Peer Mentoring Thank You Event
Peer mentors from across the University gathered at the Great North Museum: Hancock last Monday to celebrate another successful year of the scheme.
Mentors and staff coordinators enjoyed drinks, food and an array of Christmas tunes as awards were given out for the best mentor from each Faculty and for the best Co-ordinator across the University.
Student mentors were nominated by the students they were mentoring and comments made were displayed on tables around to room:
‘My mentor was always positive and put 100% effort into helping every individual in our group.’
‘It is often more helpful to have a student’s perspective on an issue rather than just a staff perspective.’
The winners were Sachin Anand from Dental Sciences, Anjuli Chatterjee from Newcastle Law School and James Fortune from School of Biology.
The Coordinator of the Year was Alison Graham from the School of Biology.
The festive celebrations aimed to thank all students and staff for the time and effort they put into making the scheme such a success.
Well done everyone!
If you would like to get involved in Peer Mentoring at Newcastle, or you would like to find out more email us.
PREVIOUS ULTSEC INNOVATION FUND WINNERS 2015-16
In 2015-16 the following awards were made:
- 8 Responsive Projects, each for up to £2,500
- 1 Strategic Project, for up to £10,000
Details of all the projects can be found in the 2015/16 list of funded projects.
ULTSEC Innovation Fund Workshop Reminder
LTDS are running an ULTSEC Innovation Fund workshop on December 12th 2-3pm in KGVI 1.36C. You will be given an overview of the fund as well as guidance from the Careers Service about how to employ students for your project. There will also be presentations from successful project teams from previous years who will share details of their project and the application process.
To sign up to this workshop please do so via the following link: http://www.ncl.ac.uk/ltds/about/training/ultsecinnovation/workshops/. We would love to see you there.
Further information including key dates and application forms and guidance can be found on the Innovation Fund section of the LTDS website: http://www.ncl.ac.uk/ltds/funding/teaching/
What I Mean When I Say… Session, 30 November
ULTSEC Innovation Fund Dates Announced
The submission dates for ULTSEC Innovation Fund have been announced for 2016/17.
Responsive
Autumn – Monday 7th November 2016
Spring – Monday 10th April 2017
Summer – Friday 26th May 2017
Strategic
Semester 1 – Friday 20th January 2017
Semester 2 – Friday 26th May 2017
We will be running some webinars and workshops which will be available to book on to via the ULTSEC Innovation Fund webpage shortly.
There will also be training workshops giving useful advice on preparing submissions. Please see our website for details.
Meet The Archaeologist: an interview with Prof Ian Haynes
Each year we open up Hadrian’s Wall: Life on the Roman Frontier to thousands of new learners.
While we know Prof Ian Haynes as the architect and lead Educator of Hadrian’s Wall, this is only a small facet of his life as an archaeologist!
Ian spoke to Archaeosoup Productions as part of their “Meet the Archaeologist” series – you can find out more about Ian’s interests and projects from this YouTube video:
Ian has made much of his scholarly work available on academia.edu – this can be accessed by creating a free account.
View Ian’s papers on Academia.edu
Find out about the next scheduled dates for Hadrian’s Wall: Life on the Roman Frontier
Peer Mentoring: Helping Our New Students to Settle In
Peer parenting, or mentoring, inductions have taken place across campus.
The university’s mentoring scheme is gearing up for another busy year of supporting first year students through the first term of University here at Newcastle.
The scheme involves recruiting second year students to act as mentors, or parents, to first years offering advice on academic work as well as on other aspects of University experience.
In the School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape (APL), Caroline Armstrong, Student Recruitment and Wellbeing Manager, organises the scheme, and the new “families” are all set for the new year.
Caroline said: ‘We call them parents in this school, rather than mentors.
‘We’ve been doing this for years now.
‘I just think that it’s such a good way of helping students to settle in.
‘I pick out the groups as soon as the firm offers are confirmed and students are contacted before they start by their new university “parents”.’
Caroline thinks the scheme is invaluable for new students in the School.
‘Just having someone there, who was in your position last year, to say “it gets better” makes all the difference.
‘Our students, like many others from across the University, are used to being real shining stars at School and when they get to University can struggle as they adjust to new subjects and new ways of thinking.
‘The have a social room, like a Common Room in the School and knowing and socialising with the second and third years can help them to feel comfortable and relaxed in these public spaces.’
The School have recently run their induction event, at which mentors meet their mentees for the first time.
‘We just get them together and they get a tour of the School and then have lunch with their new “families”.
‘To break the ice we gave them spaghetti, marshmallows and fruit pastels and told each “family” [a group formed of two mentors and a number of mentees] to build a structure.’
The scheme is so popular that the “parents” now have “grandparents”, third year students to help initiate them into their parental duties.
‘We might try brightly coloured jackets, to make the mentors really easy to spot in freshers week and to help promote the scheme to our other students.’
Caroline is currently planning feedback meetings, where students will be able to raise any pitfalls or benefits of the scheme.
‘Then it’s already looking forward to January, where we will start contacting this year’s first years to see if they want to parent next year’s students.’
Do you need help or advice about Peer Mentoring? Contact ltds@ncl.ac.uk.
Thinking of applying for promotion based on teaching?
There is a new collection of resources on the LTDS website designed to help you navigate your way through the process and help you assemble a case for promotion based on excellent or exceptional teaching.
As well as collecting together all the useful links from Human Resources, you will find pointers to case studies from people here at Newcastle University who have done it already, supporting materials such video clips which describe the pitfalls and common mistakes, workshop materials and links off to supporting literature and resources. We hope you will find this collection useful.
