Hardback
How to Offer Effective Wellbeing Support to Law Students
This How to Guide will provide readers with information and insights which will better equip them to support law students in a higher education setting. Featuring contributions from an array of eminent academics and student support professionals, this book includes personal reflections, example scenarios and practical tips for those seeking to improve support for student wellbeing.
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Critical Acclaim
Contributors
Contents
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This How to Guide will provide readers with information and insights which will better equip them to support law students in a higher education setting. Featuring contributions from an array of eminent academics and student support professionals, this book includes personal reflections, example scenarios and practical tips for those seeking to improve support for student wellbeing.
How to Offer Effective Wellbeing Support to Law Students discusses issues that impact wellbeing from a variety of perspectives including distance learning, the influence of sex and gender on the provision of pastoral support, and the challenges of providing wellbeing support at the same time as maintaining personal wellbeing. Written in an informative yet accessible style, chapters provide strategies to work with law students in a supportive capacity while integrating wellbeing as a core component of day-to-day teaching. Ultimately this How to Guide concludes that although wellbeing support varies between universities, there are universal traits and frameworks throughout that can encourage more effective and tailored welfare assistance.
This will be an excellent resource for early career researchers and more established academics in the field of law who undertake teaching and supervisory responsibilities. It will also be of interest to student support professionals as they seek to improve their techniques when working with law students.
How to Offer Effective Wellbeing Support to Law Students discusses issues that impact wellbeing from a variety of perspectives including distance learning, the influence of sex and gender on the provision of pastoral support, and the challenges of providing wellbeing support at the same time as maintaining personal wellbeing. Written in an informative yet accessible style, chapters provide strategies to work with law students in a supportive capacity while integrating wellbeing as a core component of day-to-day teaching. Ultimately this How to Guide concludes that although wellbeing support varies between universities, there are universal traits and frameworks throughout that can encourage more effective and tailored welfare assistance.
This will be an excellent resource for early career researchers and more established academics in the field of law who undertake teaching and supervisory responsibilities. It will also be of interest to student support professionals as they seek to improve their techniques when working with law students.
Critical Acclaim
‘How To Offer Effective Wellbeing Support to Law Students is an innovative new contribution which will support both law students and legal academic wellbeing. Although not all jurisdictions of legal education around the world adopt the UK system of pastoral care, all jurisdictions now have an evidence-based ethical imperative to ensure that law schools and legal academics do no harm to our students. More than that, we have a positive responsibility to support our students in their learning and career success. This work provides both theoretical wisdom and practical guidance. Bleasdale has brought together some of the UK’s most dedicated and experienced legal educators to extend our understanding of wellbeing support strategies and enhance the capacity of the legal academy globally to respond appropriately to the mental health needs of our students in evidence-based ways. This work should be on every legal educator’s bookshelf.’
– Rachael Field, Bond University, Australia
‘This How To Guide is timely, engaging and rooted in both scholarship and experience. Lydia Bleasdale has carefully curated a stimulating collection of contributions and reflections that should support reflection about our approaches within legal education. This is not the manual or the definitive list of all the answers, but offers a thought-provoking space to prompt different approaches to student wellbeing in Law. The chapters are rooted in the lived experiences of both the authors (and it’s good to see contributions from academic and professional services colleagues) and students, and are well-referenced; thus, providing a fantastic starting point for colleagues wishing to undertake further work. I particularly enjoyed the timely reflections on the complexities generated by race, gender and class. This collection is important to the sector, not least because of similar discussions taking place within the legal profession. Running through the collection is a strong sense of the importance of belonging and community – and above all the kindness and the compassion exemplified by the authors’ approaches in their work.’
– Andrew Francis, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK
‘How To Offer Effective Wellbeing Support to Law Students could not be a more timely or welcome collection. Addressing a topic of increasing importance across legal education in the UK and globally it is accessible, insightful and thought provoking. The contributors ask us to rethink our understandings of what it means to “do” student support in the classroom, on campus and in the curriculum.’
– Richard Collier, Newcastle University, UK
‘This book provides a clear and important message that effective wellbeing support for students must blend with wellbeing support for staff. We know that students are disclosing their concerns more readily than ever before and those who read this book will be presented with a selection of tools to anticipate and address those concerns, whether they are new to offering pastoral care or new to leading personal tutoring processes.’
– Caroline Strevens, Portsmouth Law School, University of Portsmouth UK
‘This book offers many practical case studies providing examples of various efforts in the university sector to support student wellbeing. For those legal educators interested in implementing practical measures to support their students, this book will offer many ideas both in terms of course design and the provision of student support services.’
– Liz Curran, Nottingham Trent University, UK
– Rachael Field, Bond University, Australia
‘This How To Guide is timely, engaging and rooted in both scholarship and experience. Lydia Bleasdale has carefully curated a stimulating collection of contributions and reflections that should support reflection about our approaches within legal education. This is not the manual or the definitive list of all the answers, but offers a thought-provoking space to prompt different approaches to student wellbeing in Law. The chapters are rooted in the lived experiences of both the authors (and it’s good to see contributions from academic and professional services colleagues) and students, and are well-referenced; thus, providing a fantastic starting point for colleagues wishing to undertake further work. I particularly enjoyed the timely reflections on the complexities generated by race, gender and class. This collection is important to the sector, not least because of similar discussions taking place within the legal profession. Running through the collection is a strong sense of the importance of belonging and community – and above all the kindness and the compassion exemplified by the authors’ approaches in their work.’
– Andrew Francis, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK
‘How To Offer Effective Wellbeing Support to Law Students could not be a more timely or welcome collection. Addressing a topic of increasing importance across legal education in the UK and globally it is accessible, insightful and thought provoking. The contributors ask us to rethink our understandings of what it means to “do” student support in the classroom, on campus and in the curriculum.’
– Richard Collier, Newcastle University, UK
‘This book provides a clear and important message that effective wellbeing support for students must blend with wellbeing support for staff. We know that students are disclosing their concerns more readily than ever before and those who read this book will be presented with a selection of tools to anticipate and address those concerns, whether they are new to offering pastoral care or new to leading personal tutoring processes.’
– Caroline Strevens, Portsmouth Law School, University of Portsmouth UK
‘This book offers many practical case studies providing examples of various efforts in the university sector to support student wellbeing. For those legal educators interested in implementing practical measures to support their students, this book will offer many ideas both in terms of course design and the provision of student support services.’
– Liz Curran, Nottingham Trent University, UK
Contributors
Contributors include: Lydia Bleasdale, Max Broady, Georgina May Collins, Rita D’Alton-Harrison, Jenny Gibbons, Charlotte Guest, Liz Hardie, Laura Hughes-Gerber Emma Jones, James Johnston, Vicky Martin, Noel McGuirk, Rachael O’Connor, Francine Ryan, Rafael Savva, Iwi Ugiagbe-Green, David Yuratich
Contents
Contents:
1 Introduction to How to Offer Effective Wellbeing Support
to Law Students 1
Lydia Bleasdale
2 Navigating a student support leadership role as an early
career academic: supporting yourself to better support others 5
Rachael O’Connor
3 Looking back to look forward: scaffolding the student
support pathway for students through the eyes of an early
career legal academic 24
Laura Hughes-Gerber, Noel McGuirk, Rafael Savva
4 Pastoral support: student views 39
Georgina May Collins
5 Supporting law students: student support officers’ perspectives 59
Lydia Bleasdale, Max Broady, Charlotte Guest, James Johnston
6 Reflections on the influence of staff and student sex and
gender on the provision of pastoral support 74
Jenny Gibbons
7 How to offer effective pastoral support in a distance
learning institution 88
Liz Hardie, Francine Ryan
8 You see me, but can you hear me? Let’s talk about race 102
Iwi Ugiagbe-Green
9 Wellbeing in the classroom 120
Georgina May Collins, Rita D’Alton-Harrison, David Yuratich
10 Integrating wellbeing into the law school curriculum 140
Emma Jones
11 Being a personal tutor in a diverse HE sector 157
Vicky Martin
1 Introduction to How to Offer Effective Wellbeing Support
to Law Students 1
Lydia Bleasdale
2 Navigating a student support leadership role as an early
career academic: supporting yourself to better support others 5
Rachael O’Connor
3 Looking back to look forward: scaffolding the student
support pathway for students through the eyes of an early
career legal academic 24
Laura Hughes-Gerber, Noel McGuirk, Rafael Savva
4 Pastoral support: student views 39
Georgina May Collins
5 Supporting law students: student support officers’ perspectives 59
Lydia Bleasdale, Max Broady, Charlotte Guest, James Johnston
6 Reflections on the influence of staff and student sex and
gender on the provision of pastoral support 74
Jenny Gibbons
7 How to offer effective pastoral support in a distance
learning institution 88
Liz Hardie, Francine Ryan
8 You see me, but can you hear me? Let’s talk about race 102
Iwi Ugiagbe-Green
9 Wellbeing in the classroom 120
Georgina May Collins, Rita D’Alton-Harrison, David Yuratich
10 Integrating wellbeing into the law school curriculum 140
Emma Jones
11 Being a personal tutor in a diverse HE sector 157
Vicky Martin
