Rep FAQs

Enrolment to be a Course rep takes place September - October, with School Rep elections taking place in November and March.

To be a rep, you must have spoken to your course leader, signed up with Arts SU, and attended training provided by Arts SU. Course Reps and School Reps should then start by introducing themselves to their fellow students (on their course for Course Reps, across their school for School Reps). You can do this by sending an email, saying hello before or after class and/or asking your Course Leader to introduce you to students alongside them. 

After you have introduced yourself and students have got to know you, you can then start gathering feedback from them about their academic experience.  

There are various ways you can do this that we will share with you below.  

There are different ways to gather feedback. 

Choose an approach that works for you and try different things if something isn’t working. 

If you’re struggling to gather feedback for any reason, speak to your Course Leader or the Arts SU Education Quality Team; they are there to help you. 

Here some different approaches you might consider for gathering feedback from students on your course or across your school: 

• Create an online survey with questions about your fellow students’ academic experience and send it to them via email. You can create an online survey using Microsoft Forms and there is an option for students to submit their feedback anonymously.  

• Create online polls for quick responses. 

• Ask your Course Leader and/or lecturers to allocate you 5 minutes at the end of class to speak to your fellow students and gather feedback. 

• Create a Teams Chat to stay in touch with other students on your course.    

• Update your fellow students about key meetings coming up (e.g. Student and Dean Forums, Course Committees), so they know to send you academic feedback in advance. 

Course Reps and School Reps collect feedback on students’ academic experience. 

Academic experience is defined as any feedback that relates to the students’ university learning and training.  

Key topics include: 

• Teaching and Learning 

• Assessments and Feedback 

• Course Organization e.g. timetables, Moodle.  

• Facilities and Resources (digital and physical) 

Feedback can be Positive and Constructive. 

Positive feedback is about finding out from students about what is going well on their course or across the school. In other words, what they’re enjoying about their academic experience and how it is helping them to develop and grow as artists and learners.  

Constructive feedback is about finding out from students about what they feel could be improved on their course or across the school. In other words, what they feel isn’t working so well about their academic experience and how it could be addressed to improve their experience.  

Gathering a combination of positive and constructive feedback is the best and most helpful way of ensuring students’ voices are heard.  

 If you are looking for conversation starters and/or useful questions for gathering feedback, try some of these: 

• How would you describe your experience of accessing and using your timetable?  

• How would you describe your access to resources (books, materials, computers, facilities, software) that you need? 

• How would you describe your experience of using Blackboard? 

• Do you feel that tutors provide feedback on your work in a timely manner? 

• Do you find this feedback helpful to your ongoing development? 

If you send student feedback to Course Leaders and Deans and do not immediately receive a response, this does not mean they are ignoring you.  

Some feedback takes longer to respond to because it requires input from staff in another department or team. During busy periods, UAL staff will often need more time to process students’ feedback and respond to you. 

If this happens, please be patient. However, if you need an update from staff so you can share it with students on your course or at your school, please ensure all reminder emails and communications you send to staff are respectful. 

Here are some guidelines:  

• Establish a timeframe: when raising student feedback with your Course Leadr or another staff member at UAL, it’s helpful to ask a question like “when can you follow up with me?” and/or “do you think it’s reasonable to expect some progress before the end of term - what can I pass on to the course?” These questions establish fair expectations and a reasonable timeline.  

• Send an update to students: Once you have raised student feedback with UAL staff, the next step is to share an update with students to let them know this has been done. Even if you are still waiting for an update from staff, letting students know that their feedback was raised goes a long way. 

• If you’re a Course Rep, get in touch with your School Rep: if you feel that the feedback you’ve gathered goes beyond your own course, you can email your School Rep and ask them to consider raising the issue with a more senior UAL staff member.   

• If you’re a School Rep, get in touch with your College Sabbatical Officer: if you feel that the feedback being shared with you goes beyond your own school, you can email your College Sabbatical Officer and ask them to consider raising the issue with a more senior staff member.   

• Unfortunately, not all feedback can implemented: UAL staff and Arts SU want to do the very best they can for student, but there will always be some areas of feedback that we cannot implement. Course Reps and School Reps are not expected to solve all problems or implement every piece of feedback sent their way by students. Be transparent with your fellow students about what they should and shouldn’t expect from you in this role.  

If you feel like none of these are working, try get in touch with the Arts SU Education Quality Team at either coursereps@arts.su.ac.uk or schoolreps@arts.su.ac.uk.   

It’s important for students to priorities their mental health and personal wellbeing. The same is true for Course Reps and School Reps.  

One way you can do this is to establish clear boundaries when speaking to students who send you feedback. 

To establish clear boundaries, take some to remind students what you are NOT expected to do as either a Course Rep or School Rep.  

You are not expected to get involved with students’ personal problems or complaints about other individual students or staff members.  

This includes:  

• Personal disputes between students and academic staff or individual students, including allegations of harassment, discrimination or victimization.   

• Formal procedures including extensions, extenuating circumstances, academic misconduct, academic appeals and individual complaints or disciplinary procedures.   

• Financial and funding queries, including student finance and debt.   

• Health issues, whether related to housing, employment, immigration or wellbeing.  

Issues like these require a different kind of expertise to ensure the most appropriate guidance can be given.  

If a student brings any of these issues to your attention, please refer them to the Arts SU Advice Service or UAL Student Services. 

Sometimes a student might feel that the reality of their academic experience is different to what they expected when applying to study at UAL.  

If a student shares this feedback with you, the first thing to do is ask them for clearer information on what it is specifically about their academic experience that is failing to meet their expectation. 

You can use the four academic experience feedback topics listed above in Q3 to ask these questions. For example, you might ask them: 

• Is the teaching and learning failing to meet your expectations? If so, how?   

• Are the assessments and feedback you receive failing to meet your expectations? If so, how? 

• Is your course organised in a way that fails to meet your expectations? If so, how?  

• Is your experience of using the facilities and resources failing to meet your expectations? If so, how?  

You can also ask your Course Leader to help you address this feedback try and raise it at Course Committees and/or Student & Dean Forums.  

There might be times when students come to you with feedback about their academic experience that doesn’t reflect your own individual experience at UAL, or that you do not personally share.  

Even if the feedback you receive isn’t reflected in your own experience as a student, it is often still important and relevant, and something that UAL staff need to know about. 

The feedback you raise with UAL staff on behalf of your fellow students does not have to reflect your own personal beliefs or individual experience; however, it should always be related to one or more of the four academic experience feedback topics listed in Q3 above. 

If you receive feedback from one or more students that you’re uncertain about, it can be helpful to reflect on it by asking these questions: 

• Is the feedback this student has raised about their experience of UAL’s teaching and learning? 

• Is the feedback this student has raised about their experience of UAL’s assessment and feedback processes? 

• Is the feedback this student has raised about their experience of UAL’s facilities and resources? 

• Is the feedback this student has raised about their experience of how the course is organised? 

If the answer is ‘yes’ to any or all of the above, then despite your own personal view or experience, the feedback is relevant and should be shared with UAL staff. 

The Education Quality Team at Arts SU is available Monday – Friday to support Course Reps and School Reps in their role; if you have any queries or concerns, get in touch by emailing us at coursereps@arts.su.ac.uk or schoolreps@arts.su.ac.uk  

The Advice Team at Arts SU is available Monday – Friday to support all students with any complains and concerns to do with housing and accommodations, mental-health and personal wellbeing and formal academic complaints. Get in touch by emailing them at advice@arts.su.ac.uk  

If you want to speak your Sabbatical College Officer about a college-wide issue that is impacting student, or share your own ideas for a campaign or initiative, you can get in touch with them. Find your Sabbatical College Officer here.