We are delighted to announce that we have appointed two new Development Consultants to the sparqs staff team, Cerys Davies and Sophie Kennedy. Between them they bring a great balance of knowledge and expertise and we look forward to working with them both very soon.
Cerys joined us on Monday 29th June from Aberdeen University Students’ Association, where she was the Student Representative Co-ordinator. She has been involved with sparqs in recent years as a regular contributor to our Student Engagement Staff Network (SESN) meetings. Cerys also brings experience from working in Access and Articulation at Robert Gordon University where she worked with students and staff from colleges and universities to address issues such as retention and progression. She has a wealth of experience supporting student voice activities and in her most recent role she supported the institution’s TQER, SPA and SEAP, ensuring the processes were shaped by appropriate data and evidence. Her experience of supporting the co-design of new student representative structures based on recommendations from a Democracy Review and utilising data streams to inform wide-spread decision-making will bring important insight to the sparqs team.
Sophie is due to join us in early August, just in time for our summer training! She joins us on secondment from Abertay Students’ Association, from her role as Democracy and Representation Co-ordinator, where she has been involved in a range of exciting projects, including teaching on an accredited first-year microcredential about student life and experiences, and supporting the development of a toolkit for academic staff on more inclusive teaching practices for neurodivergent students. She has also been a regular contributor to our SESN meetings for several years and has recently been sharing the Scottish approach to student engagement and the Student Learning Experience model with colleagues from Portuguese Universities. Sophie has recently gained her Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy.
Both Cerys and Sophie attended our recent, joint STAG/SESN/NEON meeting in mid-May, our annual ‘planning for the year ahead’ meeting, so will already have a good insight into some of our work plans for the coming academic year …and pieces of work which may be coming their way!
Cerys’ bio has been added to our staff page and Sophie’s will be added when she begins in post. Their main work areas and responsibilities will be established over the coming weeks and months and their bios will be updated accordingly. Changes to our institutional contact list will inevitably be made over the summer and we will be in contact with any institutions whose sparqs contact will be changing... and, of course, previous sparqs contacts will also be on hand during any transition periods.
We are delighted to have Cerys and Sophie joining the team, in perfect timing for the summer training period! We know that sector colleagues will, as always, join us in extending a warm welcome to them both.