Session Outline

With the continued reliance on personal tutoring (PT) as a method for delivering student support and learning, this presentation will report the findings of a research study into the perceptions of managers, staff and students of how PT policy operates in practice. The study uses Reynolds and Saunders’ implementation staircase {Saunders, 2015} to explore the perception of PT at different levels of a university management hierarchy. An interpretative approach was used to inform both the survey design and data analysis and an online survey was distributed to senior staff, lecturers, and undergraduate students in a post 1992 university. While the findings show that there are areas of agreement between students and senior staff on the purpose of PT, a key finding is that those who actually deliver the service, the lecturers, are far more sceptical of both the purpose and effectiveness of PT. This scepticism is mirrored in student responses who report a poor experience of PT. This raises important questions about the delivery of PT and we argue that without adequate resourcing, including the need for staff to be committed, and a clear remit of its purpose, PT cannot be delivered to a consistently high standard and this can be detrimental to both the institution and ultimately the student.

Interaction will be through delegates sharing experiences from their institutions. Time will also be allocated for questions and answers.