Are personal tutors working for combined honours and flexible students?
Mostly, yes, but access and assessment literacy need work. In National Student Survey (NSS) open‑text on the personal tutor theme, 61.7% of comments are positive, yet the model suits standard rhythms better, with full‑time students more upbeat than part‑time (index +32.0 vs +22.4). Within Combined General or Negotiated Studies, personal tutoring features heavily in feedback (7.5% share), but unresolved assessment clarity—especially marking criteria (index −41.9)—often drives students to seek help from tutors. As a cross‑institution theme, the personal tutor lens shows how well providers organise individualised support; as a subject grouping across the sector, Combined General or Negotiated Studies covers flexible, student‑designed pathways that frequently test standard support arrangements. These insights frame what follows: availability, the blend of academic and pastoral support, continuity, assessment guidance, communication, and the wider support ecosystem.
How accessible are tutors for students who straddle multiple subjects?
Availability and ease of contact dominate student judgements. Combined honours and negotiated studies students juggle multiple subject communities and often need more touchpoints. Some describe staff who respond and meet promptly; others report uneven access across departments and slow email triage. The mode pattern in NSS data implies the need to design for those with atypical timetables: publish a simple service standard (expected response window, typical check‑in cadence), offer out‑of‑hours and asynchronous options, and track adherence. Where institutions standardise routes to book time and escalate concerns, students report fewer barriers.
How can tutoring embed pastoral and academic support?
Students value tutors who recognise both academic and wellbeing pressures and who provide routes into specialist services when needed. Effective tutors normalise help‑seeking, interleave advice on study strategies with signposting, and coordinate with disability and wellbeing teams. The sector evidence shows broadly inclusive experiences; sustaining that requires accessible appointment formats, short follow‑ups after crises, and clarity about who owns what in the support network.
Does continuity of tutor matter more than fresh perspectives?
Continuity builds trust and shared context. Many students feel disoriented when tutors change year‑to‑year, especially during peak assessment or transition points. Rotation can add new approaches, but it works best when records travel with the student, expectations are reset quickly, and workload allows timely meetings. Programmes should prioritise continuity for students on flexible pathways, or at least guarantee a warm handover and a first‑month check‑in that focuses on goals, risks and upcoming assessments.
How do tutors shape academic progress, assessment literacy, and confidence?
Students want tutors who help translate programme‑level aims into concrete study plans and who demystify assessment briefs, marking criteria and feedback. In this CAH, students’ strongest pain point is criteria opacity, with marking criteria sentiment deeply negative (index −41.9). That makes the tutor’s role in assessment literacy pivotal: tutors can share exemplars, unpack rubrics, and run short calibration conversations before major submissions. When feedback lands, tutors who help students extract actions, not just comments, reduce churn and anxiety.
What gets in the way of effective tutor–student communication?
Communication quality often determines whether tutoring feels supportive. Students praise prompt, specific replies and the option to meet in person when issues are complex. Frustration grows with slow responses, unclear guidance or impersonal templates. Providers improve consistency when they publish communication standards, use a single source of truth for office hours and availability, and nudge tutors to check in at known stress points (e.g. before deadlines and after results).
Where should students turn when the tutor is not enough?
Personal tutoring works best within a connected ecosystem. Departmental advisors, wellbeing teams and disability services each have distinct roles; students need simple routes to them. For combined honours cohorts, coordination across schools prevents duplication or gaps. Predictable timetabling and named owners for course communications reduce avoidable queries to tutors and free time for higher‑value academic and pastoral support.
What do students say needs to change?
Students appreciate individualised guidance and the sense that someone knows their trajectory; they ask for easier access, steadier continuity, and more consistent assessment guidance across modules and departments. Drawing on sector patterns, programme teams should adopt playbooks from higher‑scoring subject areas: proactive onboarding, scheduled check‑ins across the year, and rapid, practical responses when stress peaks. Listening to student voice—at cohort and programme level—and closing the loop on actions sustains trust.
How Student Voice Analytics helps you
- Analyse Personal Tutor comments across years and drill from provider to school, department and programme to pinpoint where availability or communication falters.
- Compare like‑for‑like across CAH groups and demographics to see where combined and negotiated pathways diverge from the norm, including mode‑of‑study effects.
- Generate concise, anonymised summaries for programme teams that surface assessment‑literacy issues (e.g. criteria clarity), scheduling pinch points and support gaps, with export‑ready tables and year‑on‑year movement to evidence change.
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