Art History Staff & Student Consultative Committee

Art History Staff & Student Consultative Committee
1:00 pm Boswell Room, Wednesday 17 February 2016
ATTENDING:
Staff: Dr Julian Luxford (Head of Department)
Dr. Tom Normand (Staff Representative)
School President: Lily Barnes
Year Reps:
(PHD) Elizabeth Swarbrick
(MLitt Art History) Anja Ivic
(4th Year) Kelly Bertrando
(4th Year) Vienna Kim
(3RD Year) Isabelle Mooney
(2nd Year) Helena Neimann Erikstrup
(2nd Year) Viktoria Szanto
(1st Year) Sandra De Giorgi
Apologies: Dr Ulrike Weiss (Director of Teaching), Natasha Sivanandan (UG1 rep), Hannah
Sycamore (MGS rep)

LB: No feedback regarding MEQs; the DoT and I have not had that discussion yet, but
I will keep you informed on it.
1 New Business:
a. Joint Honours Information
LB: This has been a concern over the past year, particularly of the Arts and
Divinity Faculty President. I want to know what students felt about the
information received about Joint Honors and Joint Honors in general. The
concerns were lack of communication between advising of two schools and work
load. A lot of potentially troubling concerns may not apply to our school.
KB: I’ve never had any issues.
JL: It is very simple and we’ve gone to great lengths in this school on how to find
out about expectations of Joint Honors students.
LB: As a school we are doing well on this front.
JL: If this a passion of the faculty president it is up to them to produce a
handbook. There is sufficient information out there.
LB: There has been a suggestion to create a compilation of Joint Honors
information, but I know in the past that, despite support for the idea in theory,
there has been concern about whose responsibility this would be to create.
b. Appoint a New Library Rep
LB: Cordelia will not be returning to St Andrews so there is an open position for
3rd year and a need for a library rep position.
JL: What does this involve?
LB: SLUG meetings, 3-4 times a year; any student feedback specific to library
resource issues will go through them and they will work with me to work through
this
TN: Does the student rep liaise with the school’s library rep?
LB: Not officially, however this might be useful. It is a minimal role so there is
room for expansion within the role.
IM: I can take on the role.
LB: Do we run elections for the 3rd year position or are we okay as we are?
IM: Collecting feedback was not any harder. I would be fine doing it on my own.
LB: As there is no requirement to fill this position if we do not feel the need to,
then we can stay as we currently are.
2 Class Rep Feedback Updates
Post-graduates:
PGR
ES: The PGs are very happy this year, due to good work of Linda Goddard and
Mary Kettle
o One deadline in PGR calendar coming up.
o PGR forums are well attended, thank you Lily for your help in applying
for money.
o One Pproject that I have no disentangled how to go about; would it
be possible to have skills training in regards to image manipulation? I
have approached Andrew who was happy to run such workshops. I
would need to cost it out and apply for funding. How does this work
with Andrew’s contract?
JL: He should help people with anything to do with the provision of images.
He is a full-time member of staff. It would be a matter of courtesy to him and
it would seem to be within his work.
ES: He has previously run such courses for CAPOD and it had been
freelancing.
JL: Do you want a CAPOD course?
ES: I was thinking of two short workshops on basic principles of photoshop
and in-design so we can present our images as professionally as possible
within our thesis documents. It would be just for PGs and within the
department.
LB: You need to find interest and guarantee attendance. The Union Design
Team could perhaps be helpful as well, as I know they have run free
photoshop classes in the past.
JL: We would want to avoid duplicating something that already exists.
TN: In the past I have always discussed this with students as each thesis is
different. There is a different way to put across images, there might also be
copy-right issues.
ES: Some theses may have a small amount of images and some may have a
lot.
TN: It raises questions of whether you put images in the text or whether you
cite images at the end.
ES: There are some programs that make it easier, such as preparing images in
another program and exporting them into theses. It makes files smaller and
easier to export
JL: Students can map out their own issues and then go to Andrew with
specific issues. It would give Andrew more work but everyone would get
more effective help. It needn’t be run through CAPOD or necessitate raising
money.
MLitt Museum and Gallery Studies
LB: Any feedback has now been addressed. No other concerns at the
moment.
MLitt Art History
AI: Everyone is happy with their modules, students are finalizing dissertation
topics right now. At the beginning of March there will be a pizza night for
which funding has already been secured.
Honours:
Fourth Years
VK: People are happy with the expectations of their courses and happy with
communication between tutors and professors. People who haven’t attended
school events have heard good things about them and people who have
attended that they are organized and useful.
o Research seminars are good but are too focused on modern and
contemporary, students want more Renaissance and medieval seminars.
o Exam process and grading of last semester: some people thought the
dissertation feedback was useful. One person didn’t receive their
dissertation feedback. Is there a time to receive feedback? Hours without
having to individually message tutors?
JL: I disagree. Exam feedback is a right and students can have a session with
your tutor. Very few people request it and I don’t think a general session
would help. Everyone would need different feedback. I would hope people
have a good enough relationship with tutors to request it from them
personally. They can also contact the office for this if they wish.
VK: From personal experience, I want feedback, but sometimes have trouble
communicating to tutors. A set hour might remind and/or encourage people.
JL: People have office hours, however making an appointment is expected as
they might be seeing someone else.
KB: Maybe it needs to be better advertised.
JL: An email can go out as this is not adequately advertised. This is a concern
raised in other years. It is in the handbook, but people forget as the exam is over.
The staff are obliging; we want you to do as well as possible.
KB: On the topics of information about the dissertation, the main issue was
about ethics forms. More information in advance would be helpful. In the
learning and teaching review some other issues came up; the advisors weren’t on
same page and there was confusion around forms A and B.
TN: This is my fault I need to look at it more carefully and give better
information. There is routine that should be followed by all advisors. I’m not
insistent on forms A and B enough, I should insist that we have paper work
continually coming through; the majority submit form A but when they start
they’re on a different thesis. I must try harder.
KB: A potential solution could be a meeting between all dissertation advisors to
make sure they are on the same page, such as how many drafts to look over as
there are differences between advisors at the moment.
TN: There is a minimum number of readings to do, but all of us are happy to
return again and again; perhaps there should be a maximum reading limit. All
advisors have to do a minimum; beyond that it is a negotiation between
supervisor and student.
KB: There is one student that hasn’t received dissertation feedback.
TN: I am shocked that this happened, all students need to go to the office and
ask.
LB: We can remind people to get their feedback from the office. If it’s not there,
contact one of the three of us, we’ll work this out.
JL: To go back to the research seminars mentioned earlier, I would like to explain
it, not to excuse it.
o It depends on who is available. It is organized a year in advance and we
want a certain standard of speaker coming, so there is limited pool of
people.
o The people organizing it have more connections with modern speakers.
LB: Last semester there were at least 2 were pre-modern seminars.
JL: Due to the desire for artist talks, there are more contemporary speakers (still
alive). I do sympathize and agree there should be a balance, but there are
reasons it pans out like this.
Third Years
IM: I asked how students felt about module choices this semester and their
dissatisfaction from last semester. People feel happy and catered to it and
people’s concerns were seen to quickly.
o There was anticipation about masters and whether in the future we were
going to have talk from other universities about Masters outside of St
Andrews.
LB: This is not something that I have thought about and I don’t know how I feel
about. The St Andrews Masters session was poorly attended; I would not want to
invite other universities for an empty room. If it is done, then it is something that
needs careful planning and that we should be sure there is a definite demand for.
KB: Christies come every year.
LB: It’s hard to cater to things beyond that, as art history and St Andrews are so
international - Would we go beyond Scotland, go to USA? It’s hard to cater to the
demand; we would have to put a lot of research into it, but it is an interesting
idea.
IM: People like the careers talks. One student was talking about interdisciplinary
masters and wanted to find out more about jobs non-related to art history.
LB: I tried to look into it but it’s hard to seek people out. Most of the people I find
are within the field of art history. I would want to know if people are interested
in them, but it is something to think about in the future. At the last careers event
we surveyed to see what people wanted, we could to that again.
VK: It’s a matter of talking to people and who they actually want to hear from.
JL: Art history is useful in hospitality/tourism industry. We could ask members of
staff about people who have been through this department and work in those
sectors. People are happy to come back, though usually from London.
TN: They’re all over the world and it can be difficult.
JL: There are some. Members of staff can be asked, they are a resource.
ES: PHD students can also be asked. We know people who are doing well in nonrelated art history department (such marketing and advertising).
LB: That is something to think about for possible third careers event, or for next
year. It would be great to use to contacts and expertise of staff and PhDs.
JL: Things that were recommended by the teaching review for the school
o We need to liaise better with Careers Centre
o Members of staff would give ‘how I got here’ talks
LB: Other schools have ‘meet the academics’ lunches. I can talk to other
presidents to see how that’s done.
JL: People don’t necessarily want to listen to staff talk, but staff probably know
people whose advice would be helpful to students.
Sub-honours:
Second Years
HNE: Most students think the course is what they expected, mostly positive
feedback for lectures, students think material is engaging and interesting
VS: There has been progress in the digitizing of resources. There was an unofficial
complaint but it was never filed.
TN: To address the complaint, I don’t make the powerpoint available at the point
of the lecture. A student would like it to be opened up before. I would not like to
for the good of education, but think I am going to be beaten down.
HNE: No one has complained.
JL: There could be a comprehensive survey about what people want in regards to
the issue.
TN: I think its worse when the powerpoint is released.
JL: We are required to post them early for those with special circumstances.
VK: I like to open them during lectures, not necessarily before, but I can go back
after the lecture and review the slides.
LB: We can get an answer from the second years through a survey, perhaps find
2-3 other issues to put on it, so that we get comprehensive feedback on more
than this one issue.
HNE: Issue that the lectures go too fast, there is too much information and they
are not in-depth enough.
TN: Lectures can have too much in it and it become a poor lecture for that
reason. We want everything out there, but sometimes the timing doesn’t work.
VS: That is what honors is for, to go more in depth.
ES: There are reading lists if you want more in-depth information.
JL: We should go down to minimum weight, but sometimes there is so much
material.
TN: We don’t want to leave things out.
JL: For pedagogical reasons it probably wouldn’t matter to have one fewer
images/slides
LB: If extreme shaving down of content has to be done, then extra content could
be included as an epilogue on the powerpoint instead of being presented.
KB: Lecturers could suggest to tutors to discuss material that was left out.
ES: Students have asked tutors for that, as we wouldn’t know if something was
missed. I start tutorials with asking how the lectures were to encourage students
to ask about anything was unclear. Often I feel that students do not take this
opportunity to ask questions about exactly this: things they do not understand
from lectures.
LB: We should encourage people to talk to members of staff and use them as the
great resource they are. Some newer students may not be sure what is allowed.
We should encourage people to contact us and/or ask their tutors if they have an
issue.
JL: There are layers of help which are written in the school handbook. If the tutor
isn’t helpful, students can go to module coordinators.
First Years
SD: Students are generally happy. Like last semester there are a lot of new
people to art history who are getting into the swing of things. Most people
thought the VAT was more difficult than exams, but that the VAT was also good
prep for the exams.
JL: Lots of people take it as a third subject and then change their intention for
honors as we have so much to offer. We want to look after these people
(newcomers).
JL: How many people asked for exams?
SD: Not many; students generally didn’t want to revisit the exam, but I think its
an important resource.
VK: We could send an email sent to remind people to come discuss exams.
JL: The email should remind people that they are entitled to their exams. Exams
can bring down an average and some people go into denial about it. Feedback
from past exams are very important preparation for the next exams.
TN: Feedback is crucial.
JL: It is important that there is a one-on-one session. Tutors don’t mark up the
scripts a lot and students need someone to talk them through it.
ES: In the undergraduate skills workshops we can mention that students are
entitled to feedback and ask for it.
JL: You will do well in the exam if you don’t get too focused on just one session.
Students should do lots of reading, attend lectures; the workshop should be
about fine tuning things. The critical thing to know about exams is they test you
over the entire course.
4
Any Other Business
LB: This is still a few weeks off but elections will be happening for school president. If
you’re interested email me about it. Also if anyone else have presidential aspirations,
tell them to contact me.