How to Resolve Student Complaints Skilfully and Effectively in Higher Education

Farseeing and Highly Developed solutions to 13 Thorny Student Complaints questions - directly from 7 Pre-eminent UK Educational Complaints Specialists

London

Friday, 23 March 2012
Caledonian Club, London SW1

SOLD OUT

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23 March is now fully booked

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Thursday 24 May

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xfull conference programme below ...

0930
Coffee and registration

1000
Chairman's introduction:
What new pressures and types of complaints can we expect as a result of the current Higher Education legislation?
x
Peter Williams CBE
Board Member, Improving Dispute Resolution Advisory Service for Further and Higher Education (IDRAS)
Is former Chief Executive of the Quality Assurance Agency and past President of the European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education.

1005
Students, parents and employers can fall into the trap of seeing university as a transaction which leads to a degree. How can student charters be clear in managing expectations of what students are actually buying? Will the new legislation increase the impression that students are buying a degree?

1045
To what extent are complaints growing because students struggle to make the transition from being rewarded for effort in performing tasks at school to being rewarded for attainment by applying their minds at university?

1125
Morning coffee

1140
How do you deal with students who complain about resources, tutors and other university inputs when the real issue is their performance? What if the complaint is about reasonable adjustments for disability or raises issues of discrimination?

1220
Under the legislation, how are student group actions going to manifest themselves. What extra powers do universities have to address group action?

1300
Lunch

Format for the day:
With the help of 106 education complaints practitioners, we have developed a series of thorny questions where a forthright discussion will be of benefit..
Led by your chairman, Peter Williams CBE, the speakers will give short, highly targeted 30-minute presentations, before the question sets are opened to the Panel and audience for 10 minutes of questions and discussion.

1400
How can you effectively apply mediation as an alternative approach to resolving complaints? How can this underpin a change of culture in complaints handling?

1440
 How does mediation work alongside complaints processes? In what circumstances and at what stage - sooner or later - do you stop investigating and start mediating?

1520
How do you achieve finality in long-running or vexatious cases? When and how do you communicate that there is nothing more to be said and no further progress can be made?

1615
Close of conference

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Your Complaints-Resolution Specialists

Sir Deian Hopkin
Former Chair of the Student Loans Company and Vice Chancellor and Chief Executive of London South Bank University.
President of the National Library of Wales and an IDRAS Board member, he serves on the Council of Essex University and the City and Guilds Institute and on the Higher Education Commission. A patron or trustee of a number of charities and organisation, including the Campaign for Learning, he is also Vice Chairman of the Council for Assisting Refugee Academics.

Rob Cuthbert
Professor of Higher Education Management, University of the West of England and Chair of IDRAS
Has 20 years’ senior management experience including Deputy Vice-Chancellor and Acting Vice-Chancellor. Was Chair of the Society for Research into Higher Education, awarded a Fellowship by SRHE in 2010.

Fiona O’Donnell
Director of Legal Services, University of Dundee
Set up and leads Dundee's pioneering and highly successful early dispute resolution service. She is a former Trustee of Mediation Scotland and co-editor of "a Guide to Mediation in Scotland".

G. R. Evans
CEO of IDRAS and Professor of Medieval Theology and Intellectual History, University of Cambridge
Co-founder of Oxcheps Higher Education Mediation Service, project leader of the Improving Dispute Resolution Project funded by HEFCE, CEO of the Improving Dispute Resolution Advisory Service, experienced in dispute-resolution casework in HE.

Ros Gardner
Is one of the UK's most accomplished customer care specialists. She managed Marks & Spencer's outstanding customer services department, held overall responsibility for the operation of Citizens Advice Bureaux in England, and helped the Cabinet Office identify and implement best practice in customer care and complaints handling within the public sector.

Chris Morecroft
Is Former Chair of the Association of Colleges Higher Education and Further Education Group, and a Board member on JISC Advance, the Open College west Midlands Region and IDRAS. Has 37 years teaching and senior management experience including being the Principal of Worcester College of Technology and Principal of Dearne Valley College.
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