About

I am a Senior Lecturer in Social Work.

• I teach both the MA Social Work and the BA Social Work Programme and I am a tutor on the BA Social Work Programme
• I am Year 1 Tutor and Year 2 Tutor for the BA Social Work
• I was runner-up in the Inspirational Teaching Award, Union of Students Derby 2018
• The Student Mentor Project, which I initiated, won University's Biggest Win in 2018
• I won the Exceptional Contribution to Education Award in 2019
• I became a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy in 2020

Teaching responsibilities

I am Module Leader for:

• Attitudes and Values
• Applied Sociology
• Human Growth and Development

I also teach on the Substance Use Module, as well as being a personal tutor on both the BA and MA Social Work programmes.

I teach on the MA in Social Work, Counselling Degree, Child and Family Health degree and Health and Social Care degree.

I research compassion-focused teaching.

I lead student peer mentoring on BA Social Work.

I am to become a Schwarz Rounds facilitator.

Professional interests

• Therapeutic Social Work
• Loss
• Counselling
• Inequality
• Teaching and Assessment Methods
• Student Mentoring
• Developing the self-belief and aspirations of students
• Compassion-focused teaching

Research interests

• Teaching and Assessment Methods
• Student Mentoring
• Creative Teaching
• Developing students' self-belief and aspirations
• Compassion-focused teaching

Membership of professional bodies

• Social Work England
• Human Givens Institute
• Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy

Qualifications

• BA Hons Law, St Catharine's College, Cambridge June 1982
• MA Social Work, University of Nottingham 1990
• Human Givens Diploma 2001
• Postgraduate Certificate in Reflective Supervision, University of Birmingham 2011

Recent conferences

• Presented on Assessment by Discussion at LTE Conference University of Derby 2016
• Presented on Assessment by Discussion at Higher Education Academy Conference in 2017
• Presented on Student Mentoring at ICERI conference in Seville in 2017
• Presented on Student Mentoring at UKAT Conference in 2018
• Presented on Student Mentoring at IPIE Conference in 2018
• Presented on Record, Pause, Rewind skills technique at IPIE Conference in 2018
• Presented on A Partnership Approach to Student Mentoring at the International Forum of Peer Mentoring in Brighton in June 2019
• Presented on Cultivating Self-Belief at Education New Directions Conference in Porto in June 2019
• Presented webinar for UK Advising and Tutoring (UKAT) on Developing Self-Belief and Aspirations of Students in Higher Education in July 2019
• Presented on a Partnership Approach to Student Peer Mentoring at the Student Experience Conference hosted by the University of Derby in November 2019
• Presented at The Learner Conference (Valencia virtual) on Cultivating Learner Self-Belief and Aspirations in July 2020
• Presented at Derby Festival of Learning July 2020 also on Cultivating Learner Self-Belief
• Presented a webinar on the importance of compassion and cultivation of student self-belief to the International Peer Learning Network in March 2021
• Presented on the Cultivation of Student Self-Belief at UK Advising and Tutoring Conference in April 2021
• Presented on Embedding a Culture of Student Self-belief at Advance HE Conference in July 2021
• Presented on Surviving as a Professional in a World of Nonsense at Human Given Institute Conference May 2022
• Presented on Person Centred and Action Learning approaches to partnership in student mentoring at the International Peer Learning Forum 2022
• Presented on Engaging Students Through the Use of Music and Filmed Drama at END Conference 2022
• Presented on Online Q and A sessions to support Student Peer Mentoring. International Forum of Peer Learning. March 2023
• Presented at The Learner Education Conference (Sao Paulo) 2023 on Why An Understanding of Social Work and Counselling Can Be Helpful for All Educators in Hiher Education

Experience in industry

• Worked for Derby City Council as a Residential Social Worker, 1984-2004
• Worked for Derby City Council as Training and Education Officer, 2004 -2012
• Worked as a Senior Lecturer at the University of Derby, 2012-Present
• Have carried a private counselling caseload since 2001

International experience

• Presented at ICERI Conference in Seville, 2017
• Presented at IPIE conference, 2018
• Presented at END conference in Porto, 2019
• Presented at The Learner Conference (Valencia virtual), July 2020
• Presented a webinar on the importance of compassion and cultivation of student self-belief to the International Peer Learning Network, March 2021

Recent publications

• Learning Imaginatively in Higher Education (2017) Human Givens Journal Vol 24 No. 1
• Cultivating Self-Belief in Students published in December 2018 in the Human Givens Journal (Jinks. G & Harber. A.D.)
• Behaving Professionally in an Age of Political and Corporate Nonsense (2020) Human Givens Journal Vol 27 No 1 2020
• Presented a webinar on the importance of compassion and cultivation of student self-belief to the International Peer Learning Network, March 2021
• A chapter on the use of service user feedback in Williams & Conroy (2022) A Student's Guide to Placements in Health and Social Care Settings. St Albans. Critical Publishing
• The Use of Online Q and A Sessions to support Student Peer Mentoring. (2023) International Forum of Peer Learning