Knowing and responding to your students’ diverse needs.
Contextual Background
I am Stage 2 Lead on BA Fashion Communication: Image and Promotion. I am a part time member of staff (0.6) and I lead a cohort of 48 students.
Evaluation
It has been challenging to be able to track the progress of all of the students from the start of Stage 2, having begun the year with several group projects. There is a huge diversity of needs to respond to, with a growing number of students with neurodiversity and mental health requirements. There is also a need to address issues of cultural integration in response to incidents of racism and anti-East Asian sentiment.
Moving forwards
Fostering a sense of belonging is key. As Stage 2 lead, it’s important that I am able to better get to know the students from the very beginning of the year. Over the past 2 years, we have begun the year with group projects, which means there is little 1-2-1 contact as the year starts. I have addressed this by changing the tutorial structure, so rather than being assigned one tutor for projects, students will rotate between several to allow for multiple perspectives, but also so each of them is able to have an individual tutorial with me. We will also begin the year with an individual project which emphasises personal research as a foundation to their practice.
As Brooks states in ‘Could Do Better?’, students’ demands for more feedback and contact can be as much about their need for a sense of belonging and connection. The answer to providing this is not simply down to more tutor time, instead it may be about facilitating more opportunities for students to become empowered enough to trust their own judgement, through establishing supportive peer led environments. This is an approach I would like to cultivate in the coming academic year, through more group led feedback sessions and educational technology tools.
With a growing number of international students making up the cohort, cultural integration needs to be a priority. One East Asian student commented, ‘staff never get our names right’. It is our responsibility as tutors to learn student names correctly, so this was disappointing to hear. We have low representation of East Asian staff in relation to students in the department. Although I can’t address larger staffing, I have booked representative HPL’s to give Guest Talks and will continue to do this. I will also signpost students to supportive communities where they can build collective voices.
Aswell as students being able to bring incidents issues to us, staff also need to feel we can get appropriate support. There is very little training into how we might promote intercultural understanding, and how this might impact teaching.
References
Brooks, K (2008) Students critique of feedback Art, Design and Media