Faculty Education Manager

Joe Noteboom, Faculty Education Manager, The MAPS Faculty Office

I’ve just started a secondment as Faculty Education Manager in the MAPS Faculty Office. In this role, I’ll be working closely with the Faculty Head of Education and Student Experience and Vice Dean (Education), as well as other academic and professional services colleagues across the faculty and UCL, to support and enhance educational provision and the student experience across the Faculty of Mathematical and Physical Sciences.

Previously, I’d been working as the Joint Faculty Quality Assurance and Governance Officer since January 2018, supporting the Faculties of Arts and Humanities and Social and Historical Sciences, along with School of Slavonic and East European Studies, in the Joint Faculty Office. My role supported a wide range of functions related to education administration and governance, including servicing Joint Faculty learning and teaching committees, supporting various quality assurance and enhancement processes and coordinating faculty-level examinations procedures. I was also involved with student academic representation activities for the faculties, administering a small grants fund and coordinating selection processes for scholarship schemes, among other things.

Prior to coming to UCL, I worked as an English language teacher in several universities in Vietnam and Japan. I came to the UK to do an MA at the IOE focusing on higher education policy and practice, with a view to transitioning from teaching to a career in university policy and administration. During my time as a student, I started working as an intern in Academic Services, which, after returning from a visa-related absence from the UK, led to a permanent position as Policy Coordinator in the Academic Policy and Quality Assurance team, where I support central quality assurance processes including external examining, programme approval and Annual Student Experience Review. After a relatively short time in this role, I was offered an opportunity to apply for a short-term placement and then a secondment in the Joint Faculty Office, which led eventually to my current permanent position.

Since deciding to come to the UK and to UCL, my overall aim has been to learn as much as I can about teaching and learning in higher education in the broadest possible sense and to contribute to the valuable work that universities do educating students. Therefore, my priority has been to gain experience in as many areas related to teaching and learning as possible and to develop my administrative skills and competencies to enable me to take advantage of opportunities that suit my interests and values. My role in the Joint Faculty Office has been ideal in this regard, as supporting and coordinating the teaching and learning activities of 19 departments and liaising between departments and central services has provided a unique opportunity to understand and contribute to teaching and learning at UCL, while gaining a wide range of professional experience in a small team.

My advice to others in this area would be to take advantage of opportunities that present themselves and always be looking to learn something new. It’s important to have a sense of any gaps in your own experience, skills or knowledge and always to be on the look-out for opportunities to address those gaps, whether through formal learning, involvement in a project or a secondment - and when opportunities do present themselves, don’t be afraid to take chances!