On the horizon The Higher Education landscape in 2016: A university perspective

Money Matters Financial help for

students at university

Subject Spotlight: Criminology

Teachers and Advisers magazine

Issue 10: January 2016

GoldNetwork

Welcome and introduction

We hope you’ve had an enjoyable and restful break over the Christmas and New Year period, and are invigorated and ready to go for 2016!

We want to remind you of the many ways in which the network can support you, so please read our article on p4 to find out more. As always, your feedback is important to us, so please don’t hesitate to email us at schoolsliaison@gold.ac.uk

With the New Year now well underway and the 15 January UCAS deadline passed, our admissions tutors are working hard to make decisions on all of our undergraduate applications for study. Your students will soon start to receive their decisions, and we hope our article on p10-11 (Firm and Insurance choices) helps them make the next decision in their journey to university.

As you will know, there are lots of proposed changes to the HE landscape outlined in the recent Green Paper. James Ringer, our new Deputy Head of

Recruitment, unpicks the key points of the Government’s proposals and how they will affect universities. James has been with Goldsmiths since September, and brings with him a wealth of experience in the sector.

The Student Recruitment & Engagement team here at Goldsmiths is looking forward to another exciting year, with a busy events calendar including Open Days, Applicant Days, UCAS conventions, school visits, Goldclasses and Summer Schools. Our 2016 Goldclasses programme is now open for bookings, allowing your year 12 students the opportunity to gain an in-depth understanding of teaching and learning at university level. We are also delighted to confirm the 2016 Teachers & Advisers Conference will run on Friday 1 July, so please get in touch to reserve your place.

We look forward to working with and supporting you in 2016,

The Student Recruitment & Outreach team

Welcome to the tenth edition of GoldNetwork – the magazine we produce for the network for teachers

and advisers involved in supporting students with their Higher Education choices

Contents

Campus news

Reintroducing GoldNetwork

Be part of our network of advisers and teachers

Goldclasses

Free taster sessions for Year 12 students

Money matters

Financial help for students at university

For the record

Different ways students can show off their achievements

Subject spotlight: Criminology

Find out about one of our latest courses

Firm and Insurance choices A teacher’s guide to the next stage of HE applications

On the horizon

The Higher Education landscape in 2016: A university perspective

Musical score for local students

Lord Lloyd Webber’s charity supports Goldsmiths project

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8 10

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2 3GoldNetwork Teachers and Advisers Magazine Issue 10: January 2016

Reintroducing the GoldNetworkMore than a magazine

Goldclasses 2016:Free taster sessions for Year 12 students

When the first issue of this magazine was published in 2013, our aim was to inform and engage colleagues on a range of topics relating to higher education and student progression, and develop our GoldNetwork of schools and colleges.

Ten issues later, we are delighted to continue delivering Information, Advice and Guidance (IAG) nationally through the publication. But for the benefit of new readers, we wish to take this opportunity to re-introduce the wider network and its value beyond the magazine.

Connecting with people who advise students is at the heart of what we do, so our GoldNetwork of esteemed teachers and advisers is very much about us sharing best practice and acting as a conduit for discussions about the latest Higher Education policy announcements and developments. We want to support you in the best way possible, so please join us on LinkedIn, Twitter and of course at our annual Teachers and Advisers Conference on 1 July.

The Student Recruitment and Outreach team not only coordinates activities within schools and colleges for students, but also for advisers and teachers; running on-going CPD sessions around IAG and the applications and reference-writing processes.

We also work in close partnership with the Goldsmiths Teachers’ Centre (www.gold.ac.uk/teachers-centre) who can further support your role with their CPD, Certificates, Diplomas, MA and research provision that is focused around the needs of schools.

IAG is at the core of the GoldNetwork, and we hope

University taster sessions in Year 12 offer an invaluable opportunity for students to sample higher level study, both informing their decision-making process and strengthening UCAS applications.

Goldsmiths is offering over 40 subject-based Goldclasses in 2016, developed and delivered by leading academic staff. These free masterclasses aim to stimulate enquiry, broaden knowledge of the subject area and introduce students to a wider network of academics, undergraduate students and peers.

Some sessions relate closely to the school curriculum, enabling students to enhance their current studies, while others introduce new

topics studied at university level, exposing students to subjects beyond the post-16 school and college syllabus. The masterclasses are not revision lectures, but academic sessions aimed at giving students from any school or college the opportunity to gain an in-depth understanding of teaching and learning at university level.

Each Goldclass includes a stimulating lecture or workshop delivered by Goldsmiths academics, an introduction to the admissions process and the opportunity to hear about life as a Goldsmiths student from a current undergraduate.

Goldsmiths is offering Goldclasses from each of our departments, so whether

To download a complete programme and register for sessions please visit: www.gold.ac.uk/goldclasses If you have any questions please contact goldclass@gold.ac.uk

you find this magazine an enjoyable and useful part of it. We aim to stimulate conversation both in the staffroom and online, where we hope you will share your experiences and expertise as well. We really value your feedback, so please get in touch if you have any ideas about how we can improve, or you would like to work with us more closely.

@GoldSchools www.linkedin.com/ groups/8459014

or search ‘GoldNetwork’ in the LinkedIn Groups section

students are interested in entrepreneurship, the contemporary art world, media innovation or Shakespeare, we hope there will be something for everyone!

4 GoldNetwork Teachers and Advisers Magazine Issue 10: January 2016 5

THE GOLD AWARD

www.gold.ac.uk/careers/students/goldaward

BE MORE

“I have achieved more than I thought I could.Gold Award Achiever

Universities offer a variety of financial help to students, in the form of bursaries and scholarships, which are based on a mixture of need, student motivation, potential and academic achievement. Current packages on offer at Goldsmiths include fee waivers for local residents, care leavers, refugees and asylum seekers. Goldsmiths also offers help through student travel cards and help with accommodation costs.

Going to university is as much about developing experiences and skills as it is about academic study. Goldsmiths has two initiatives that encourage students to do this: the Higher Education Achievement Report (HEAR) and the Gold Award.

The HEAR is a new type of transcript that offers a more sophisticated approach to recording student achievement in Higher Education. It tracks both a student’s academic and co-curricular achievements.

The HEAR scheme was developed after a review of the UK honours degree classification. It is intended

Applications for bursaries at Goldsmiths open in April 2016. Our Scholarships Coordinator, Shoshana Jackson, offers some tips for those who want to apply:

• Make sure you have read the eligibility criteria

• Check you can provide all the supporting evidence you need

• You can apply as soon as you have a conditional or unconditional offer; do not wait for your results!

• Apply for everything you are eligible for. Goldsmiths will always endeavour to give you the highest award

• Don’t leave it until the last minute as there are often questions and checks that need to be done

• Check the university website and the department you are applying for, as sometimes universities have subject-based scholarship or bursaries

Money mattersFinancial help for students

Once students have arrived at university they can apply for extra support through the Student Support Fund for help with travel costs, hall fees bursaries and payments based on need. Goldsmiths’ student support services has twinned financial help with support on budgeting and wellbeing workshops. It is really important to remind students to ask for help early rather than when a crisis has been reached.

If you would like a talk on budgeting and financial support in your school, email schoolsliaison@gold.ac.uk

Useful websites www.gold.ac.uk/ug/fees-funding/scholarships-2016 www.gov.uk/extra-money-pay-university/bursaries-scholarships-and-awards www.scholarship- search.org.uk

For the recordGoldsmiths offers two ways for students to

demonstrate their achievements and employability

to provide a ‘rich record of student activity and modernise the traditional degree classification system’. With 70% of students graduating with a first or a 2:1, the HEAR provides a way for students to tell a fuller story of their university achievements. Goldsmiths introduced the HEAR in 2014 and students graduating from 2017 onwards will be issued with the report when they graduate. More information is available at www.gold.ac.uk/hear.

The Gold Award is a personal and professional development programme helping students to reflect on their experiences and

The thought of paying tuition fees and finding living expenses is bound to have worried most students. But in addition to government loans, there can

be help at hand from universities for students who do their research.

develop the skills they are gaining from co-curricular activities. The Award helps them to increase their self-awareness and understanding of their strengths and weaknesses but it also enables them to reflect on what they want to do in the future. The Gold Award can be recorded on the HEAR. After students achieve the award, they are in a better place to choose a career that would suit their personality and allow them to fully develop their potential.

For more information see www.gold.ac.uk/careers/students/goldaward

Joanie Magill, HEAR Coordinator

6 7GoldNetwork Teachers and Advisers Magazine Issue 10: January 2016

Could you give us a bit of background to the exciting addition of the BA Criminology to Goldsmiths’ undergraduate portfolio?

As a Sociology department, one of the things we have noticed over the past few years is a real interest from prospective students in a course that considers crime

Subject spotlight: Criminology

and criminality within a sociological context. In response, we were keen to offer a degree reflecting our research strengths relating to the social and cultural construction of crime. Rather than a taking a psychological approach to criminology, we have developed what we think will be a really dynamic and contemporary degree, taught by experts within the social sciences, and using London as a canvas to locate criminological theory within practice.

What for you is ‘the Goldsmiths approach’? How will this be reflected in the degree?

Goldsmiths is a fantastic, vibrant place to study, with a collection of really varied specialisms across our undergraduate subjects. For example, within our large department students will be learning from academics at the forefront of research concerned with urban

sociology, human rights, technology and much more – I think that kind of diversity of approach is extremely refreshing.

We’re also in the middle of a world city, which greatly informs many degrees here. From the top of Warmington Tower on our campus you can see different areas of London deeply relevant to the subject. For example, when we talk about gangs in London you can point to where the Richardsons had their scrapyards; you can see the Docklands when you consider capitalism and how we might think about something like corporate crime. I really like that we’re in the midst of all this, and that students can see that when they’re thinking about more abstract issues.

What types of students should consider this degree?

Students with an enquiring mind and imagination will thrive on this degree. As Goldsmiths is an inter-disciplinary environment, students need be quite broad-minded but also fascinated by the world around them. Students who wish to challenge assumptions and think differently about how things like crime are constructed will really benefit from studying here.

How is the degree structured and assessed?

Students take core modules offering them a firm grounding in key criminological concepts – these include modules like ‘Policing the State’ and ‘Crime and Justice in a Global Context’. In the second and third years there are options for students from right across the discipline offering really exciting variation; modules include: ‘Sex, Drugs and Technology’, ‘The London Module’ and ‘Space, Place and Power’. Assessment is varied and includes coursework, examinations and a third-year dissertation.

How will the degree support students practically with career progression after they graduate?

All the lecturers here are invested in helping students fulfil their potential beyond

the end of the degree. Every student has an academic advisor, and particularly towards the end of the degree they can meet with their advisor to talk about CV development and how they can translate what they’ve learned into something that is marketable.

As well as the support offered through the Goldsmiths Careers Service, we are in the process of finalising placements with relevant external bodies that students will complete in their third year.

One organisation we will be working with is Open Book – a unique collaborative project working with ex-offenders to deliver rehabilitation and educational opportunities through various providers. Opportunities to work with organisations like Open Book will allow students invaluable first-hand engagement with the

criminal justice system, and the opportunity for practice-based critical reflection.

More broadly, key in all of our programmes is a focus on transferrable skills. In teaching students to think critically about the world, there are benefits to employability in key areas like evaluation, analysis and communication. On a practical level, degree work that includes report writing, presentation skills and independent thinking means that students will be well equipped for graduate life – whether that is working within the criminal justice system, in the fields of rehabilitation and education or across other related sectors.

Dr Vik Loveday is the convenor of the new BA

Criminology programme, and lectures across all three undergraduate years as well as teaching on Goldsmiths’

MA Social Research.

Following the introduction of our BA in Criminology for 2016, GoldNetwork caught up with course convenor Dr Vik Loveday to hear

why students should choose to study this subject at Goldsmiths.

To find out more visit: www.gold.ac.uk/ug/ ba-criminology

8 9GoldNetwork Teachers and Advisers Magazine Issue 10: January 2016

‘Firm’ and ‘Insurance’ choices: A teacher’s guide

Firm choice

This is the student’s first choice: the university and the course that they would most like to go to. Things for students to consider:

• They should have visited the university! It’s a place they will be spending around three years of their life. If a student has already been to an open day, encourage them to visit the university and department again on an ‘Offer Holder’ day. Most universities now offer these events to students holding offers, and it’s a great way of cementing the decision the student has made.

• Encourage students to look through the course in detail – most universities will have full information available on their website if not in their prospectus. Are there modules and choices that will keep them interested for three years?

• Make sure that the student is likely to meet the conditions of their offer. It’s fine to aim high, but encourage them to be realistic. Also encourage them to look closely at the terms of their offer; are there any conditions (such as GCSE grades) that will be impossible to meet?

There is lots of information on types of offers, how to reply to offers and making firm and insurance choices on the UCAS website: www.ucas.com

After the stresses of getting UCAS applications submitted on time, your students will soon start receiving offers from universities. We offer you

bite-sized overview of the key considerations when students are deciding which universities to select as their first and second choices.

There are three different types of offer:

1. Unconditional offer: a guaranteed offer of a place at a university; usually for students who have already received their grades.

2. Conditional offer: an offer of a place as long as the student meets the grades set out in the offer.

3. Unsuccessful: The application has not been successful and the university is not offering the student a place.

Once a student has received all of their offers – hopefully from all five of their choices – they are required to make a decision on their Firm and Insurance choices.

Insurance choice

This is exactly what it says on the tin: a back-up choice just in case the student does not meet the terms of their Firm choice.

• In the vast majority of cases, the Insurance offer should contain lower grade requirements than the Firm offer (please see below)

• The Insurance choice is optional – the student should only make an insurance choice if it is somewhere that they would be happy to go if they don’t make their Firm choice – otherwise it is easier to go straight into clearing on Results Day if the conditions of the Firm offer are not met

• Encourage students to have a look at accommodation guarantees that are available to Insurance candidates – some universities will guarantee accommodation, some may offer accommodation within the first month after Enrolment, whilst some may not offer anything to Insurance candidates.

Does it ever make sense to select an Insurance choice that is higher than the Firm choice?

Usually, no. However, there are some circumstances where this may make sense. For example, if the Firm offer specifies certain grades in certain modules, whereas the Insurance offer does not. Also, in cases where the Firm choice does not count certain subjects (for example, General Studies) and the Insurance does, it may make sense for a student to have an Insurance choice at the same, or even higher, grades than the Firm.

10 11GoldNetwork Teachers and Advisers Magazine Issue 10: January 2016

James Ringer, Deputy Head of Recruitment at Goldsmiths

Two key higher education deadlines passed on 15 January: the UCAS deadline for the majority of courses and the consultation deadline for responses to the Government’s Higher Education Green Paper.

Though the paper is full of big questions, it is light on answers and detail. What seems certain though is that there will be far-reaching implications for the Higher Education sector – and elements of the paper will directly affect potential students and their advisers. With so much to do over Christmas, you are forgiven if

On the horizonThe Higher Education landscape in 2016:

A university perspective

you haven’t spent your break examining Fulfilling our Potential: Teaching Excellence, Social Mobility and Student Choice for Higher Education on your new tablet, so here we’ve tried to pick out the majors points of the paper that will affect universities, and teachers and advisers.

The proposed Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) has received the bulk of attention and fits with the paper’s focus on measuring the ‘value’ and ‘quality’ of a degree. Two of the stated aims of the TEF are to improve teaching quality and reward excellent teaching, which will be judged using a variety of metrics that are yet to be fully defined.

The likely incentive for Higher Education Providers (HEPs) to do well in the TEF will be tied to the tuition fee level they can charge. HEPs will be graded from 1-4 depending on their TEF score, with 4 being the highest. However, this does not mean that the tuition fee cap is being removed; the paper only suggests that HEPs who do well will be able to adjust

their fees upwards in line with inflation as a reward. In reality, with inflation so low, this adjustment is virtually worthless, so it seems probable that there are plans for multiple levels of ‘fee caps’ in order to differentiate the TEF levels. Any talk of increased tuition fees will be of concern to prospective students, who are understandably sensitive to their potential levels of debt when leaving university.

From the HEP’s perspective, cost and quality are interlinked within the mind of prospective students, so proposals for variable fee caps will be closely monitored by colleagues

within HEPs who are responsible for recruitment and reputation management.

One proposed teaching quality metric is ‘graduate outcomes’. Although universities minister Jo Johnson recently suggested this metric will be based on rate of entry into ‘graduate’ jobs, many are concerned it will be decided by measuring graduate salaries. To make a connection between teaching quality and graduate pay is dubious because those who study arts, humanities and social sciences tend to see lower graduate earnings than those with degrees in business, law or medicine. HEPs that focus almost exclusively on the former may find that their TEF score and resultant tuition fee cap (and doubtless league table positions) will suffer as a result.

Add to this mix the fact that on average privately educated graduates earn more than their state educated counterparts after graduation, and it looks to be a tricky future ahead for HEPs who wish to continue a commitment to arts, humanities and widening participation, for students who may be torn between pursuing a subject they love and subjects they are told are more ‘valuable’, and for CIAG staff who have to make sense of this fast changing landscape – not only for themselves but also for the students they advise.

12 13GoldNetwork Teachers and Advisers Magazine Issue 10: January 2016

An exciting new project sponsored by the Andrew Lloyd Webber Foundation is giving a welcome boost to young people in the Lewisham area as they seek to develop composing and performing skills as part of their Music GCSE and A level courses. The English Schools’ Orchestra and its professional alumni chamber orchestra, the English Young Artists’ Sinfonia (EYAS), have joined forces with Goldsmiths and Lewisham Music Services Hub to provide a series of workshops and concerts through to next summer.

Forty-five pupils from Deptford Green School, Haberdashers’ Aske’s Hatcham College and

Second consecutive win for Goldsmiths game designers In the Department of Computing, our incredible game designers were named winners of the annual Ukie Student Game Jam, making it the second consecutive win from students at Goldsmiths. You can read more news and stories from the department on their blog.

Successes for the Department of Media & Communications Graduate Ely Dagher was awarded the Palme D’Or for best short film at this year’s Cannes Film Festival for ‘Waves ’98’, an exploration of his relationship with his homeland, Lebanon. Meanwhile two students scooped prizes at the

Musical score for local studentsAndrew Lloyd Webber Foundation

backs Goldsmiths’ schools music project

Sydenham High School are taking part in the project. They have already completed two improvised compositions under the leadership of Scott Stroman, Jazz Composition Professor at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and enjoyed a concert of new and established works given by the EYAS conducted by Bob Pepper MBE, the Project Director.

Joint performances with the professional musicians and Student Ambassadors from Goldsmiths are planned for January as well as an opportunity for students to meet recognised composers, hear their pieces played live and further understand

Campus newsA round up of 2015, a year of awards for Goldsmiths

Broadcast Journalism Training Council Student Journalism Awards for their radio production work, and two editorial teams from our MA in Journalism came first and second in the BBC Worldwide Best Student Magazine category at the Magazine Academy Awards.

Goldsmiths art gallery architects win Turner Prize 2015 Assemble, the London-based architecture collective who are designing a new art gallery at Goldsmiths, were named winners of the 2015 Turner Prize. They were one of three nominees last year to have Goldsmiths connections – Bonnie Camplin is a Lecturer in Fine Art in the Department of Art, and Janice Kerbel both a Reader and a Fine Art graduate,

having completed her MA at Goldsmiths in 1996.

English & Comparative Literature graduates win creative writing awards Zoe Pilger, who graduated from the MA in Comparative Literary Studies and is a current Media and Communications PhD candidate, won a Betty Trask Award for her literary debut, ‘Eat My Heart Out’. Meanwhile Rosie Rowell (MA in Creative & Life Writing) won the 2015 Branford Boase Award for her children’s novel ‘Leopold Blue’.

Last year proved to be an exciting one for us, with many of our students, alumni and staff being recognised for redefining their fields.

Here are just some of the Goldsmiths community’s award wins and successes from 2015.

what it is like to earn a living through composition.

Peter Hayward, Head of Lewisham Music Service and Director of Lewisham Music Hub said: “I am thrilled that this exciting project has come to Lewisham; it is a great example of what can be achieved when organisations work together in partnership. The project will have a real impact in enhancing the musical skills and aspirations of young musicians in our borough.”

To find out more about Music at Goldsmiths, please visit www.gold.ac.uk/music

14 15GoldNetwork Teachers and Advisers Magazine Issue 10: January 2016

TEACHERS & ADVISERSCONFERENCE

GOLDSMITHS

Register to reserve your placeWe’ll send you updates on keynote speakers and workshops as they are confirmed

Send your name, school/organisation, email address and dietary requirements to advisersconference@gold.ac.uk

Free event1 July 2016