During the three weeks since I last posted on this site, a colleague in Science Faculty has asked Tony Ryan what it is that I actually do.  I suggested to Tony that he might point his colleague to this blog.  But I also got to thinking that it probably isn't very clear to much of the University what the job of a Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Learning and Teaching actually is.  So here's my attempt at some clarification.

My overall responsibility is to facilitate the successful delivery of the University's teaching programmes - and in many ways the buck stops with me for any matter relating to these, or to the experience that students have of being taught at Sheffield.  Of course that task of facilitation is operationalsied through a number of supporting structures.  But before I get on to mention of them, one crucial aspect of my role is to seek to develop and maintain the University's overall vision of what its teaching actions should encompass, who we should be teaching, and what the outcomes should be.  This is the strategic level, and is exemplified in our overarching strategic papers on topics such as the Sheffield Graduate concept, on our Widening Participation strategy, on our International Strategy, and more recently on the role of teaching within our newly-defined Sheffield Academic concept.  These strategic positions have to be responsive to our circumstances, but they are not wholly inward-looking documents: there are crucial external audiences for them - for example at the Higher Education Funding Council, at the Office of Fair Access, and within the Russell Group. And I am frequently asked to explain to politicians, policy makers, local councillors and others interested in our work what is we are seeking to achieve.  It isn't enough to say we want to produce quality graduates: the obvious next question is 'how do you define quality?'

As  PVC I play a team role - not just within the University Executive Board, but in the learning and teaching area.  The team has different layers to it - the Faculty colleagues (particularly the Faculty Directors of Learning and Teaching) who operate the Uniiersity's structures in their area; professional service colleagues (in particular within Learning and Teaching Services, Student Services, the Library, Computing Services, and the Careers Service) who support student learning in countless and very significant ways.  These layers in the team consist of people who I generally know well and meet regularly.  But then there are those who actually deliver our teaching to our students, who in many cases I don't know and who don't know me.  But I ultimately hold the responsibility for making sure they can deliver their teaching in the best possible way - in accommodation that is fit for purpose, with a virtual learning environment (in our case MOLE) that adds value, within regulations that are clear and easy to interpret, and to students who are suitable to be studying on our programmes.  Senate can hold me to account on any of these matters, generally by questioning the reports that are presented to it from one of the University's major committees - the Learning and Teaching Committee.

That Committee actually has three sub-committees, and it may be easiest to explain aspects of my role by outlining each of these in turn.  Although these sub-committees each meet only 6 times per year, much of my day-to-day work lies in preparing and implementing ideas and actions that relate to matters that are the concern of these groups.
1. Admissions and Outreach Sub-Committee.  This sets the University's policies on who it is that we engage with amongst potential students, on the qualifications we accept (or don't accept!), and on wider aspects of outreach.  It is concerned with both undergraduate and postgraduate admissions, and a further very significant aspect of its work is concerned with the articulation arrangements that we have in place to admit students through specific routes.  Thus, for example, a major aspect of my role relates to the University's relationship with Sheffield International College, operating on North campus, and which at the start of this session brought in around a quarter of all our new overseas undergraduates and 11% of our overseas taught postgraduates.  Work through the Admissions and Outreach Sub-Committee also involves me in our arrangements for bursaries, and in many of our activities within Sheffield to raise aspirations amongst young people in schools.
2. Quality and Scrutiny Sub-Committee. This is the guardian of the University's regulatory structrue, which also has to fit in with national structures as laid down by the Quality Assurance Agency.  Its work has recently been enlarged by bringing in regulations for research degrees as well as all taught programmes.  A lot of the considerations here are very detailed, concerned with rthe exact interpretation of what we are seeking to do, but a lot of it is also very 'big picture.'  It is this sub-committee that receives the National Student Survey results and the results of other surveys. It is this sub-committee that oversees the increasing number of arrangements that we have for delivering programmes jointly or in partnership with other universities.
3. Enhancement and Strategy Sub-Committee.  This assists with the creation and monitoring of the strategies I talked about at the start.  But it also has responsibility for ensuring that we respond to student needs and to wider interests in our teaching programmes.  In particular it defines, monitors and supports the work of a variety of cross-University projects. Current examples include the work of University of Sheffield Enterprise, the work of Maths and Stats Help (MASH), CILASS, and our project on Inclusive Learning and Teaching that has been a great success in a number of departments.  This sub-committee also oversees the Senate Award scheme and various other aspects of reward for good teaching.

Beyond those areas, I also hold responsibility for providing academic liaison for the Department of Student Services and to the Library and CiCS.  This leads to a lot of fascinating work on a whole range of student-facing activities in the area of welfare, critical incident support, the development of new library services, and liaison over the introduction of major new IT systems (or the upgrade of exitsing systems) across the University.

But there is another aspect to my work, and that is that of all the PVCs I am the one who has the closest working relationships with the Officers of the Students' Union - in particular with the President, the Education Officer, the Welfare Officer, and the International Students' Officer.  Indeed I probably see the Education Officer at least once a week in some way.

Finally there are external roles.  I believe I am the second longest serving PVC for Learning and Teaching in the Russell Group (Mchael Worton at UCL has been in post longer than me).  All universities have PVCs for Learning and Teaching (and almost all also have them for research).  But much of the rest of our Sheffield structure is not directly reproduced elsewhere.  Consequently not everyone on UEB has external networks of colleagues in similar roles to draw on.  This means that the VC, the Registrar, the Director of Fiannce, the Director of HR, the Academic Secretary (through the Planning Officers group), and the PVCs for Learning and Teaching and for Research and Innovation have important information-gathering roles across the sector, through their external connectivity.

I am a member of two particular networks: one consisting of the Russell Group PVCs for Learning and Teaching (which meets twice a year but which does a lot on on-line business in between times); and the other the national network of PVCs run by the Higher Education Academy. In fact I am co-chair of this latter group (along with a colleague from the University of Surrey) and there is one of our biannual meetings coming up later this week.

Beyond that I have also been asked to serve on a number of task and finish groups for the Higher Education Funding Council for England, and perhaps because I wasn't too much of a disaster in those roles I was asked last year to join one of the Strategic Advisory Committees of HEFCE - that relating to teaching.  This gives me a seat close to the national centre of decision-making on many aspects of university policy.  It also results in increasing numbers of invitations to speak at various meetings and conferences - some of which I will report on in due course.

This is really only a shorthand version of what is a very interesting and varied portfolio - and I've not spoken at all about the tasks I take on across the University as a member of the Executive Board, or because I have developed some level of expertise through my 6 years (come 1 May) in a PVC role.  But I hope it fleshes out something of the role of my PVC-ship for those who have not previously understood it.  Perhpas it would be helpful if each day over the next week I provide a brief timetable of what I have been doing.