hubert, along with two members of professional service staff, Joanne Harvey and Jude O’Connor (pictured above). Together, the team works closely with academic staff to monitor attendance and academic progress and to provide confidential and personal academic support to law students. Students come to the Advice Office requesting support with issues such as: health and personal problems affecting academic work; submission of concessions; selection of courses and modules; accommodation issues; money problems and finance issues; disability issues; general study concerns; and general careers advice and personal development. Students can drop in to the office in Eliot Extension or make an appointment via email: lawadviser@kent.ac.uk or by telephone: 01227 824373.
Earlier this year, Student Adviser Hattie Peacocke was named ‘Best Academic Adviser’ in the Kent Union Teaching Awards 2016.
Both the Skills Hub, first launched in 2014, and the Student Advice Office form part of a comprehensive support system for law students that also includes Academic Advisers, module convenors, student mentors, academic peer mentors, Westlaw and LexisLibrary representatives, the Value programme, an annual revision conference, and the School’s Employability Officer. Both teams also facilitate links to initiatives run by the University including the Unit for the Enhancement of Learning and Teaching (UELT) and the Student Learning Advisory Service (SLAS).
Head of Kent Law School Professor Toni Williams said: ‘The staff in both teams make an outstanding contribution to the student experience at the Law School and are all dedicated, professional, experienced and empathetic. They support a large and diverse student body that has a broad range of distinctive needs, many of which are specific to the study of law and thus require specialist subject expertise as well as strong student support skills. We are delighted that their work has been recognised by the University in this way.’
The teams will be presented with their prizes by University Vice-Chancellor Professor Dame Julia Goodfellow at a lunchtime awards ceremony on Wednesday 5 October.