Meet Professor Gill Knight, your new Pro VC for Academic Leadership & Student Experience

In this interview, Professor Gill Knight, who recently joined the University’s senior leadership team, (the Offices of the Vice-Chancellor), shares her story of where she came from and her ambitions to enhance the experience for our students here at the University of Wolverhampton.

Hi Gill, thank you for taking time from your busy schedule to speak with us. Can we start with a quick introduction – where have you joined us from?

Hi, I’m professor Gill Knight, Pro Vice-Chancellor for Academic Leadership and Student Experience (ALSE). Prior to coming to the University of Wolverhampton I was Director of Education at Royal Holloway University, in Surrey, and before that I was at Aston University as their Associate Dean for Education in the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences.

My background is in bioscience. I was a Cancer Research UK scientist for 10 years at the University of Birmingham, researching the Human papillomavirus that causes cervical cancer and neck cancer, and then I moved into higher education about 12 years ago, and have worked my way up from being a part-time teaching fellow, to your Pro Vice-Chancellor.

What does your role as Pro Vice-Chancellor for Academic Leadership and Student Experience entail, and most importantly, what will that look like for students?

The idea of the role is to look across the institution to see where we’re doing a good job teaching and supporting our students making sure that their whole student journey, from before they join the university right through to their graduation, is successful and that they feel like they’ve got the right knowledge, skills and education, and the support that they need.

I’ll be working closely with academic colleagues, with Faculty Deans and Associate Deans around understanding how we’re delivering education, looking at where we’re doing really well, but equally where we need to be enhancing activities. 

I’ll also be working with the other staff across the university who support our students, such as the careers team, ASK@WLV and working with the Students’ Union to understand where we need to be looking at putting new initiatives in place to ensure we get the best outcomes for our students.  One of the key areas that we need to focus on is considering how we can give our students the right skills and opportunities within the curriculum – noting that a great many of students have a lot of commitments outside of study and often find it difficult to balance study with external commitments.

Another area to look at is going to be around our curriculum design; how do we actually teach our programmes here? I think we’re doing some great stuff already, but there’s always room for improvement. We need to be thinking a lot about how our assessments are inclusive and accessible and make sure that they challenge the right knowledge and provide the right experience. We need to think about how we make our education representative of the students we have here, so they can see themselves reflected within their degree programme.

That sounds like a great approach, to put the student in the centre of the design and build around their needs.  Which of these areas are you most excited about getting stuck into?

I think it’s got to be around strengthening our co-creation and our student partnerships. That is something I’ve done very successfully in previous institutions, I found it exceptionally beneficial for me to understand how our students are finding their university study. They often bring in different ways of thinking, they have different experiences to us and that is key in us delivering education here.

I also find that it’s an incredibly beneficial experience for the students too. They get to work with us and understand how the university functions, they get to develop some really good transferable skills around how to balance their time better, how to communicate, how to understand and put themselves in different situations. So that’s the kind of piece I really would like us to be delivering and developing here at Wolverhampton. It is here, but I think we can strengthen it and make it more of a standardised practice. 

And so why do you choose to join us at Wolverhampton, what drew you to us?

I was born and bred in South East England though I moved up to the Midlands and have been here over twenty years, so I really know the region well. When I was previously working down in Surrey it was interesting how much I missed my networks and understanding of the West Midlands area, so when this opportunity came up it felt like I could come back and do something that I understand and really enjoy. I’ve worked at universities like Wolverhampton a lot in my career, such as University of Derby, and Aston, so I really do feel like I understand our type of universities and I feel comfortable – this is where I know what I need to be doing. I know the staff, I understand the students, so from that perspective, I feel like I fit well into that kind of role. To be able to work with a university like this, which sits very well within its region, with a strong civic purpose, is something that really attracted me and I’m very glad that I’m here.

And we very glad to have you! You clearly have a lot of experience, not just leadership roles, but also working closely with students. As a final thought, as we’re at the start of new semester and are welcoming a new intake, do you have any advice for students, at any stage of their journey?

The one thing I found when I was in the classroom teaching, and I really enjoyed working with students teaching them, is that they sometimes felt a bit reluctant to ask when they weren’t sure, and when they didn’t really get it. They maybe thought everyone else understood it, it was only them who didn’t, or they didn’t know who they should be talking to for help.

What I realised is that when they found someone to talk to, it was incredibly useful to them. So, I do urge that students make sure they know who they can have those conversations with. Build those networks, not just with their friends and peers, but with their academic staff and other staff across the University - and don’t be afraid to reach out when you’re not sure! That's what our role is, we are here to help you succeed, to make sure you understand those problems and challenges within your learning and teaching, and other aspects of university life to make sure that you get the right support you need.  Often, we don’t ask until it’s a little bit too late, and from a university perspective, it can be quite difficult to catch you back up. So, if you’re not sure, do reach out, you’ll find the right person to talk to and they will help you through your journey.

It sounds like this is something that resonates deeply with you…

Yes, I can relate. I am terrible at maths, even though I’m a bioscientist. I always remember teaching in biology labs and there’s these students, you can see on their face the minute the maths starts, that they didn’t get it, and they are panicking. But I’d show them techniques that I’d used, there are easy ways, you just have to find them.  We love to over complicate things at times and if there’s a quick and easy win, show them that!