Join us on Wednesday 10 April at the Canterbury campus to find out why understanding productivity is vital for business and what can we can do to improve it.

At this event, businesses and Kent staff will have the opportunity to be involved in shaping ideas and responses to the productivity challenges businesses are facing. Along with university experts on productivity and innovation, the event will hear from companies including Viridor and AbBaltis Ltd, as well as the Chief Executive of the Kent Invicta Chamber of Commerce and the Head of the Kent and Medway Growth Hub.

The event’s keynote speaker, Ralph Meyer, Global Customer Success Manager for LinkedIn, will outline why data is crucial to an understanding of how organisations can improve productivity.

One-to-one meetings with our business relationship team and advice on funding for innovation and improving productivity will be available to all businesses who book in advance. Lunch and refreshments will be provided.

To reserve your place at our annual showcase event please visit the Eventbrite booking page.

Final year students Elise McMellin and Eva Rahman, from the Department of English Language and Linguistics, and Alex Davies, from the Department of Classical and Archaeological Studies, were recognised at a recent awards ceremony for their participation in the Academic Peer Mentoring Scheme this year.

The APM scheme is a chance for second and third year students to mentor first years in their subjects. This can be of great benefit to any first year struggling with their modules and getting to grips with a new subject, but can also be the difference between a 2:1 and a First. Alex Davis, a final year student and mentor for CLAS, gave a speech at the event about her positive experiences with the scheme, and spoke about how being a mentor was beneficial for her own studies as well.

Alex Davis said: ‘Before each meeting I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to help my mentees, but having met with them and talked through various things they were concerned about, I was happy to realise that I could make a genuine difference! Also, helping them refocused me on my own studies and reminded me how much I had learned during these three years.’

The scheme has been a great success this year and we are very grateful to all our Academic Peer Mentors for taking part!

In the latest episode of the Nostalgia podcast series, Dr Chris Deacy, Reader in Theology and Religious Studies in the Department of Religious Studies, speaks to Jo Pearsall, Deputy Secretary of Council and the Court at the University, and an alumna of the School of History.

Jo discusses how her earliest memories seem to be from photos and we learn that, despite coming from a sporty family, she isn’t sporty herself. Jo also talks about how strange it feels to work in the same university from which she graduated ten years previously; listening to the ‘Pina Colada’ song as a child; the relative merits of reading for pleasure and reading for study; why she was freaked out by ‘Witness’; whether she was a ‘Swap Shop’ or a ‘Tiswas’ person on Saturday mornings; why she was keen on studying 18th century history; the importance of degree congregations, her love of opera and Cher, what would have happened if Staffordshire County Council hadn’t given her free violin lessons up until the age of 18, and what might have happened if her dreams had been even bigger!

The School of Arts launched its MA Theatre Festival last night, comprising two weeks of performances from students on our MA programmes in the Department of Drama and Theatre.

The festival kicked off with On Our Way by Scorched Ensemble, a group undertaking the MA in Physical Acting programme, which explored the life changing journey of becoming a refugee. A gallery of images from the performance is available here.

On Monday 25 March, there will be a rehearsed reading of an original play, Sexcapades, written by MA Theatre Making student Matthew Hessey. The play story about love and sex, and all the joy, despair, affirmation, rejection and hilarity each provides. To book, please see the Eventbrite page.

On Wednesday 27 March, MA in Theatre Making student group Scapegoat Theatre will be presenting Unload in the Forrest Studio. To book, please see the Eventbrite page.

On Thursday 28 March, there be a solo theatre performance, Reflection, by a MA Theatre Making student to convey the world of self-conflict using the mirror, projection and dance movements. The performance will be held in Jarman Studio 2. To book, please see the Eventbrite page.

On Friday 29 March, MA in Theatre Making group Scene 99 will present Unrest in Jarman Studio 1. The performance provides an opportunity to be a fly on the wall in a room of pure unrest, the bedroom. To book, please see the Eventbrite page.

Finally, the festival concludes on Monday 1 April with an adaptation of Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story The Yellow Wallpaper by students on the MA in Theatre Making, held in the Aphra Theatre. Please note this is a schedule change to the previously advertised performance on 21 March. To book, please see the Eventbrite page here: https://bit.ly/2TKvP4y

All events are free to attend. There is an age restriction of 18 and over for Sexcapades and Unload.

Alumnus Antonio Mascoli, who graduated with an MA in Film with Practice in 2018, has had his film NAMRON selected to be included in the Flicks International Student Short Film Festival 2019, to be held  from 28 -29 March in Groningen, the Netherlands.

Flicks is a film festival originating from the Cultural Student Centre USVA in Groningen, which gives national and international student filmmakers the opportunity to participate by showcasing short films of up to 20 minutes in length.

NAMRON tells the story of 21-year-old Norman who is travelling to his parents’ house to tell them he’s in a same-sex relationship. But first he needs to accept the man he sees in the mirror. Sharing the journey with his boyfriend, Norman encounters different people and places, which evoke childhood memories and bring a lifelong inner turmoil back to the surface.

Speaking of the film, Antonio said: ‘NAMRON was produced as my final dissertation for the MA Film with Practice. The Master’s gave me the necessary technical and artistic confidence to make a movie about a complicated theme, about which we often think we know everything. Though, if there is still strong discrimination and prejudice nowadays, perhaps we know nothing after all.’

For more information about the Flicks Film Festival, please see the page on the Flicks Film Festival blog.

Colleagues are invited to attend the Learning and Teaching Network session taking place on Wednesday 3 April 2019, 13:15-14:30 in the UELT Seminar Room, Canterbury.

This session on Enhancing the Academic Adviser system will be presented by Dr Laura Bailey, Lecturer in English Language and Linguistics and SECL Student Success Lecturer.

SECL has historically had very low engagement with the Academic Adviser system with difficulties in implementing it consistently across such a diverse school with 1300 students in six departments and nearly 100 degree programmes. In 2018, we introduced user-friendly materials, centralised the initial meetings, and piloted the Target Connect booking system. In this session we present what went well, what didn’t work, and lessons learnt in the process.

If you have not already confirmed your attendance and wish to attend please complete the online booking form.