Even though many of our graduates will have progressed in their careers since completing a case study, they are still of interest to students who wish to gain an understanding of the world of work.

I work with a dedicated team to provide welfare and academic support, to a caseload of thirty 14-18 year old high achieving students from low-socio-economic backgrounds, through ongoing bespoke mentoring support, events and residentials.

I am also responsible for maintaining up to date student information such as writing reports on qualitative and quantitative data collected throughout the academic year and presenting findings to secondary school staff and wider UEA Outreach and Recruitment Teams, to ensure Widening Participation guidelines are met and to improve the programme in future years.

Typically, I will visit one of the five school I work in and do up to four, one-hour mentoring appointments. These are on topics ranging from writing a successful personal statement, usually for year 12 students, to managing anxiety and stress around the exam period. I will then return to the office and type up the actions the students need to complete in their own time to achieve certain goals discussed in the session send these over to them to be completed by a preset deadline and then review these actions and goals in the next session which is typically 3 weeks later.

I very much enjoy people facing roles and especially those which I believe are really making a difference to the person I am working with. I especially like that I am encouraging young people to go to university as I loved my own experience and really believe in the value of Higher Education study.

There are a lot of safeguarding procedures to follow as the young people are from vulnerable backgrounds.

I really wanted to work within the Higher education sector as I had done a lot of student work for the University of Sheffield during my time there and found it hugely enjoyable. I especially enjoyed the mentoring role I did at the University, and this encouraged me to apply for a full-time mentoring role.

Verbal and written communication skills are hugely important in my line of work. Also, public speaking and presentation skills.

My first job after completing my undergraduate degree was as an English Language Teacher, Chongqing Three Gorges University, China, August 2014-June 2015.

In this role taught and managed classes of Chinese students from several degree disciplines, supporting them with English reading, writing, speaking and listening. As a prerequisite to this job, I got a teaching English as a Foreign language qualification.

After this Oct 2015-June 2016 I moved to Madrid in Spain to once again become an English Language Teacher at an after school/work academy called the Chester School of English.

For this role I planned, prepared and delivered student-centred lessons to Spanish, English as a Second Language students, of a variety of levels, ranging from children to adults, beginner to advanced.

I would like to combine my experience teaching abroad and working with international students with my current experience working in an English Higher Education environment. A role that would ideally combine these two elements would be in international student welfare support or in international student recruitment. I am currently applying for these types of work.

Really make the most of the opportunities offered by the University, especially part-time work. Not only does it pay really well but it might end up leading you towards your desired career in the future. Every bit of experience helps.

Ian  BA Geography (1996)
Director of Finance, Planning & Governance  (Education)

Accepts questions from students about their career