Developing communities of support

This workshop will engage participants with insights from planning, teaching and participating in a postgraduate module on ‘Supporting and Guiding Student Development’ for university staff. The module involves participants across roles and disciplines in attempts to create a community of learning, practice and support. Various processes are being used but central to the approach is sharing personal narratives and reflections. These begin from macro and micro considerations of student support, address issues of practice and policy and engage with evaluation and change. During this workshop, members of this living community (module participants and tutors) give a flavour of their experiences and then invite, support and facilitate participants to consider their own student support narratives and how this relates to the characteristics of a useful community of support.