Boost your wellbeing this Summer

Some ideas for boosting your mental health and making the most of this time, wherever you find yourself this summer.

Connect with others – reach out to friends and family. Plan when you can next meet up, so you have something to look forward to. If you’re staying on campus, check out the the Student Support and Wellbeing events calendar for ways to meet new people such as the Walking Buddy and Just Coffee initiatives. Kent Union’s Postgrad Summer programme offers lots of social events and upskilling opportunities, both online and on campus.
Get out in nature – spending time in nature can have huge benefits for our mental health. If you’re at Medway, the Rochester Lawn has benches, a covered area and a trail gym for you to explore. Based at Canterbury? Check out the new Canterbury Wellbeing Map and discover more places to relax and unwind. We’re super lucky to have the Kent Community Oasis Garden at our Canterbury campus (located at the end of Park Wood).Join students, staff and members of the community for relaxed gardening sessions throughout the summer – check out the calendar or follow the KentCOG on Instagram for more details.
Caring responsibilities – Are you a student or staff member trying to juggle childcare over the vacation? Check out Kent Sport’s children’s holiday camps with discounts for Kent staff and students. Everyone with a Kent email address can also access Togetherall, a free online mental health platform where you can join discussions and get support on being a caregiver, whether for elderly relatives, children or disabled people.
Exercise regularly – exercise is a great way to let go of frustrations and improve your mood as well as increase your fitness. Check out Kent Sport’s campus routes, to guide you through campus, or you might consider using the gym over the summer break, going to fitness classes, booking in for a fitness appointments or using the Kent Sports Clinic – all available at Kent Sport throughout vacation.
Get enough sleep – sleep is vital to allow both your body and mind to recharge. If you struggle with your sleep, check out this free online Togetherall course: How to Improve Your Sleep.
Relaxing reading –Whether you are able to get away this summer or enjoying a staycation, staff at the Drill Hall and Templeman libraries have shared some books they have enjoyed recently. You can check out the recommendations virtually on our summer reads reading list online and via the physical displays at both the Templeman and Drill Hall libraries from 5 July 2022.
Eat well and stay hydrated – we all know that eating well and drinking plenty of water is good for us, but we often forget just much it can affect our mood. Check out the Blurt foundation’s blogpost about foods that boost mood and energy.

Student Support and Wellbeing continues to operate throughout vacation

Remember that all of our disability, autism, specific learning difficulties and mental health support teams are working throughout the summer, so you can still contact us to book appointments. Follow @UniKentSSW on Instagram for tips and advice on staying well and connected all summer.

The Mental Health Team consists of Mental Health Advisers, Counsellors and Student Mentors. Mental Health Advisers are specialist practitioners who can offer mental health advice and support. They can provide short term focused interventions to promote wellbeing and support students to develop coping strategies and help put in place an ILP or ‘inclusive learning plan’ if required. We also have a free confidential Counselling service for all Kent students, offering a safe space to those experiencing problems such as anxiety, depressed feelings, and emotional difficulties that may or may not be connected to student life.

Written by Miriam Sandiford and Natalia Crisanti, staff, on 05.05.22; amended 01.07.22

Check out further articles on Support and Wellbeing.

Introducing CricketZone children’s holiday camp!

We’re pleased to announce our brand new children’s sports camp, CricketZone coming this August!

In partnership with Kent Cricket, CricketZone provides a week of professionally-led softball cricket coaching, delivered by qualified and DBS-checked coaches.

This new camp is aimed at children 5 to 12 years old who are new to cricket or keen to gain experience through our inclusive camp. Children will have daily skills sessions based on introductory level softball cricket.

Dates and times

CricketZone 2022 runs from Monday 22 to Friday 26 August.
You can drop your children off from 8.30 and pick up at 15.00.
We also offer a late pick-up option from 15.00 to 17.00.

How to book

Online booking for CricketZone 2022 is now open.
Please ensure you complete a form for each child you wish to book on CricketZone.
Booking and payment can be completed online.

Prices

For University of Kent staff:

One day £30 per child
One week (five days) £125 per child

For members of the public:

One day £35 per child
One week (five days) £150 per child

Late pick-up (15.00 to 17.00)

Our late pick-up option includes fun and engaging activities tailored to the location, such as table tennis, table football, new age kurling, bowls, speed stacks, twister, board games, and creative drawing.
£10 per child per day

More information

If you have any questions about our holiday camps, or if you would like to be added to the mailing list for future camps, please email sportsdevelopment@kent.ac.uk or call 01227 816391.

KentVision Project Update

Since the launch of KentVision last year, we have been engaging with diverse stakeholder groups across the University to determine the schedule for its immediate and future functionality development and release. The KentVision Board has established six Functional Area Working Groups to enable and assess feedback from a variety of individuals and teams across the University. This will enable us to best prioritise future improvements to the system.

Functional Group members represent a mixture of colleagues from Divisions, professional services and central teams and are split across the following operational areas:

Statutory and Core student record
Admissions, Clearing and Recruitment
Assessment
Finance
PGR
Student Activity and Experience

The proposed order of delivery has been assessed against the academic calendar and our statutory requirements. Further work will be undertaken following the completion of deliverables committed for August 2022 to strengthen and refine the delivery estimating and create a schedule for delivery into 2023.

What will be delivered by August 2022?

We have committed to introduce improved processes and functionality by August 2022. This will improve the experience for both staff and students. Some examples of this include:

New automated communications for student immigration compliance will help us stay in touch with the relevant students and ensure we comply with government regulations.
We are improving enrolment and re-registration processes to ensure accurate collection for Data Futures – improving data compliance and the student experience.
Improved usability of the right to study screen in enrolment ensuring that students are able to progress through enrolment and re-registration in a timely manner, helping us comply with Home Office rules.
We will continue to improve the results release process and result letters ensuring they are clear and meet the needs of our students for the re-sit period.
Enhanced functionality including changes to improve progression/award rules and exam board reporting particularly for the re-sit period. Post-exam board functionality will allow chairs actions to be recorded and CSAO will be automatically notified – removing administration burden and preventing unnecessary communications.
Full support for the clearing processes, ensuring permissions are allocated known issues are resolved, and underlying processes for the new telephone offers initiatives are enabled.
Development of the integration between KentVision and the new CRM.
A new process to roll forward scholarship fund reference data to the next academic year.
Improvements to the student financial registration processes – ensuring facilitation of student engagement and timely addition of payment information.

Next Steps?

Technology and process improvements for statutory data compliance and PGR student management areas are to continue with deployments scheduled through July and August. Along with planning for the autumn – the new academic year and admissions cycle.
A timeline for delivery from September 2022 of the far-ranging and numerous improvements will be shared at the end of August.
Detailed business readiness activities, including transition plans and training and communication.
Continuous updates on how our improvements, plans and communications are informed by feedback from our students and staff.

Garden to Gulbenkian in Under 5 Minutes

For the first time ever, the catering department has been able to purchase fresh produce from the Kent Community Oasis Garden (KentCOG).

Several crates of organic Swiss chard made their way to the Gulbenkian Arts Centre Café for Senior Chef, James Argent-Paine, to use in his daily specials. James used his exceptional culinary skills to produce a delicious chard soup, and an equally tasty dish of fish cakes and stir-fried chard.

The chard travelled a total distance of 1.3 kilometres (a 3-minute drive, or 15-minute walk) from plot to plate, meaning the vegetable was not only fresh and delicious, but chock-full of vitamins and minerals.

Local produce is not only tastier and healthier, but it’s also better for the environment, as it eliminates the need for fuel-intensive transportation, excessive packaging, and unnecessary preservation methods.

The KentCOG team commented that it was “so wonderful to see the food grown by students, staff and community members making its way into campus meals!”

Typically, the fruits, vegetables, herbs, and flowers grown in the garden are available free of charge to volunteers, or by donation to visitors. This is the first time KentCOG has sold its produce at market value to another commercial service.

This culinary collaboration is an exciting step towards a more sustainable future at Kent.

About Kent Community Oasis Garden

Launched in September 2018, the Kent Community Oasis Garden is a multiuse space for students, staff, and the local community run in partnership with East Kent Mind. The garden provides a space for people to grow food, learn new skills, and enjoy some peace and quiet.

The garden is a pesticide free space, adopting permaculture principles and building hibernacula to look after the neighbouring creepy crawlies.

The Community Oasis Garden runs lots of different activities including ecotherapy sessions, insect talks, craft sessions, and foraging workshops.

For more information about the Kent Community Oasis Garden, please visit the Kent COG website.

Catering wins a number of awards!

This has been very successful time for Kent’s Catering Team. Not only have they won the highly sought-after Street Food Award at the 2022 U Dine Awards. But 11 of their food outlets have been presented with an Elite Food Hygiene Award too!

Here’s some more detail about each of these fantastic achievements from our catering team:

Street Food Award at U Dine Awards 2022

The awards, held at the University of Birmingham on Thursday 16 June, celebrate and recognise excellence across the university hospitality sector and are supported by the Institute of Hospitality (IoH). The awards were hosted by celebrity chef Brian Turner CBE.

The Street Food Award is an accolade which recognises on-trend, innovative street food operators. The University of Kent was presented with the award for their adaptable and dynamic street food van – The Street Kitchen.

Since its launch, The Street Kitchen has become a much-loved food destination amongst staff and students, serving delicious, grab-and-go meals at low-cost prices. The menu changes every week, meaning customers never grow bored of eating the same dishes week in week out.

Over the years, The Street Kitchen has cooked up a variety of dishes from across the globe, including South African bunny chow, Jamaican jerk chicken, Italian arancini balls, and Korean chicken burgers.

The Street Kitchen team work incredibly hard to appeal to the student demographic, keep on top of food trends, produce exciting plant-based options, and provide customers with a mouth-watering street food experience.

Keith Williams, Head of Trading, said: “It’s fantastic the University of Kent has won this award, and quite an achievement given the calibre of the competition. It’s brilliant to see the hard work, creativity, and innovation from Street Kitchen chef, Sam Ranger, recognised by the sector.

Sam will join other U Dine award winners on a 3-day insight tour into the hidden gems of Tuscany and its regional cuisine. Expect to see some incredible Italian dishes on the Street Kitchen’s menu soon!”

The three other shortlisted contenders for the Street Food Award included Newcastle University, The University of Leeds, and The University of Nottingham.

Elite Food Hygiene Awards

11 of Kent’s food outlets have been presented with an Elite Food Hygiene Award.

Scores on the Doors hands out ‘Elite’ awards to businesses who have demonstrated real consistency and care in the field of food hygiene – achieving three consecutive five-star ratings for ‘very good’ food hygiene.

The Scores on the Doors Food Hygiene Rating System helps customers choose where to eat or shop by providing clear information about a businesses’ hygiene standards.

Food Hygiene Ratings are determined at routine inspections carried out by Environmental Health Officers from the local council. The hygiene standards found on these inspections are rated to show how closely the business is meeting the requirements of food hygiene law.

Businesses who have achieved ‘Elite’ status have maintained years of exemplary hygiene standards, ensuring food is properly handled, kitchen and dining areas are clean, and food safety records are kept up to date.

David Jordan, Safety and Compliance Adviser, proudly presented Elite Food Hygiene Awards to the following outlets:

Rutherford Dining Hall
Bag It
Create Café
The Street Kitchen
Hut 8
Origins
Darwin Kitchen
Gulbenkian Café
J’s Tea Bar
Dolche Vita
Mungo’s

David Jordan said, “To achieve Elite hygiene status in 11 of our catering outlets has been one of the proudest moments of my career. Over 72% of UK businesses hold a five-star hygiene rating, but only 12% have been presented with an Elite Food Hygiene Award.”

It can take more than four years to build up three sets of consecutive five-star hygiene ratings. The catering team are hopeful that both K-Bar and Sibson Café will achieve Elite status when they receive enough inspections to be eligible. Both outlets currently hold two consecutive five-star hygiene rating awards.

LSSJ Research Festival – 7th and 8th July 2022

The Division for the study of Law, Society and Social Justice (LSSJ) Research Festival will be taking place in July.

When

Thursday 7 July 2022 in Medway from 14.00 – 18.00 in the Rochester Boardroom
Friday 8 July 2022 in Canterbury from 9.15 – 18.00 in Darwin Conference Suite

The content is primarily internally facing but colleagues from across the division and the wider University are warmly invited to join us at either or both campuses. Staff expenses for travel between the Canterbury and Medway campuses will be reimbursed.

You are welcome to join us for all or part of the day. To register please visit the Eventbrite website.

Draft Medway Programme:

Rochester Boardroom, Rochester Building

14.00 – 14.05: Welcome and Introduction, Dawn Lyon, Director of Research and Innovation, LSSJ and Kate Ludlow, Research and Innovation Manager, LSSJ

14.05 – 15.20: Panel: Migration and movement, with Tracee Green / Emma Soutar (CCP), Aravinda Kosaraju (KLS), Rachel Larkin, Bridget Ng’andu (SSPSSR), and Jo Warner (Chair, SSPSSR)

15.20 – 15.40: Tea and Coffee

15.40 – 17.00: Workshop: Body Mapping, led by Tara Young

17.00 – 18.00: Drinks (location TBC)

Draft Canterbury Programme:

Darwin Conference Suite, Darwin College

09.15 – 09.30: Welcome and Introduction, Dawn Lyon, Director of Research and Innovation, LSSJ and Kate Ludlow, Research and Innovation Manager, LSSJ

09.30 – 11.00: Panel: Childhood and Civil Society with Ellie Jupp, Emily Lau and Ali Body (SSPSSR), Melissa Nolas (Goldsmiths)

11.00 – 11.20: Tea and Coffee

11.20 – 12.00: Research Choices and Journeys with Miri Song (SSPSSR), and Lydia Hayes (KLS)

12.00 – 14.00: Lunch with parallel sessions

Research Exchange / Walking and Talking / PGR Speed Dating / PGR Posters / Sound Workshop / Craftivism Workshop / Sensory Research (smell/touch stall!)

14.00 – 15.15: Collaborative research: partnerships and co-production with Chrissie Rogers, Vivi Triantafyllopoulou and Serena Tomlinson (Tizard), Amanda Bates (CHSS), Darren Weir (KLS) Helen Brooks (Arts) and others TBC

15.15 – 15.35: Tea and Coffee

15.35 – 17.15: ECR Spotlights with Asta Zokaityte, Clare Williams, Flora Renz and Ida Petretta (KLS), Kayla Wicks (SSPSSR) and Jolie Keemink (PSSRU)

Meet the Author with Beth Breeze, Heejung Chung, Carolyn Pedwell (SSPSSR), and Erika Rackley, Eleanor Curran, Sheona York (KLS)

17.15 – 18.00: Drinks, Darwin Conference Suite

Postgraduate Innovation Challenge Day: Sustainability and the Margate Soul Festival

All postgraduate students are warmly invited to take part in an Innovation Challenge Day, held in partnership with Olby’s Creative Hub Margate, organisers of the annual Margate Soul Festival.

Thursday 7 July 2022, 9.15 – 17.00.
Cornwallis East Seminar Room 5 (CESR5)

The challenge

All over the world, festivals, both large and small, are growing conscious of their ecological footprint. So far, over 40 U.K. festivals have pledged to form a more sustainable future by halving their emissions and obtaining 50% recycling rates by 2025.

The Margate Soul Festival aims to join this group, by reducing the environmental impact of its annual weekend event which attracts over 20,000 music fans per day over three days in a regenerated Margate town centre.

Working in small, interdisciplinary teams, we challenge you to come up with creative and practical solutions to helping the Margate Soul Festival on its pathway to sustainability.

Increase your problem-solving and team-working skills
Help a local business to solve a real-world challenge
Add the IBM Enterprise Design Thinking Practitioner badge to your CV
Gain 15 Employability Points
Network over a free lunch and refreshments

The day has been organised by Research and Innovation Services, Knowledge Exchange and Innovation Department at the University of Kent

Register online at PG Innovation Challenge Day: Making Margate Soul Festival more Sustainable Tickets, Thursday 7 Jul 2022 at 09.15 | Eventbrite

How to view your exam results

When will my results be available?

2022 results release dates can be found on the Student Administration website. You will be contacted via your University of Kent email address when your results are available.

How do I view my results?

Please see our video and text guidance on how to view your results.

What do I do if I think there is an error with my results?

If you believe that there is an error with your results, please contact your Division within 5 working days of receipt of results.

Academic appeals

We strongly encourage you to contact your Division in the first instance to informally resolve any queries before entering the formal appeals process. Please contact your Division within 5 working days of receipt of results or a decision to ensure that the informal process can be completed within the 15 working day deadline to submit a formal appeal.

Full information, including FAQs and contact details, can be found on the academic appeals webpage.

In Conversation with Lemn Sissay OBE

Kent’s commitment against sexual violence: progress in the last year

A review of our campaigns, actions and pledges to foster a culture of consent and respect that’s University wide and palpable for students, staff and visitors.

As the conversation on sexual violence gets louder in society, we at the University of Kent have been working hard so that our university campuses stay positive and safe places. Our ongoing commitment to keep the members of our community safe became more visible this past academic year as we launched our new ‘Consent. Get it. Full Stop.‘ campaign to cultivate and strengthen our awareness and understanding of consent and to continue working to prevent harassment and sexual misconduct from taking place within our community. We have also worked on promoting the specialist support we have available in recognition of the difficulties faced by victim-survivors, and made changes to our policies, procedures and guidance documents to address concerns that were voiced to us by students and staff.

Five concepts were at the heart of this year’s work in tackling sexual misconduct and keeping our campuses safe: Transparency, Preventing, Reporting, Responding and Supporting. As the academic year comes to an end, we want to make good on the first of these – transparency – by highlighting some of our top achievements in each of these areas.

Prevention – Everyone at the university matters when it comes to tackling unacceptable behaviours.

We launched a university-wide campaign entitled ‘Consent. Get it. Full stop.’ which has a strong presence on social media and our webpages, with clear and thought-provoking messages about consent and healthy relationships. As part of this campaign we ran a number of initiatives including the ‘Celebrating Consent Day’ event, where we took the opportunity to promote policies, procedures, and support available.
This year we have seen senior leaders make a clearer and more visible commitment to tackle sexual misconduct. In November, Deputy Vice-Chancellor Professor Richard Reece called for community-wide reflection and discussion in the form of an all-student email released on International Day of Elimination of Violence Against Women and Girls.
A focus group entitled ‘Safety on Campus’ has been created. This groups exists as a collaboration between staff and students including representatives from Respect the No, Women’s Network, BAME Network, Disability Network, LGBTQIA+ Network, and UN Women UK Kent Society, to name a few, as well as individual students. In this forum, students can openly discuss concerns about safety on and off campus, providing a clear line of communication between students and the University. We have discussed all initiatives and campaigns relating to sexual misconduct within this forum, giving students the opportunity to provide feedback and shape our work in this area.

Responding – We want everyone to know what to do and where to go.

We have created and circulated new guidance documents (in accessible formats) to students and staff on what to do if they: 1. have experienced sexual misconduct, 2. are accused of an incident and 3. if, as a member of staff, an incident is disclosed to them. A staff facing page where staff can find more information about how to respond to disclosures, how to take part in the campaign and the training available to them as all so been created and can be found on Staff Guide.
The University has recruited a student intern as a Campaign and Project Assistant which provided a stronger link to our student body, ensuring that student voice and collaboration with students are kept at the forefront of all our work in this area. This role has brought helped bridge gaps between staff working in this area and the student body and will be in place for the next academic year as well to keep this collaboration going.
Sexual misconduct became a permanent feature on the agenda of our Education and Student Experience Board to ensure that continued progress is regularly reviewed.
We have arranged for multiple opportunities for staff training:
- The Specialist Wellbeing Manager provided specific training to Sexual Assault Responders – a cohort of substantive staff that are trained to respond out of hours to students disclosing sexual violence.
- A new e-learning module entitled ‘Responding to Student Disclosures of Sexual Misconduct’ is now available for all staff to complete.
- Front line staff have been provided with the opportunity to attend specialist training from Protection Against Stalking (PAS).
- All Student Conduct and Complaints Officers have been provided with training from Lime Culture in conducting trauma informed investigations.

Reporting – We want our students’ voices to be heard.

We have introduced a new reporting tool, Report and Support. This platform allows for support articles to be made available to students with information on University of Kent procedures and how to access support internally and externally. The data gathered will enable us to identifying potential trends and/or areas of concern, to enable a tailored response. Report and Support will also enable us to increase our commitment to transparency as we plan to publish anonymised data gathered over the year.
A new Student Conduct and Complaints (SCCO) webpage has been created. This page provides information and guidance on how to submit a formal report to the University, and regulation documents for students to look at.
Our non-academic disciplinary regulations have been updated to include a specific appendix focused upon disclosures and investigation of Sexual Misconduct.

Supporting – We are here to support you. We want you to know the support we offer and how you can access it.

We have continued to promote the support available to students from within the university. This includes support from the Specialist Wellbeing Manager and Sexual Assault Responders (SARs) who provide round the clock practical and emotional support to student disclosing sexual misconduct.
We have done substantial work to increase transparency in relation to our processes. This includes the creation of a number of accessible visual guides relating to seeking support and reporting processes.
Throughout the year we have placed strong emphasis on the promotion of the support available to students. We have done this through our consent campaign, social media, posters around campus, podcast episodes, and blog articles.
With the introduction of Report and Support we ensure that students are able to access support in a timely manner. Students who choose to report anonymously still receive signposting information to enable them to access external support, should they prefer.

After such an eventful year, we at Kent can proudly say that as a community we have made substantial progress in a short time, surpassing in many aspects the Office for Students (OfS) statement of expectations. Still, we recognise that there is a long way to go and make meaningful, positive and long-lasting change in our community; as a University, we are committed on continuing this work with the help of both staff and students, to aim for a safe, respectful and supportive place for us to study, work and socialise.

Stay up-to-date as Kent walks the walk on this issue by following #ConsentGetIt on social media, and check out other articles on Consent.

Written by Student Services, 20.06.22

If you’d like to comment on or contribute to a podcast or article for Student Services, email us at StudentServicesWeb@kent.ac.uk.