Dr Demetris Tillyris, Programme Director for our undergraduate degrees, explains how we will be supporting students over the summer and helping you to prepare for the new academic year starting in September.

As part of our commitment to teaching excellence and student support, we will be holding a range of (non-compulsory) re-orientation and transition sessions and activities throughout the summer and during the first couple of weeks of the next academic year. The purpose of these activities and sessions is to prepare you for the next academic year, help you excel in your studies, and keep you engaged. Some of the sessions and activities are the following:

1. Feedback ‘surgeries’ (online) with module leaders. These sessions will enable you to discuss in more detail your assignments, the feedback and feed-forward which you have received as well as ways in which you can improve your future submissions. Your module leaders will be contacting you via email about this in due course.
2. Personal tutor meetings (online). These meetings will provide you with additional feedback opportunities, and an opportunity to discuss issues or problems which might be affecting your studies. You will receive an email from your personal tutor, inviting you to attend an online personal tutor meeting in the next couple of weeks.
3. Module Material and Support: module leaders will be sharing various material related to the modules which you will be studying in the next academic year (e.g. short introductory video on the module and its focus; module handbooks; discussion questions; recommended readings etc.). Module leaders will share these learning and teaching materials via email. These materials will be also accessible via the Politics administration blackboard page (folder titled ‘Summer Transition Activities 2020).
4. Skills Based Activities and Tips: We will uploading a range of relevant activities, and more general guidelines on ways in which you can polish some of the core skills necessary to excel in your modules and professional career (e.g. essay writing; critical analysis; developing and presenting an argument etc.) These materials will be accessible via the Politics administration blackboard page (folder titled ‘Summer Transition Activities 2020).
5. COVID-19 reorientation sessions: We will be holding meetings via Collaborate or Skype with PATs and sharing via email relevant online resources to ensure that you are up-to-date with key policies and messages pertaining to Health and Safety and Learning and Teaching.

I hope that you will find these activities and sessions useful, and enjoyable. We look forward to welcoming you back in September. In the meantime, if you have any questions or issues which you would like to discuss, please do not hesitate to get in touch. You can email your Personal Academic Tutor, me, or the admin team at politics@canterbury.ac.uk