#academicmentor

Abstract

Academic culture is not evenly accessed or experienced (Spurling, 1990; Mirza, 1995; Read, Archer and Leathwood, 2003; Semper and Blasco, 2018; UUK and NUS, 2019). This opinion piece will liken the author's previous academic mentor role to a translator of institutional culture. Within this role, the author sought to demystify the university experience by providing academic support and guidance to student mentees (Smith, 2014; Naismith and Livingstone, 2017). Mentoring students throughout the pre- and post-assessment phases prompted the author's consideration of several dilemmas (Stevenson, 2013; Scager et al., 2017). The significance of this essay lies in the framing of academic support in the era of access and participation plans (UUK and NUS, 2019; Department of Education, 2019; Office for Students, 2019). Though the title of the author's role may differ from other occupations engaged in learning development, the experiences and dilemmas remain the same (Hartley et al., 2011; Hilsdon, 2018).

Introduction

“Translation is not a matter of words only; it is a matter of making intelligible a whole culture"                                                                                                      (da Cunha, 2010)

The above quote epitomises the role of the academic mentor (AM); the AM essentially 'translates' the requirements of the institution to the student mentee. This essay will commence with a very broad discussion of the AM's translator role. This will be followed by an exploration of the AM's translation remit in the pre – and post-assessment phases. The pre-assessment phase refers to the AM's transfer of knowledge that enables students to complete assignments successfully. In contrast, the post-assessment phase refers to any activity after the submission of assignments. Looking at these phases provides an excellent vantage point to observe the AM's translation work. Subsequently, there will be a brief reflection on the dilemmas of the translator role. This essay is significant because it seeks to conceptualise the largely unresearched and under-theorised work of student-facing academic mentors (Naismith and Livingstone, 2017).

Academic Mentoring

In the literature, academic mentoring can refer to a staff-facing role in which experienced academics support the professional development of their less experienced colleagues (Budge, 2006; Sorcinelli and Yun, 2007; Darwin and Palmer, 2009; Carmel and Paul, 2015; Schmidt and Faber, 2016). It can also refer to 'peer mentoring' in which older students are charged with the responsibility of mentoring younger students in a bid to increase self-esteem and establish specific academic goals (Budge, 2006; Terrion and Leonard, 2007; Smith, 2014). However, in the context of this opinion piece, academic mentoring is a fusion of the approaches above. The academic mentor is an experienced and qualified member of the university's academic staff that imparts knowledge, provides support and offers guidance to a student protégé on academic matters (Naismith and Livingstone, 2017; Eby et al., 2013). Mentoring has become increasingly important in higher education (HE) to facilitate integration into the culture of an institution and is regarded as a pivotal support mechanism to the success of students outcomes (Naismith and Livingstone, 2017; Foster et al., 2015; Santora et al., 2013)

Due to the contextualised nature of academic mentoring, it is important to discuss how it was implemented in the author's previous mentoring role in a post-1992 London university (Naismith and Livingstone, 2017).  Though the concept of academic mentoring may inspire notions of a blend between pastoral and academic support, the author's previous role inclined towards the latter; activities were centred on providing students with support throughout the assessment process, whereas other departments serviced their pastoral needs. The author's previous role was situated within the learning development sector; in the sense that it was 'concerned with how students learn and how they make sense of academic conventions' (Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education, 2020; Hartley et al., 2011; Hilsdon, 2018). The scenarios of a typical learning developer's role envisioned by Hilsdon in the opening pages of his edited book faithfully depict the author's past mentoring role (Hartley et al., 2011).

The mentoring role was carried out in the 'access and participation' climate in which higher education providers (HEPs) were required by the Office for Students (OfS) to be more strategically focused in providing support to their students (Singh, 2011; Department of Education, 2019; Office for Students, 2019; Office for Students, 2020). Such a climate has made it difficult for HEPs to direct blame to poor schooling and broader social inequalities; 'disadvantaged students will always do less well in their degrees' (Office for Students, 2020). The new climate that HEIs must acclimate to insists that if students from disadvantaged backgrounds are given support, they can end up performing just as well as, if not better than, their more privileged counterparts (Office for Students, 2020; Gorard and Siddiqui, 2019). With this in view, the task of translation has become increasingly important.

Translation

Upon entry, many students who were traditionally excluded from higher education encounter an immense institution, shrouded in mystery (Read, Archer and Leathwood, 2003; Mirza, 1995; Grant, 1997).  AMs seek to demystify the university by providing academic support and guidance (Lee, 2013; Naismith and Livingstone, 2017). In a sense, the academic mentor 'translates' the demands of the institution to the student body. The author could do this because he was 'bilingual'; on the one hand, he was able to recall his' native language' of initial fears, anxieties and bewilderment, on the other hand, through years of learning and teaching in HEIs, the AM acquired the 'institutional language', which he imparted to his mentee (Naismith and Livingstone, 2017; Foster et al., 2015; Santora et al., 2013; Lee. 2013). This is not to say that translation was 'one way', regardless of the topic, each student brought their previous knowledge, beliefs and attitudes to the discussion, translation involved communication between both parties to co-construct meaning (Ritchie, 2015; Jones, 2018).

The author has employed the analogy of 'translation' as opposed to 'interpretation' because the former has the connotation of asynchronous text-based communication, while the latter implies synchronous speech-based interactions (O'Hagan and Ashworth, 2002). The translation work of AMs is primarily concerned with the interpretation of asynchronous text-based communication text (assessment guidelines, feedback, lecture notes and criterion assessment grids).  

Moreover, when the analogy of translation is used, the author refers to 'paraphrasing' or 'translation with latitude' (Weyland, 1999; Schulte and Biguenet, 1992). This is where the exact meaning is kept in view, but the conversation between the mentor and the mentee will focus much more on the 'meaning' of the requirements in which issues may be minimised, amplified or qualified. Such selective translation avoids placing the full weight of the institution on the student's shoulders. A full translation may overwhelm the student; instead, what is needed is a prioritised and skilful rendering of the requirements (Weyland, 1999; Schulte and Biguenet, 1992).

'Paraphrasing' is in contrast to 'metaphrasing' or 'word for word' translation (Weyland, 1999; Schulte and Biguenet, 1992). Metaphrasing is not an effective approach for the AM.  It does not enrich students with any new understanding; the mentor merely duplicates what initially confused the students. Also, metaphrasing does not allow us to read between the lines to reveal the 'hidden curriculum' (Rowntree, 1987; Cotton, Winter and Bailey, 2013; Boud, 1995). The term 'hidden curriculum' is widely-used but covers a broad range of definitions; in the context of this essay, I will use it to describe the 'shadowy, ill-defined and amorphous nature of that which is implicit and embedded in educational experiences in contrast with the formal statements about curricula and the surface features of educational interaction' (Sambell & McDowell, 1998, p391 - 392; Cotton, Winter and Bailey, 2013). This 'shadowy' world is most recognisable in the pre- and post-assessment phases (Rowntree, 1987; Cotton, Winter and Bailey, 2013; Boud, 1995). Thus, the subsequent section will focus on these two aspects.

Pre – Assessment Translation

The first aspect of translation refers to AMs preparing students, in group and one-one sessions, for an upcoming assessment. The request for help is often prompted by a prior assessment that laid bare the students' misinterpretation of assessment guidelines. Commentators have observed that students tend to find assessment standards and criteria difficult to comprehend and that some aspects of their lecturers' expectations about assessment are difficult to articulate, hence 'hidden' (Orr, 2007; O'Donovan, Price, and Rust 2008; Lia and Hu, 2016). Many factors interrupt the transmission of assessment instruction; regarding the teaching staff, there may be issues with their pace of instruction, lack of scaffolding, minimal teaching experience, fluctuating assessment landscape, unfounded assumptions, lack of congruence between members of staff (O'Donovan, Price and Rust, 2004; Equality Challenge Unit and Higher Education Academy, 2016). Regarding the student body, absence, unfamiliarity with a particular writing genre and unawareness of the 'hidden' norms and conventions are cases in point (Higher Education Academy, 2013; Equality Challenge Unit and Higher Education Academy, 2016).  

Amid this communication breakdown, the AM intercedes to become a 'middle person' in the communication between teaching staff and the students. It must be noted that translating from the middle is not reflective of the critical pedagogy perspective in which presentation of seemingly neutral assessment requirements must be uncovered if they are to be critically addressed (Friere, 2017; Apple, 1990; Semper and Blasco, 2018). The motives of pre-assessment translation are far more modest; instead, it is merely a means to enunciate 'hidden' matters that are so taken for granted by lecturers that they are rarely given any attention (Gair and Mullins, 2001; Semper and Blasco, 2018). Even if lecturers had the desire to give such matters the attention they deserve, the transmission of implicit knowledge through continuous observation and practice is too resource-intensive and no longer viable given the reduction in resources and the growth of the student population (Li and Hu, 2016; Rust, Price, and O'Donovan 2003).

To bring these ideas to the fore, the author will provide their experience of pre-assessment translation, intersecting the experience with relevant commentary. Reacting to prior mediocre grades or the expectation of such, teaching staff would often request the services of an AM to 'walk' students through the assignment criteria in a classroom setting. This can be linked to broader notions of the 'culture of performativity' in which teaching is viewed as a response to a perceived deficit, which leads to short-term reactive responses; rather than 'proactive, thoughtful, research and disciplinary-based developments' (Jarvis, 2016).  While it may have been more fruitful to be part of a more thought-out intervention, whatever route allows learning developers to engage with the student body within a normalised space is an appreciated opportunity (McWilliams and Allan, 2014).  Once inside this space, the translation process begins by explicitly rejecting the 'transmission model' in favour of a 'dialogic model' (Li and Hu, 2016; Ajjawia and Boud, 2018).  This dialogic interaction was not a conversation but instead a guided and purposeful dialogue in which students and the author co-constructed meaning from exemplar assignments that met the assessment criteria (Li and Hu, 2016; Ajjawia and Boud, 2018).  Carefully placed prompts in the dialogue were established to give the translation process a more 'organic feel' that would lead to 'both stronger confidence and better performance in completing assignments' (Li and Hu, 2016, p2; Rust, Price, and O'Donovan 2003)

Post – Assessment Translation

The second aspect of translation involves the AM's translation of the teaching staff's written feedback.  Until the 1980s, very little research had been carried out to understand how students perceive tutors' written comments (Ziv, 1982; Sommers, 1982; Lee, 2013).  This is intriguing, given that this area of translation is significant because the lowest scores received by the National Student Survey (NSS) are often in the area of feedback (Higher Education Academy, 2013).  Students have experienced significant problems with understanding and addressing their feedback (Higher Education Academy, 2013). Correspondingly, staff were confounded by the lack of attention paid to feedback (Higher Education Academy, 2013).  Such a scenario is problematic because written feedback provides a 'mode of communication between the tutor and individual student that is unlikely or rarely likely to take place in the everyday classroom' (Lee, 2013, p. 11; Hyland and Hyland, 2001, p. 185).

Intersecting the experience of the author with relevant commentary, this piece turns its attention to the nature of post-assessment translation.  Students often requested a one-one appointment to make sense of their written feedback; in this regard, Sutton and Gill (2010) noted that deciphering feedback comments were described by students as akin to 'learning a foreign language' (Ajjawia and Boud, 2018).  Though a portion of the conversation involved a direct conversion of the teacher's comments to make them understandable to the student, a significant amount of 'latitude' was employed to foster the latter's self-regulation. The author needed to become 'creative' in this area, given that the majority of written feedback comments are at the level of task, in the sense that feedback was chiefly concerned with how well the task was performed or understood rather than fostering students' self-regulatory behaviours (Ajjawia and Boud, 2018; Arts, Jaspers, and Joosten-ten Brinke 2016; Lee, 2013; Glover and Brown 2006; Orsmond and Merry 2011; Hattie and Timperley 2007).  This was principally achieved by repurposing retrospective feedback ('You did not include the required introduction!') towards a 'feedforward' approach ('In future, it is good practice to include an introduction that gives the focus of the essay) (Higher Education Association, 2013; Lee, 2013).

Without such contextual translation in the pre- and post-assessment phases, even the most carefully worded guidance can hold little meaning for students (Maclellan, 2001; Hussey and Smith, 2002; O'Donovan, Price and Rust, 2004).

Dilemmas in Translation

There are four significant dilemmas that the author faced in his translation work. Differing from a 'problem' that can be solved, a 'dilemma' cannot be fully resolved without leaving some residue (Scager et al., 2017).  First, the quality of the author's translation was dependent on the quality of the teaching staff's instruction.  For example, it was not always possible to interpret feedback or assignment guidelines if they were poorly worded or provided minimal instruction (Lee, 2013). On occasion, this placed the author in a precarious situation in which he was faced with the choice of withholding support for a period or run the risk of providing erroneous translations.  This dilemma laid bare the problem of the academic staff not always being on the 'same page'. McWilliams and Alan's study (2014, p. 12) on embedding academic literacy skills saw this as 'one of the most challenging aspects of our work'.  

 A second dilemma is, are we socialising students away from their innate creativity towards a very narrow and rigid conception of a 'good student'?  On the one hand, it appeared to be a partnership; the discussions between a student and the author were framed by the needs of the former.  Also, the discussions appear to be a negotiation of meanings drawn from our knowledge and experiences.  However, this was counterbalanced by the push towards of conformity through the author's translation work; this notion is best explained by Lea and Street's educational research into student writing which uncovered three approaches: 'study skills'; 'academic socialisation'; and 'academic literacies' (Lea and Street, 1998; Lea and Street, 2006).  It would seem that the author's translation work did not move beyond the first two approaches; the transmission of a set of atomised skills that students must learn to 'fix' problems with their learning and the unquestioning induction of students into a new 'culture' of the academy (Lea and Street, 1998; Lea and Street, 2006). Inadvertently, both practices centre on how to get working-class students to write more like middle-class ones (Paris and Alim, 2014).  The author cannot confidently state that he was able to employ the third approach, 'academic literacies', in an explicit and sustained manner.   An academic literacies approach engages with what' counts' as knowledge by looking through the prism of meaning-making, identity, power and authority (Lillis et al., 2015; Lea, 2016). Such an approach invites students to read between the lines; instead of focusing on what disciplines 'are', there is an insistence on paying close attention to uncovering what disciplines actually 'do' and how they shape student's thinking (Lillis et al., 2015; Lea, 2016). Mirroring his fellow learning developers, the author's development activities were increasingly shaped by 'contingent approaches' that reflected local management priorities, constraining attempts to contest and expose meaning (Hartley et al., 2011).

The third dilemma involved the amount of translation that the author withheld or provided.  Throughout the translation process, the author had to remain conscious that he was not overly supporting the student to the detriment of their independent learning.  An essential component of enhancing self-efficacy is traversing through challenging periods.  Excessive support could hinder their journey of learning.  Studies have shown the need for students to face difficult challenges to stimulate learning (Noble and Childers, 2008; Weiss 2003; Scager et al., 2012).  Though teaching staff did offer opportunities to discuss assignment briefs and feedback, for many reasons, students did not always take advantage of these opportunities (Ramsden, 1992; Voss et al., 2007; Kandiko and Mawer 2013; Semper and Blasco, 2018).  As a result, the AM was increasingly accessed to translate assignment briefs and feedback. Faced with such demands, there remains a constant concern about what to withhold and what to provide.

The last and the most pertinent dilemma in the era of access and participation is the concern of whether my previous 'fire-fighting' role supported an institution that did not offer sufficient student support itself, but still accepted students whose educational experience could not adequately prepare them for the demands of higher education (Stevenson, 2011).  Was my role the equivalent of a 'bandage' placed on an ailing system?  As one of the few members of staff with a sole focus on supporting students, we could not faithfully meet the ever-growing demand of students that needed our support.  Yet, our services were heavily advertised to those inside and outside of the university.  Perusing through the university's prospectuses and access and participation plans of the last two years, you would be forgiven to believe that our impact and numbers were substantial.  However, upon entry to the university, you would soon discover that our services were severely limited.

 Conclusion

Following LeGrange (Jansen, 2019) who ended his chapter with a section titled 'some parting thoughts in lieu of a conclusion', the author does not 'really wish to conclude and sum up, rounding off the arguments so as to dump it in a nutshell for the reader'.  It is essential that discussions about how we view our work and the dilemmas that we encounter continue well beyond the closing words of this article.

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