We spoke to three of last year's winners of a Proud To Be Staffs award and asked what it meant to them, how they feel they proved themselves and even got them to offer a little bit of advice on how you can bag yourself one. You can still nominate and be nominated up until Friday 14th April so make sure you do something extra special to get yourself a nomination, or remember someone great that someone has done for you.
Melanie Ebdon - Best Feedback
How did it feel to win the award for best feedback?
"It was a huge honour – it’s always nice to feel that your efforts are recognised. I was a little surprised as I can be quite direct in my feedback but, hopefully, students understand that I’m not judging them personally, just their work and how it can improve in their next submission. Half of our small team in English & Creative Writing has now had this award in recent years, so we’re starting to think of it as “our” award and we need to fight to retain it now!"
What do you feel you did to go the 'extra mile' to recieve a nomination in the first place?
"The student that nominated me made mention of much more than written feedback on essays: it was also to do with verbal feedback, being approachable in my office, explaining things well when responding to questions in taught sessions and so on."
What advice would you give to other lecturers who may feel they deserve the award but perhaps don't receive the nomination in the first place?
"Based on my nominator's comments: to think about feedback in a variety of forms. It's also important to remember that feedback needs to be formative in some way and should always be looking towards the next submission and what can be done differently in the future. Small steps are important too: it's not usually helpful to tell a student who is getting 3rd class marks what they need to do to get a 1st. They need to be coached in small steps which will hopefully result in an improvement of 5% or so each time. I try to think of three 'improvement points' in their work which will help them achieve that."
Carmel Elliott - Volunteer of the Year
How did it feel to win the award for best feedback?
"It felt amazing to win the volunteer of the year award. It was a big honour and I was extremely happy that my hard work with the women's rugby and the girls programme had not gone unnoticed."
What do you feel you did to go the 'extra mile' to recieve a nomination in the first place?
"I fought for the club to get equipment and pitch space as well as reaching out to RFU development officers for help. I also planned and ran the sessions myself with little help to begin with until I had the 3 committed girls who came week in week out who I then created a committee with to advertise and promote the club. And I was also coaching externally and completing placement hours for my degree whilst being an active committee member for 2 clubs."
What advice would you give to other people who may feel they deserve the award but perhaps didn’t receive a nomination?
"For anyone who feels they deserve the award but hasn't been recognised, don't get disheartened because it has a massive impact on the people you work with. Whether you get the award or just receive a nomination, it doesn't matter as long as you continue to work hard and keep doing what you love and make your self happy doing it. I feel like I only won because I worked with a massive amount of people in a lot of different areas and so I had the opportunity due to contacts I made on top of all the work I did. Now my project is snowballing and the rugby team is actively in BUCS competing weekly and it's almost like my legacy when I graduate."
Katy Pogue - School Led Rep
How did it feel to win the award for best School Led Representative?
"I felt grateful and felt honoured when I was given the award. Its one of the kindest things you can get here to tell you that people acknowledge the work you put in. At the same time though I felt I wanted to share the award. There were 12 school reps who all deserved recognition and deserved that award."
What advice would you give to other people who may feel they deserve the award but perhaps didn’t receive a nomination?
"Honestly? I wish I knew, I just do what a school rep does. We work with students and staff to make things better (for both)."
What advice would you give to other people who may feel they deserve the award but perhaps didn’t receive a nomination?
"Keep your chin up. An award doesn't mean that you didn't help. The most rewarding part of any job is seeing one person who's struggling and knowing that you can help them and seeing their positivity after. That's the real reward. So if you don't get nominated don't feel down because you know in yourself that you work hard and whether it be supporting your society, your course or school you should be proud of yourself and to be staffs."
You can nominate someone to win an award here.