Later today at Rochester Cathedral it will be our huge pleasure to welcome our first cohort of returning students for their in-person graduation ceremonies. Graduations are always momentous occasions, marking not just our students’ success but a significant juncture in their lives. However, this first set of ceremonies has a particular poignancy as we mark a year group that faced challenges like no other. I wanted to take this moment to reflect on what they – and we – have all gone through together over the past two years. 

It’s easy to forget that university life for the ‘Class of 2020’ began like any other – the buzz around campus of new friendships being formed; bustling bars filled with excitement; the clatter and chatter of a packed lecture theatre settling down to class. What a contrast to how jarring that first lockdown was, as silence fell across our estate. The resilience, courage and commitment of those students to complete their studies while the whole world changed around them was truly humbling – as was the deeply moving way colleagues across the University pulled together in support. It was the best of our community, as so many adapted to huge personal challenges to ensure our students had the best possible experience we could provide. 

This didn’t come without its difficulties, with having to cancel in-person graduation ceremonies a particular low. For that year group to then graduate online and move into a new world of work, often behind a digital desk, shows just how remarkable they are. Kent graduates are special and throughout this first set of ceremonies we will be celebrating both them and the amazing things they have gone on to – showcasing how employability runs through our work, and how graduates who are ‘Made in Kent’ leave us ready to shape tomorrow’s world. 

Their success is also testament to all of you. Everyone at Kent can look at graduations and feel pride at their contribution. Maybe you sparked someone’s imagination in your tutorials or brought inspiration through your research. You may have been the first smile they saw when they came to collect their keys; a supportive word when they were in need of help; or serving them the food that reminded them of home when they really needed it. Everyone has a part to play, from when a prospective student picks up a prospectus to when they open their first Alumni Newsletter – and I hope you can all take a moment to reflect on your part in this as these wonderful ceremonies return. 

I know many will be volunteering this week and next or taking part through your more ceremonial role. Wherever you are, do look out across our campuses and social media for the smiles, hugs and special family moments as they return once again and know that they are yours to share in too.  

With my thanks to all of you for everything you do. 

Karen 

Professor Karen Cox | Vice-Chancellor and President 

From John Sotillo | Director of Information Services

** Updated 17.00, Friday 18 March **

Following my earlier update this morning and the regular progress reports on the IS blog, teams have been working throughout the day to get affected systems back online. Here’s where things currently stand:

Wi-Fi and networks

We have been working throughout the day to restore Eduroam across all campus buildings. This should be back up imminently – however, as we are still in the process of restoring systems, there may be further periods of disruption over the weekend as things come online, so do check back if you can’t get access. It will also remain unavailable outdoors throughout the weekend.

Student PCs   

Wired connection in campus accommodation has also been coming back online throughout the day and should be fully restored shortly. In the meantime, student PCs are still available throughout the campus.

Affected buildings  

The Kennedy Building should be returned to normal usage this evening; Jennison remains largely out of use for the time being. Alternative arrangements are being put in place where necessary to support those affected by this, including rescheduling timetabled events.

Deadlines and Mitigations  

Given the impact this will have had on a number of students, we sent out confirmation earlier today that all deadlines for work due today have been extended to Monday 21 March. In areas most affected by the outage, Divisions have arranged separate extensions, with all students informed.

We will provide a further update on Monday morning when we should have a clearer picture following further work over the weekend.

John

John Sotillo | Director of Information Services

The University is continuing to support humanitarian efforts in Ukraine through a variety of initiatives. An update on the contributions from the University, staff and students is detailed below.

Council for At Risk Academics

The University has increased its contribution to the Council for At Risk Academics (CARA). CARA has reported that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is “having a devastating effect on millions of innocent people…among them, many university academics, and their families”. This increased funding will directly help the organisation to provide opportunities to more Ukrainian academics and their families.

If you know of any Ukrainian academics who may be at risk, please contact ukraine-support@kent.ac.uk and we will pass on the details to CARA. They will ensure the information will reach the relevant people as quickly as possible.

Homes for Ukraine

You may have seen that the Government has launched the ‘Homes for Ukraine’ scheme. This scheme allows individuals, charities, community groups and businesses to offer refuge to an individual or family from Ukraine who are fleeing the war. To find out more, please visit the Government webpage.

Hardship Fund

If you know of any students from Ukraine, Russia or the wider region who have been impacted financially by the tragic events of the last few weeks and require financial support, please ask them to get in touch with our Financial Aid Office and see the Emergency Funding webpage.

Bake and Book Sale

Yesterday’s Bake and Book sale in the Colyer-Fergusson raised around £1,000 for the Red Cross emergency relief fund for Ukrainian refugees. Many thanks to those who made cakes, contributed books, and of course to everyone who attended and generously donated.

Kent Global Showcase

A final reminder that Kent’s forthcoming Global Showcase will take place today (16 March) from 14.30-16.00. More details can be found on our staff news story.

Please continue to let us know if you have any ideas as to how the University community can support humanitarian efforts in Ukraine and the wider region by emailing ukraine-support@kent.ac.uk.

From Martin Carvey | Project Manager

Throughout the opening months of 2022, the KentVision project team has continued to work through prioritisation and management of ongoing helpdesk tickets to clear the path for the major changes that we know are still required for the system to be fully operational. A lot of this work takes place ‘behind the scenes’, ensuring we have the right approach to collaboration across areas and adjusting to a more iterative delivery model with appropriate testing time.

This means that benefits aren’t realised as quickly as many across both the project and wider University would like – my thanks again to all system users and our key stakeholders in particular for their continued engagement with this as I know the impact of the system’s current state remains a real challenge across a number of areas. However, the work in recent weeks is critical to us being able to start delivering regular improvements in a managed way without furthering risk to our regular work.

Roadmap for deliverables

Consultations continue across the University, with an updated roadmap tracking seven deliverables that are currently scheduled, with the balance being assessed against what can be realistically delivered. Priority areas at high level factor in Change of Circumstances, Board of Examiners and Data Quality/Statutory Data, with user stories are being created in each area to ensure we have thought through what the impact of each change will be, and ensure that the appropriate solution can be delivered in each case. A delivery plan for the new training environment has also been established, with both shared with key stakeholders shortly.

Continued engagement

Benefitting from the insight and experience of those in key teams across the University remains central to delivering a product that works as it needs to. In recent weeks we have allocated additional resource to make sure more real time data and reports can be provided, with clarity on progress and risks on key deliverables throughout.

Next steps

With these project improvements in place, our aim remains that people begin feeling the benefit of improvements across the system from this Spring onwards. Using an Agile delivery model, our initial priorities have been agreed with KV Project Board, and KV Operational Group members, ensuring that we have fully tested and delivered changes required ahead of the upcoming exam term and other committed timelines.

This remains a challenging project and I am especially grateful to all of those who are feeding in their on-the-ground experience of how the system currently works, including what they need it to do in future – this is invaluable to the project, and I know it is not easy when people are also impacted by the issues with its current form. By my next update, I am confident that the detailed work in recent weeks will begin to bear real fruit, with improvements across areas that make a real difference to how we work across these initial priority focus areas.

From Richard Reece| Deputy Vice-Chancellor | Education and Student Experience

After a very challenging two years, we are finally able to look ahead and return to relatively normal operations at our University. Whilst the pandemic has been incredibly difficult for our whole community, I believe it has encouraged us all to be more reflective about what we do here. Now more than ever, the student voice must be at the heart of our institution – by truly listening to our students’ needs, wants and expectations, we can ensure they have a fantastic experience while at the University. 

The pandemic led to many changes across our University, with staff responding admirably to the ever-changing government guidelines and expectations. I would like to thank you all for your dedication during this time and all you continue to do for our students. As we return to ‘normality’, it is important that we do not dismiss all the changes we have made. Some of our new ways of working have improved the experience of our students, such as our implementation of online exams which helped to alleviate pressure on students at such a difficult time. As we make our plans for the future, it is imperative that we continue to listen to, and champion, our students’ voices so we might adapt our offer to suit their needs.  

Listening to what our students care about is so important to the relationship we hold with them. We have seen some great examples of how our students’ voices have helped shape change on our campus, such as our return to face-to-face teaching and the work some of our Student Reps have been doing concerning Consent. As we look ahead to the future at Kent, a culture of listening must be central to our ethos. It is important we continue to promote the NSS, as a valuable tool for our students to share their voices with us.

Our new ‘always on’ Your Uni, Your Say campaign brings together different ways for students to give feedback, making it easier for all students to tell us how they feel. We will shortly be asking students for their feedback on the shape of our academic year at Kent. This follows the consultation with staff that began in 2016/17 looking at how we might change the academic calendar to improve the experience at Kent. By working in partnership to reshape the academic year in the future, I hope we might reduce pressure felt by students and staff as well as improve student performance. We also might help to address issues of student experience in relation to assessment and feedback as well as the complexity of managing students with Individual Learning Plans. I am looking forward to understanding staff feedback on the proposals and will be running a series of online sessions so I can hear your views. Please look out for further information on this in due course.  

I am excited to see our future plans coming together and the hard work taking place across the University so we might deliver an even better experience for our students. Kent prides itself on providing an excellent academic environment and by working collaboratively we can ensure we inspire our students to be the very best they can be, now and in the future. 

Thank you for your dedication and continued support. 

Richard Reece

Our official Employee Assistance Programme provider, Care first offers a numbers of services and provide useful advice and support.

Due to the stabilising situation of Covid, they’ll be doing a side-range of webinar topics. Here’s the schedule for two weeks:

Week commencing 21 March 2022

Monday 21 March – ‘What is short term solution focussed counselling’ – This webinar provides further information on short term solution focussed counselling and ‘in the moment’ support.
Time: 12.00-12.30 – click on this link to sign up

Wednesday 23 March – ‘How Care first can support you’ – A webinar for awareness and how to access the EAP service provided by Care first.
Time: 12.00-12.30 – click on this link to sign up

Friday 25 March – ‘Debt Awareness Week’ – This webinar looks at the impact debt has on people’s mental health and details the support and advice that is available to individuals contacting Care first.
Time: 12.00-12.30 – click on this link to sign up

Week commencing 28 March 2022

Monday 28 March –‘Care first Management Support’ – This webinar provides an overview of the support available for managers and also the mental health first aiders of organisations through the EAP.
Time: 12.00-12.30 – click on this link to sign up

Wednesday 30 March – ‘How Care first can support you’ – A webinar for awareness and how to access the EAP service provided by Care first.
Time: 12.00-12.30 – click on this link to sign up

Friday 1 April – ‘Walk to work day – In association with Move More Month’ – This webinar considers the positive impact staying active can have on your general wellbeing, in line with Move More Month.
Time: 12.00-12.30 – click on this link to sign up 

A Bake and Book sale is being held at the Colyer Fergusson on the Canterbury campus on Tuesday 15 March 12:00-15:00 in aid of the British Red Cross Emergency Appeal for Ukrainian refugees.

Any donations of books and baked goods would be gratefully received. Please take these donations to Lucie Maslin in the Rutherford Extension entrance on Monday 14 March by 5pm, or before 11am on Tuesday 15 March.

All proceeds will go to the British Red Cross DEC Ukraine Appeal.

Please find our latest Continuing Support for Ukraine news story. 

As we continue to view the unfolding events in Ukraine with horror, our thoughts go out to the many bereaved and wounded, those suffering bombardment, homelessness and the destruction of their lives in the region. We express our solidarity with Ukrainian students and colleagues, along with all of those affected by the invasion, and we stand united in unequivocally condemning violence against civilians, hoping that peace can be restored as quickly as possible.  

We also look to how we can help as the humanitarian situation escalates in the country and the wider region. As Dr Olena Nizalova, Senior Lecturer in Economics and a member of our staff of Ukrainian origin, has said in a blog post earlier this week, there are practical ways to help, the critical means being the donation of money. 

National efforts are focussing on the work of the Disasters Emergency Committee which coordinates efforts across a range of agencies working in the region and we would urge students and staff who wish to donate to contribute to DEC’s Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal. 

At the University, we are already engaged in a number of practical steps to support those impacted by the conflict in Ukraine.  

For many years we have provided the Council for At Risk Academics (CARA) funding to support refugee and displaced academics with opportunities for study and research at Kent. We have been in touch with them this week to confirm that this funding is available for Ukrainian academics and to explore ways in which we might extend our contribution via this route. We have also been in touch with the worldwide #ScienceForUkraine initiative to ensure that they are aware of our support through CARA and to publicise it through that venue. 

As communicated last week, we have identified several staff and students from Ukraine and Russia and have taken immediate steps to support these individuals. Additionally, we have been supporting students based in both countries to ensure we can get them to a safe place as quickly as possible. Teams are also tracing any further staff or students who have travelled to the regions to make sure they can access the help they need. 

We are working with our students and with Kent Union to organise and promote a range of fundraising activities and would urge all staff to consider supporting these. Further details on this will be shared shortly. 

We are also exploring how our hardship mechanisms can be utilised by Ukrainian students, and whether or not we can enable specific donations to support this provision. We will be communicating with students, staff and alumni about this as soon as we have worked through the practical details.  

After the wide support offered by Kent staff and students at Kent’s Solidarity with Ukraine event, the next opportunity to feedback on our activity will be held within our forthcoming Global Showcase. This will take place on 16 March from 14.30 to 16.00.  

We would very much like to hear about further ideas as to how the university community can support Ukraine and the Ukrainian people at this extremely difficult time for the country, and if you have any thoughts, please do let us know by emailing ukraine-support@kent.ac.uk. 

My thanks to all of our community who have pulled together to coordinate our response to this. 

Yours sincerely, 

Karen 

Professor Karen Cox | Vice-Chancellor and President