PDR

A busy week was made busier! The one morning I didn’t have to be in the field, my personal development review was scheduled. I had made sure to fill out the form. It turned out to have been last year’s version. It didn’t look different from the new one, but apparently, close scrutiny would reveal relevant details. Oh well. 

I have my meetings with the Head of School (John) and the Director of Teaching and Learning (Dei). That leads to some meandering conversations! Staying on topic isn’t always Dei’s strongest point. But this time, we had a curfew. I needed to pick students up from Bangor not much later! 

We did the usual talking about teaching and teaching management and other roles, and we got a bit sidetracked by the initiative to change the teaching on the non-biological side. It turned out that John didn’t know what was going on. Informing him wasn’t really the aim of the PDR, but that’s the sort of usual derailment. 

Another thing that derailed a bit was academic integrity. I mentioned before that I had been lenient on a student, after which she filed a complaint for non-adherence to the regulations. Even though it had been to her advancement. I suppose she might have figured she could effectively be acquitted on the basis of a technicality. A risky assumption! But it may have paid off. If so, that means we send student into the world with good Bangor University degrees, even if they admit to having let AI write their dissertations. I think that’s wrong. But I don’t have the final say here. 

Since that incident I have been a veritable stickler for the rules. This resulted in me referring three students to the University’s academic integrity panel this summer. These students are now all three still in limbo. No panel meeting has yet taken place, and these students don’t know their fate, even though term is already starting. John knows this. So he knows I have agreed to become a jobsworth, and he has cold hard evidence for that actually happening. He still told me at least three times during the meeting I should be that jobsworth. Yes I know! And you know I know! And you know it’s actually happening. Now shut up about it. 

This will have been my last PDR with John, as he is retiring. I have no idea who his successor will be! PDRs might be quite different with someone else…