Personal Tutoring
As a student at Sheffield you will encounter dozens of members of staff whose job is to make your time here as rewarding as possible - from lecturers and Departmental administrative support staff to librarians, the University accommodation and Student Services teams, careers advisors and Union officers. It’s great to be studying in a big institution like this University; but it’s also important that there is continued support across your time here.
That’s why, in addition to the wider network of support, there is always at least one member of academic staff who is specifically assigned the role of looking out for you as move through your degree and move towards your future career. This is your personal tutor (PT).
A Personal Tutor’s Responsibilities
The main role of the personal tutor is to guide, help and support you as you proceed through your course. The PT:
- can be the first person to turn to if any issue arises with your studies that you need help with
- can provide general academic guidance and personal support
- can point the way to a wide range of personal support services provided by trained professionals within the University and the Union of Students
As you see, rather than it being the personal tutor’s responsibility to have the answer to every problem, often the PT acts as a “signpost” directing you to other sources of support.
So: what sorts of things can a personal tutor do for you?
It’s difficult to predict why you might need your personal tutor, as everyone is different, and there are differences in their roles across departments, but here are some of the things PTs regularly help students to get more help with:
- Choosing their modules
- Understanding how well they are doing on the degree programme, and finding ways to improve
- Coping with problems at home
- Making the most of their time here, so that they will have good academic references when applying for jobs
- Providing references
- Settling in at University, getting involved with University groups/societies
- Finding sources of financial support when needed
- Making good career choices
- Changing their degree programme
- Applying for leave of absence, completing special circumstances forms, and other issues to do with absence from University
- Supporting with your self-development projects like The Sheffield Graduate and Personal Development Planning
- Understanding the University’s academic appeals other procedures
- Motivation, time- and stress-management and other work-related issues
- Generally being a “friendly face” and offering specific point of contact with the University during the degree
Things to bear in mind
Your department will arrange for you to meet your Personal Tutor early on after your arrive in Sheffield; you’ll also hear about how to stay in touch during the year. Like any relationship, it’s important that both sides make an effort to cement it early on, so you should make sure to attend any meetings that are scheduled. You are entitled to a one-to-one meeting with your personal tutor at least once every semester. In addition to this, you should feel free to contact your personal tutor to ask for an appointment to discuss about any issues you need to address.
Next steps?
Beyond the broad picture you see here, each department has a slightly different way of handling Personal Tutoring. It’s a good idea to find out how own department(s) plan to do so: start by looking on the department website or in any general guidance documents you’ve been given.
You should definitely make a point of speaking to your personal tutor soon, if you haven’t already. Just send an email and introduce yourself. You can certainly make that relationship one of the most important of your time at Sheffield.