Pedagogy in practice: questioning personal tutoring

Initial questions: What does personal tutoring look like in the Departments of Business, Law, Policing and Social Sciences (BLPSS) and Health, Psychology and Social Studies (HPSS) at the University of Cumbria? How do lecturers use personal tutoring? Does personal tutoring support employability? How is personal tutoring arranged and practiced? What issues are there in personal tutoring? Does practice reflect policy? Method: Action research in that we aim to improve practice at UoC Semi structured interviews with 15 staff IRF funds for transcription – 200 pages of data Initial inductive thematic analysis Secondary analysis using activity theory deductively Tertiary analysis to draw out assessment relevant data Comparison to key literature Key messages from the literature: The personal tutor role is multifaceted (Small, 2013) Personal tutors are required to perform the roles of exemplar, motivator, counsellor and mentor (Harris et al, 2000) Personal tutoring can be therapeutic in nature, providing a safe setting where students can express concerns authentically (Warne and McAndrew, 2008) Personal tutors are seen as an essential element of academic support (Quality Assurance agency for Higher Education, 2014) There is a lack of up to date research into both academic staff and students views about personal tutoring processes