Whether you’re an undergraduate or postgraduate student, your personal academic tutor is here to help you to develop, grow and succeed in your studies and research.
Every student is allocated a key named member of academic staff, from their course of study, called a personal academic tutor (PAT).
Your PAT will work in partnership with you to help you to succeed in your studies at CCCU. Together you will reflect on your academic development, student life and future goals covering:
- Transition into University and each stage of your student journey to help you settle in and prepare for the next level of study.
- Academic skills including helping you to access resources, review assessment feedback and explore ways to improve your grades.
- Sense of belonging, equity and inclusion and how you can get involved in the wider University community.
- Employability identifying the skills and experience you will need to secure your future graduate career, writing references and offering informal advice.
- Support on offer at the University, signposting you to the appropriate teams that they feel could help you further.
How to find out who my personal academic tutor is?
Your Personal Academic Tutor will contact you at the beginning of your studies to introduce themselves and make an appointment to meet you.
If you are unsure who your PAT is, please contact your course team.
How often will I meet my personal academic tutor?
Students should have contact with their PAT in each period of study (semester, trimester or module dependent on course structure), so it should be at least twice a year.
You can also contact your PAT when you have something you would like to talk over. Remember PATs have busy schedules too, so don’t leave it too late to book an appointment if there is something time sensitive that you need their advice on.
How can I work best with my personal academic tutor?
The most successful relationship with a Personal Academic Tutor will be a two-way one, in which you as a student can also have an active role. Your part in the relationship will involve:
- Preparation for and attendance at all scheduled and other requested meetings.
- Regularly checking your CCCU email from your Personal Academic Tutor and responding as appropriate.
- Proactively seeking support from your Personal Academic Tutor when needed in a timely way.
- Keeping notes on any agreed action points following your meetings and following up on those agreed actions.
- Contacting other recommend teams for support.
How can I prepare for my personal academic tutor meetings?
Think about what you might want to talk about and the types of questions your PAT may ask.
Below are examples of questions your PAT may raise at a meeting to help you prepare.
- Are you enjoying your course and modules?
- Do you understand what is required of you?
- Are you coping/managing with the workload?
- Are you managing/on track to meet deadlines?
- Do you need any specific academic help or information (e.g. with essay writing; revision; referencing; plagiarism)?
- If you have an LSP, how is this working out and are the reasonable adjustments being met?
- Do you need support to obtain an LSP?
- Do you have any major commitments beyond your study (e.g. work; sporting; family); If so, what are the implications of these for your studies?; Are you coping with the different demands on your time?
- What academic targets or goals would you like to set yourself and achieve this semester/year
- How do you intend to go about achieving your academic targets of goals? (strategies)
Your meetings with you PAT will evolve as you progress in your studies. Below are some example questions your PAT may ask at different levels of study:
First Semester/Trimester
- Have you engaged with Welcome Week and induction and our Welcome Hub?
- How is your access to the timetable, Blackboard, course resources, and library working?
- If you were late to start or register is there anything that you need support to get up-to-date on?
- What will help you progress in your studies this year?
- How are you planning to manage your assessment submissions to meet the deadlines and avoid plagiarism?
- How is your attendance so far?
- Have you settled in your student accommodation? Are there any issues?
- Are you familiar with how to find information about study support, student wellbeing, university sports and cost of living?
- What are your aspirations and goals for achievement and employment through this course?
After the first assessment results
- What achievements and challenges are you facing?
- How happy are you with your results so far?
- Have you engaged with your assessment feedback?
- How is your achievement of your learning goals progressing?
- What will help you achieve your goals for this year?
- How is the independent learning engagement with study support /learning hub coming along
- What modules are you engaging with this semester/term and why?
- What volunteering/part-time job(s) are you taking up, do you enjoy it/them?
- How is your uni-work-life balance? Would you consider changing anything to feel better?
- How is your job providing you with skills for your career aspirations?
- How happy are you with your accommodation, social circle and friendships?
Before the next assessment period
- How is your work progressing for the last/next set of assessments and exams?
- What are you doing to be confident that you will submit all assessments and study for your exams for the year?
- What are the modules of the first semester that you still need to work on, if any?
- What actions are you taking to ensure that your uni work life balance is helping you achieve your goals for this academic year?
- How is your wellbeing? What support / actions, if any, would you consider?
- What are your plans for the summer; and how will you plan for reassessments, if any?
First Semester/Trimester
- Have you engaged with Welcome Week and induction and our Welcome Hub?
- How is your access to the timetable, Blackboard, course resources, and library working?
- If you transitioned from L0-4 how are you settling in at the next level? Did you attend your L4 Course Welcome
- If you were late to start or register is there anything that you need support to get up-to-date on?
- What will help you progress in your studies this year?
- How are you planning to manage your assessment submissions to meet the deadlines and avoid plagiarism?
- How is your attendance so far?
- Have you settled in your student accommodation? Are there any issues?
- Are you familiar with how to find information about study support, student wellbeing, university sports and cost of living?
- What are your aspirations and goals for achievement and employment through this course?
After the first assessment results
- What achievements and challenges are you facing?
- How happy are you with your results so far?
- Have you engaged with your assessment feedback?
- How is your achievement of your learning goals progressing?
- What will help you achieve your goals for this year?
- How is the independent learning engagement with study support /learning hub coming along
- What modules are you engaging with this semester/term and why?
- What volunteering/part-time job(s) are you taking up, do you enjoy it/them?
- How is your uni-work-life balance? Would you consider changing anything to feel better?
- How is your job providing you with skills for your career aspirations?
- How happy are you with your accommodation, social circle and friendships?
Before the next assessment period
- How is your work progressing for the last/next set of assessments and exams?
- What are you doing to be confident that you will submit all assessments and study for your exams for the year?
- What are the modules of the first semester that you still need to work on, if any?
- What actions are you taking to ensure that your uni work life balance is helping you achieve your goals for this academic year?
- How is your wellbeing? What support / actions, if any, would you consider?
- What are your plans for the summer; and how will you plan for reassessments, if any?
- What are your plans for module option choices for Level 5?
First Semester/Trimester
- Have you engaged with our Welcome Back Hub?
- Have you re-registered? Do you have access to the timetable, Blackboard, course resources, and library?
- If you are returning from Interruption what support do you need?
- If you are doing re- assessment or re-assessment with attendance what support do you need?
- What worked well in Level 4 and what would you do differently in Level 5?
- Are you clear about any modules you need to choose for this year?
- What student support/study support independent learning are you engaging with this term? (Identify two modules that you will work on independently.)
- What are your aspirations for your course and the final classification?
- What are your aspirations for graduate employment through this course?
- How are you developing your careers and enterprise interests?
After the first assessment results
- What achievements and challenges are you facing?
- How happy are you with your results so far?
- Have you engaged with your assessment feedback?
- How is your achievement of your learning goals progressing?
- What will help you achieve your goals for this year?
- How is the independent learning engagement with study support /learning hub coming along
- What modules are you engaging with this semester/term and why?
- What volunteering/part-time job(s) are you taking up, do you enjoy it/them?
- How is your uni-work-life balance? Would you consider changing anything to feel better?
- How is your job providing you with skills for your career aspirations?
- How happy are you with your accommodation, social circle and friendships?
Before the next assessment period
- How is your work progressing for the last/next set of assessments and exams?
- What are you doing to be confident that you will submit all assessments and study for your exams for the year?
- What are the modules of the first semester that you still need to work on, if any?
- What actions are you taking to ensure that your uni work life balance is helping you achieve your goals for this academic year?
- How is your wellbeing? What support/actions, if any, would you consider?
- What are your plans for the summer; and how will you plan for reassessments, if any?
- What are your plans for module option choices for Level 6?
First Semester/Trimester
- Have you engaged with our Welcome Back Hub?
- Have you re-registered? Do you have access to the timetable, Blackboard, course resources, and library?
- If you are returning from Interruption what support do you need?
- If you are doing re- assessment or re-assessment with attendance what support do you need
- What worked well in Level 5 and what would you do differently in Level 6?
- Are you clear about any modules you need to choose for this year?
- What student support/study support independent learning are you engaging with this term? (Identify two modules that you will work on independently.)
- What are your aspirations for your course and the final classification?
- If you have an Independent Study, Research to conduct or Dissertation Module are you clear about the topic and learning outcomes you need to meet?
- What are your aspirations for graduate employment through this course?
- How are you developing your careers and enterprise interests?
After the first assessment results
- What achievements and challenges are you facing?
- How happy are you with your results so far?
- Have you engaged with your assessment feedback?
- How is your achievement of your learning goals progressing?
- What will help you achieve your goals for this year?
- How is the independent learning engagement with study support /learning hub coming along
- What modules are you engaging with this semester/term and why?
- What is your progress with Independent Study, Research or Dissertation?
- What volunteering/part-time job(s) are you taking up, do you enjoy it/them?
- How is your uni-work-life balance? Would you consider changing anything to feel better?
- What is the progress with the Careers, graduate employment and further studies plans? have you engaged with with CV360 and Interview360 in the Careers and Enterprise Hub?
- If you have been engaged with placement activities or work experience how has this gone and what graduate attributes and skills are you developing?
Before the next assessment period
- How is your work progressing for the last/next set of assessments and exams?
- What are you doing to be confident that you will submit all assessments and study for your exams for the year?
- What are the modules of the first semester that you still need to work on, if any?
- What actions are you taking to ensure that your uni work life balance is helping you achieve your goals for this academic year?
- How is your wellbeing? What support/actions, if any, would you consider?
- What are your plans for the summer; and how will you plan for reassessments, if any?
The student engagement dashboard
The Student Engagement Dashboard will be used by your personal academic tutor or Course Support Team in conversation with you to give an indication of how your learning is progressing and where you may need further support.
In preparation for these conversations, you should consider and reflect on your own engagement and identify your strengths and any support you may require to succeed.
The dashboard pulls together a range of existing data about your engagement in your studies, as well as how this compares to average engagement. Pulling together this information in this way will help us to understand how we can best support you to develop and reach your goals.
For further information on the dashboard and how your data is being used, we have developed this student guide. The dashboard is not part of any formal assessment. If any of the personal data used in the dashboard is inaccurate, you will be given the chance to correct these inaccuracies.