peer assisted study support issue no.4, autumn/winter ... · gregory and nicholas illman) at the...

PASSPASS NEWSLETTERIssue No.4, Autumn/Winter, 2009

PASS mentors inpioneering scheme withCivil Service Fast StreamFour BME (Black and Minority Ethnic) PASSmentors have been selected, via application,to be the first students benefiting from apioneering partnership between QueenMary and the Civil Service Fast Stream. This all began when Emily Huns, Head ofCareers at Queen Mary, went to a showingof the film, PASS at Queen Mary, in thesummer. She was impressed by thestudents on the film and those introducing it and put the central PASS coordinator intouch with Shareena Butt, Fast StreamProject Lead Manager. The selected PASSmentors are being paired with current CivilService ‘Fast-streamers’ who will becometheirmentors, exploring hopes andambitions for the future and informing themabout the Civil Service Summer DiversityInternship Programme and the Fast Stream.

On 4 November, a team from the FastStream came to Queen Mary to meet thefour PASS mentors chosen to take part:Melissa Gabriel (Medical Engineering), Juliet

Omotayo (Biology with Psychology), TanzilMazid (Computer Science with Mathematics)and Kanar Soor (Biomedical Sciences).Kanar’s mentor could not be there so had metup with her separately but Mel, Tanzil andJuliet were delighted to be introduced to theirs and to hear about their varied – andsurprisingly exciting - work as young FastStream Civil Servants. The advice given,including tips on tackling the tests andapplication procedures for the SummerDiversity Internship Programme and the Fast Stream was, as described by one of the chosen mentees, ‘absolutely brilliant’ but,as Rhonda Calder, Head of Marketing andDiversity for the Fast Stream, reminded them,‘You are the person who can make or breakyour experience.’

There will be more news about this scheme inthe next edition of the newsletter. For moreabout PASS and Careers working together, see ‘Working with Careers’ below.

Peer Assisted Study SUPPORT

• PASS mentors in pioneering scheme with Civil Service

• New face for PASS

• Mentor training 2009

• Alumni news

• PASS IT ON

• Working with Careers

• What is the PASS central team?

• Plea from student organisers

• Finding out more

Welcome to the fourth PASSNewsletter. Please sendcontributions for future issues to: [email protected]. The deadline for contributions or comments for Issue 5 is 1 February 2010.

New face for PASS Fathea Khanum, who joined the WideningParticipation team in March, is becoming a familiar face for PASS mentors. Fatheawrites: ‘It is great to be involved in PASS.I’d have loved to participate when I was a student at Queen Mary myself(Biochemistry, 2008). I would have been very interested in the Civil ServiceFast Stream scheme, too!’

Welcome

In this issue:

Mel, Kanar, Juliet and Tanzil with three of their Civil Service mentors (two of whom, Charlene Woolley and Ramesh Deonarine, are Queen Mary alumni)

Fathea consults with a new mentor during anicebreaker exercise at training

Pub5410 Peer Mentoring Issue4 NL_v3:Layout 1 13/11/2009 15:46 Page 2

PASSPeer Assisted Study Support

Mentor training 2009

One of last year’s PASS centralteam brought back an ideafrom a student mentoringconference we are nowadapting for PASS at QueenMary, under the name PASS IT ON. This involves setting up a bank of recentlygraduated mentors willing to give informalemail advice to current mentors in theirfinal year about how to cope with finalprojects and exams and entering the worldof further study and work. Some are alsowilling to offer ideas and advice onrunning sessions.

So far, alumni have said they are willing tobe contacted over the following areas andcurrent mentors wanting to be put intouch should contact Debbie Andrews([email protected]) or theirstudent organiser(s):

• General advice on mentoringsessions and specific advicefor student organisers

• Final year work in SBCS

• Final year work in Maths

• Final year work in ElectronicEngineering

• Final year work in ComputerScience

• Applying for a PGCE

• Applying for medical school

• Applying for Dentistry

PASS alumni reading this who are willingto join in and have not yet let us know,please get in touch.

PASS IT ON – PASSalumni help currentmentors

Three PASS mentor trainingsessions were held in Septemberto accommodate the growingnumbers on the scheme.

The trainers were impressed with the energyand commitment of the trainees, who allgive up their own time to preparethemselves in this way. This year we wereable to show the DVD, PASS at Queen Mary(funded by a small grant from Educationaland Staff Development) to give the traineesan overview of the scheme. Sessions withformer and current PASS mentors were, asusual, an important part of the training; asone of the trainee mentors said, in the truespirit of PASS, ‘It’s always good to hear frompeople who have been there.’ Former PASSmentors Samia Faruq and Chris Gungaloooffered well honed advice and currentmentors Thiaga Edirisinghe, MerottMovahedi and Mel Gabriel offered insightsfrom the mentoring front-line.

Experienced mentors would say that thetrickiest, yet most important, PASS mentoringskill is to help mentees arrive at solutions andanswers for themselves. To demonstrate this,trainees at this year’s session took part in anexercise where blindfolded ‘mentees’ calledon the help of ‘mentors’ for guidance andconfidence in working out how to reach their‘learning goal’. The difficulties in their waywere represented by objects to hand and themoment of achievement by a chocolate bar!

In the picture below, Silas Mellor (SBCS) isthe ‘mentor’ and Farrell Healion (ElectronicEngineering), the blindfolded ‘mentee’. Silascomments: ‘This blindfolding exercise gaveus a taste of what mentoring involves, andalso presented a few pitfalls for us to try andavoid. This was further explored by feedbackevaluation with the other mentors afterwards.’

Farrell recalls: ‘As the blindfolded mentee Ifelt vulnerable to what was ahead of me andthen with Silas' help I managed to overcomeall the obstacles in front of me and achievemy goals.’

For most of the year, PASS is rooted inacademic departments but the chance tomeet people from across the university attraining is always appreciated. As onetrainee mentor commented: ‘I liked the factthat there were people from differentdepartments, as all PASS sessions are rundifferently and it was good to see whateverybody thought about their departmentalPASS sessions.’

Veteran mentor Chris Gungaloo chats to new mentors in SBCS

Farrell Healion (blindfolded) is encouraged by Silas Mellor

New mentors in Maths and Dentistry chat after training

New mentor Mouna Chetehouna (SEMS) puts her pointacross in the Careers training exercise


News of PASS alumni

Some of them have emailed to catch us up on what they are doing now. We hopethose who have PASS-ed on will continue to send in news and thoughts for thisnewsletter.

Shahid Ahmed (Maths) is at the start of ateaching career: ‘At the moment I am doingmy PGCE course in Mathematics at theUniversity of East London. I have justreceived information about my firstplacement; the school is located in Essex.’

Mark Bradley (SBCS) is another teacher inthe making. He emails: ‘I've begun mySecondary Science PGCE at Goldsmiths andbegin my first school placement tomorrow!I'm somewhat apprehensive... But nevermind! PASS mentoring actually helped mefor my future career... And gave mesomething relevant and worthwhile todiscuss in my interview.’

Adam Deshpande (SBCS) is currentlystudying for an MRes (Molecular/MedicalBiosciences) at Newcastle University.

Aadila Lallo (SBCS), is still at Queen Mary but has shifted campuses to studymedicine at Whitechapel.

Jason Lizarraga (Electronic Engineering) hasbeen working on the staff at Queen Mary tosave up for travelling and reports that histickets are now bought! He says, ‘I'm offmainly to Asia: India, Philippines, Thailand,Malaysia, Singapore and China.’

Nuzhah Gooda Sahib (Computer Science)has begun a doctorate in her old departmentand is the Professional Skills ProgrammeCoordinator there, a role she takes over fromSamia Faruq who was also her predecessoras PASS student organiser in DCS.

Ivy Tong (Maths) emails: I have recentlyreturned to the country after participating ina volunteering programme in Taiwan. It wasdefinitely a great experience where I had achance to teach people English as well asMandarin. It was a training course as wellas a volunteering programme, so I got tostudy further about my religion and do allsorts of volunteering work, from cooking for 500 people (and washing dishesafterwards!) to getting my hands dirty

(digging grounds and throwing out industrialwaste for the new temple they are building).

I believe the PASS scheme has equippedme with the skills that I need when teachingpeople, whom I am not familiar with. Someof them don’t even understand anythingthat comes out of my mouth (and I speakthree languages) but at the end you seethem start picking up the language andreally being able to communicate withothers. That is quite amazing! So yeah,PASS made me understand the importanceof understanding the needs of the mentee,and how to adapt different ways of teachingwhen facing different students. Definitely.


Shahid Ahmed (with fellow PASS mentor, MohammedNaser) back in his student days…

Ivy Tong (with members of her old mentor team, JenniferGregory and Nicholas Illman) at the PASS certificateceremony in 2008

When PASS mentors graduate from Queen Mary, they are invited to stay on the mailing list for the newsletter and to keep in touch.Their continued interest is greatly valued by staff and current mentors.



What is the PASS central team? The PASS central team is made up of the student organisers, who head up the mentorteams in their Schools or departments and scaffolded by the central PASS coordinator.They meet together a few times a year to exchange ideas, mentor each other and generateideas for central PASS activities. They are also all volunteer mentors themselves, withintheir own subject teams. Ideas such as the PASS alumni advice scheme mentioned aboveare generated at their meetings.

Ongoing feedbackAs well as Facebook groups and noticeboards set up by PASS mentor teams, are the all-important sign-in sheets, providing essential records of each session. Early comments frommentees on these sheets are promising and suggest a good year ahead. They include: ‘Itwas great. I’ll come again’ and ‘Nice students, very willing to help’ (perhaps that should bea new PASS slogan….?) Many thanks to mentors and organisers from academic andcentral coordinators for ensuring these sheets are filled in and returned.

Plea to (a few) mentorsfrom (some) studentorganisersPLEASE stick to the mentoring sessions youhave put yourself down for and don’t thinka last-minute text to say you can’t come ismuch (or any) use!

Finding out moreAnyone reading this newsletter is likelyalready to be involved in PASS at QueenMary. However, if there is anything aboutwhich you would like to know more (or ifyou would like to contribute to the nextedition of this newsletter), please contact:

Dr Debbie Andrews, Peer-mentoringCoordinator (Widening Participation Team,Corporate Affairs):[email protected]

Below is a list of the key PASS people inschools and departments. These are theacademic coordinators and theundergraduate student organisers, each ofwhom is a PASS mentor leading a team ofmentors.

Established PASS schools and departments

Biological and Chemical SciencesAcademic coordinator: Dr Caroline Brennan;student organisers: Serap Gonen, SilasMellor, Kostadin Stoenchev

Computer ScienceAcademic coordinator: Dr Tassos Tombros;student organiser: James Snee

DentistryAcademic coordinator: Dr Sahar Mohsin;student organiser: Prina Patel

Electronic EngineeringAcademic coordinator: Dr Janine Lajudie;student organisers: Helena du Toit, MerottMovahedi

Engineering and Materials ScienceAcademic coordinator: Professor JuliaShelton; student organisers: Mel Gabriel,Mohamed Kadir

Mathematical SciencesAcademic coordinator: Dr Robert Johnson;student organiser: Rishi Shah

Schools and departments running PASS as a pilot this academic year

Languages, Linguistics and FilmAcademic coordinator: Dr KirsteenAnderson; student organisers: StephMurray, Jo Piddock

From left to right: Silas Mellor, Kosta Stoenchev, Serap Gonen, Helena du Toit, Mohamed Kadir, Merott Movahedi, RishiShah, James Snee, Mel Gabriel, Steph Murray (not in picture, Prina Patel, Jo Piddock)

Working with CareersAs will be clear from some of thecomments in the ‘Alumni news’ section,PASS mentors often find their experiencea very useful addition to their own skillset and to their CVs when they come tomake their next move after graduation.

Advisers from the Careers Service at QueenMary (this year, Fiona Thurley and AbiSharma) run a session to increaseawareness of this at PASS training andalways find the mentors a rewarding groupto work with. PASS also had a stand at‘Experience Works!’, the Careers Service’sevent held on 7 October for first-yearstudents looking for volunteering andemployment opportunities on campus.PASS student organisers Rishi Shah (Maths)and Stephanie Murray (SLLF) had a steadystream of enquiries and felt it was a veryuseful and enjoyable evening.

Rishi Shah gets ready to meet his public


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