About us
Contact us by email: bal-ast@port.ac.uk
Welcome to our students in the faculty of Business and Law at the University of Portsmouth
We are the Academic Skills Tutors for the faculty and work closely with your course teams to ensure you develop and improve the skills you need to complete your academic assessments. You will often see us in your lectures and seminars where we aim to give you targeted advice for the assessments that you will be working on throughout the academic year.
We provide workshops and seminars to support your academic writing (essays, reports, dissertations), help you to manage your time and workload, provide advice about effective revision and exam techniques, give tips on delivering presentations and support you when you are working in groups. We can also help you to use the feedback from your course teams more effectively.
We can also offer one-to-one or small group tutorials and are able to offer advice on your written assessments before they are submitted.
If you struggle with procrastination, finding a quiet space to work or giving yourself time out of a busy schedule to study, try a Study Huddle or Writing Retreat. You can find these, alongside our workshops and seminars on our events page.
Our resources page is full of handouts and videos that are created by us, for you so keep checking back for our tips and advice.
See you soon! The AST team
Claire Burrell
Level 4 Tutor & Team Leader
I joined the team with 10 years of experience teaching business and hospitality at a local college, having worked in industry for many years. I am the Academic Skills Tutor for first-year (Level 4) students and the AST Team Leader. I have a degree in Sociology, a PGCE, an MA in Education Studies and I am currently working towards a Doctorate in Education here at the University of Portsmouth.
Michelle Kane
Level 5 Tutor
Michelle has worked at the university for over 16 years as a faculty technician, working on academics' Moodle sites amongst other roles and duties within the university. Prior to this she worked in private industry. She graduated with a BA (Hons) in Leadership, Business and Management in 2020 as a mature student, studying a Foundation Degree and the top-up part-time before moving to a Academic Skills Tutor role as the Level 5 tutor in 2021.
Dr Lynn Lansbury
Level 6 Tutor
Lynn supports final year undergraduate students (Level 6) and specialises in final individual projects. She holds a first class degree in psychology, a postgraduate certificate in social research methods and a PhD in organisation studies and human resource management. Previously she was a principle investigator at the University of Southampton.
Dr Deborah Hicks- Clarke
Postgraduate Tutor
Deborah works with Kevin supporting Postgraduate students with their study skills. She holds a first degree in Sociology with Psychology, a PDip in HRM and a PhD in Organisational Behaviour (OB). She has worked in both the private and public sector in a variety of business, research and teaching roles and has spent the last decade teaching international MSc students.
Karen Findon
DA/PT/DL/Partner College Tutor
Karen has worked in a variety of businesses in the private and public sector and joined the University in 2007. She studied part-time for a degree in Leadership, Business & Management, a PGCHE , Level 7 Apprenticeship and her Teaching Fellowship. She is the Academic Skills Tutor looking after B&L Apprentices, Undergraduate part-time, Distance Learning and those studying at local, UoP partner Colleges.
Kevin Jacks
Postgraduate Tutor
Kevin had many years experience in research before becoming an Academic Skills Tutor, firstly with the Foundation Direct CETL and now in Business & Law. He is one of the two tutors assigned to look after our Postgraduate students. He has a BA (Hons) in Politics (winning the Student of the Year award) and a PGdip in Social Science Research Methods.