Welcome to the Beyond Your Research Degree podcast from the University of Exeter Doctoral College! The podcast about careers and all the opportunities available to you... beyond your research degree!  In this episode we talk to Dr. Demelza Curnow, Quality Enhancement Manager for the QAA!

Music from https://filmmusic.io ’Cheery Monday’ by Kevin MacLeod (https://incompetech.com) License: CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses

Transcript

100:00:10,890 --> 00:00:23,850Hello and welcome to the Beyond Your Research Degree podcast by the University of Exeter Doctoral College.

200:00:23,850 --> 00:00:27,450Hello and welcome to the latest episode of Beyond Your Research Degree.

300:00:27,450 --> 00:00:28,890I'm your host, Kelly Preece

400:00:28,890 --> 00:00:39,330and today I am talking to Dr Demelza Curnow and Demelza works in one of those many sort of academic related jobs or academic related fields,

500:00:39,330 --> 00:00:46,020but this time at an organisation outside of academia called the quality assurance agency.

600:00:46,020 --> 00:00:51,720So Demelza, are you happy to introduce yourself? My name's Demelza Curnow

700:00:51,720 --> 00:00:56,610My Ph.D. was in mediaeval English.

800:00:56,610 --> 00:01:03,330The title of it was five case studies in the transmission of popular middle english birth romance

900:01:03,330 --> 00:01:07,830Possibly not the most catchy and as where I am now.

1000:01:07,830 --> 00:01:12,630I'm based in the far tip of Cornwall, down near Penzance in.

1100:01:12,630 --> 00:01:23,220a little village called Ludford and I came back to Cornwall pretty close on on finishing my Ph.D. and my

1200:01:23,220 --> 00:01:32,160work over the last 15 years or so has been in academic quality and standards and governance.

1300:01:32,160 --> 00:01:37,860That wasn't what I went into immediately after my Ph.D.

1400:01:37,860 --> 00:01:41,850And I can say more about that, if you'd like me to. Yeah, absolutely.

1500:01:41,850 --> 00:01:48,110So we will get on to kind of how how you got to academic quality and standards, definitely.

1600:01:48,110 --> 00:01:57,310But. So what was the initial transition you made or the first role that you did after you finished your Ph.D.?

1700:01:57,310 --> 00:02:01,420Well, I'm from a farming family, and I finished my Ph.D. realising this,

1800:02:01,420 --> 00:02:09,100I knew nothing about anything apart from farming and middle English, which is an unusual combination.

1900:02:09,100 --> 00:02:13,390And I guess one of the big differences is I'm conscious of between

2000:02:13,390 --> 00:02:22,570When I did my Ph.D. 20 years ago, when they're done now, is that all I did was my Ph.D.

2100:02:22,570 --> 00:02:29,650There was nothing around the edges in terms of employability and other skills.

2200:02:29,650 --> 00:02:34,900And also, I wasn't doing lots of teaching or doing the conference rounds either.

2300:02:34,900 --> 00:02:41,630Just specialising in my manuscripts. And then I suppose the first.

2400:02:41,630 --> 00:02:48,350What if you could quote a proper job that I had outside of family really was working at the cider

2500:02:48,350 --> 00:02:56,350farm up near Truro where I worked for about nine months as a tour guide and tractor driver

2600:02:56,350 --> 00:03:02,650And in some respects, I can actually trace my career journey from that point.

2700:03:02,650 --> 00:03:10,090And I think one of the the really important things it did for me was forced me to stand in front of people and speak,

2800:03:10,090 --> 00:03:13,720which was something that was complete anathema to me.

2900:03:13,720 --> 00:03:20,620And one of the reasons that I didn't want to go into an academic career, I never planned to go into an academic career.

3000:03:20,620 --> 00:03:27,490I was simply doing my Ph.D. for the sheer enjoyment of playing with mediaeval manuscripts.

3100:03:27,490 --> 00:03:33,820This was quite fortunate in many respects because at the time this, I was doing my my Ph.D.

3200:03:33,820 --> 00:03:40,240Many of the mediaeval departments around the country and universities were closing.

3300:03:40,240 --> 00:03:55,790And I suppose I also felt that I wanted to have complete flexibility about where I live, so the jobs were actually reducing in my area of specialism

3400:03:55,790 --> 00:04:03,500And I felt that where I was mattered more to me, perhaps, than what I did, and that was coupled with this idea as well,

3500:04:03,500 --> 00:04:08,660that I didn't feel that I was confident about standing up to lots of people and speaking,

3600:04:08,660 --> 00:04:14,330and maybe I wasn't entirely convinced by my credibility as a researcher, either.

3700:04:14,330 --> 00:04:18,350And I don't know how unusual that is in academia.

3800:04:18,350 --> 00:04:24,210I suspect not that unusual, really, and particularly perhaps not in the arts and humanities as well.

3900:04:24,210 --> 00:04:33,170It's not that unusual at all. I think the norm rather than the rule rather than the exception.

4000:04:33,170 --> 00:04:40,370So I think there's just some really interesting things in there about what drives us to make career choices.

4100:04:40,370 --> 00:04:47,120I mean, firstly, you know what you're saying about actually, I just really loved playing with mediaeval manuscript.

4200:04:47,120 --> 00:04:53,060I loved doing. The thing that I researched was about the goal of getting the Ph.D. was not an academic career,

4300:04:53,060 --> 00:04:57,290and we do make the assumption that that's what people are kind of aiming for when they do a Ph.D.

4400:04:57,290 --> 00:05:05,150And that's by no means always the case. But also that our career decisions are also driven by.

4500:05:05,150 --> 00:05:14,340Geography. You know, where in the country may we may want or need to be for various different reasons.

4600:05:14,340 --> 00:05:18,050It was primarily for family reasons, really.

4700:05:18,050 --> 00:05:27,770Yes, this is the kind of geography and needing to be. Locally and yeah, and I think the other thing is also.

4800:05:27,770 --> 00:05:38,950You know, sometimes that is the priority. All our lives outside of our work are the priority rather than necessarily what you end up doing.

4900:05:38,950 --> 00:05:42,990And they're important factors to consider when making career decisions.

5000:05:42,990 --> 00:05:51,770You know, we don't think enough about our lives and what we want out of our lives and how our jobs or careers might fit into that.

5100:05:51,770 --> 00:06:01,490So kind of having finished the PhD and doing a kind of a range of different things, forcing yourself into decent public speaking.

5200:06:01,490 --> 00:06:11,540Going back to your roots a little bit and. How did you go from there to where you are now?

5300:06:11,540 --> 00:06:20,480Well, my work at the cide fram being in the sort of tourism industry took me to working at Tate,

5400:06:20,480 --> 00:06:33,050and that's where I began to get much more experience around governance and in turn, that led to a job working in the Cornish branch of Sport England.

5500:06:33,050 --> 00:06:37,400And I suppose again, there I was, specialising in governance a little bit more.

5600:06:37,400 --> 00:06:47,750And I was also working around local partnerships, and it was some of that work and some of the skills I was picking up there,

5700:06:47,750 --> 00:06:53,840which led to me getting a position as a graduate trainee in the quality and standards

5800:06:53,840 --> 00:06:59,950team at what was then University College Falmouth and later became Falmouth University.

5900:06:59,950 --> 00:07:05,480I think one of the interesting things to me was that really by sheer chance,

6000:07:05,480 --> 00:07:10,760I ended up doing a lot of the accounts whilst I was working at that sports partnership.

6100:07:10,760 --> 00:07:15,110And certainly, that sort of maths was not my background at all.

6200:07:15,110 --> 00:07:23,390I did maths up to A-level, but certainly wouldn't consider myself someone who could work with accounts

6300:07:23,390 --> 00:07:32,350But in preparing the organisation's accounts for audit with the county council accountants.

6400:07:32,350 --> 00:07:40,750One of the things I noticed was that looking for anomalies in numbers wasn't so different to looking for anomalies,

6500:07:40,750 --> 00:07:49,750in words, in manuscripts, so I could see how I was transferring what I had done in my Ph.D. to quite a different situation.

6600:07:49,750 --> 00:07:54,760And I remember picking out that example when I was being interviewed for my

6700:07:54,760 --> 00:08:00,040graduate traineeship and that that graduate traineeship was only a 12 month post

6800:08:00,040 --> 00:08:09,460And I think that something which did characterise all my early posts, I was applying for jobs which simply interested me.

6900:08:09,460 --> 00:08:14,110I was in a very, very fortunate position because I was living at home.

7000:08:14,110 --> 00:08:18,970So and I always knew that if the worst came to the worst, I could go to work on the farm.

7100:08:18,970 --> 00:08:25,960So I wasn't going to get bored, but I just I just looked for jobs where I thought I could give it a decent stab.

7200:08:25,960 --> 00:08:35,530I could argue my case and I thought I'd enjoy it, and it didn't bother me at all to be applying for short term posts

7300:08:35,530 --> 00:08:41,530So my very first job at the cider farm was a seasonal one, but they kept me on.

7400:08:41,530 --> 00:08:47,560My next one at Tate was a maternity cover and I think maternity cover I saw absolutely brilliant.

7500:08:47,560 --> 00:08:57,970But giving you experience in a role which might not look natural, fit that if you can argue a case, people will often take a chance on you.

7600:08:57,970 --> 00:09:03,110It gets you some interesting experience and very often it opens up more doors.

7700:09:03,110 --> 00:09:08,420After that, it's another fixed term post than it was at the 12 month post at Falmouth,

7800:09:08,420 --> 00:09:15,950and that then led to a permanent position, though, was that permanent position at Falmouth.

7900:09:15,950 --> 00:09:20,280Yes, it was it was in the same team, it was an assistant registrat post

8000:09:20,280 --> 00:09:25,130NSo I think it's really interesting how kind of.

8100:09:25,130 --> 00:09:36,610Taking a circuitous route kind of back into an academic related role and actually going through kind of tourism and that experience kind of.

8200:09:36,610 --> 00:09:39,850Working on a farm and kind of coming coming at it through that perspective,

8300:09:39,850 --> 00:09:44,170you develop the whole range of skills applied a whole range of skills in different contexts,

8400:09:44,170 --> 00:09:51,760like you were saying about kind of finding anomalies in language and finding anomalies in in in numbers isn't actually

8500:09:51,760 --> 00:10:04,150necessarily always that different and kind of that bringing you back round into into quality and standards within a university.

8600:10:04,150 --> 00:10:13,560When you got the job at Falmouth, were you motivated to to kind of go back to working in an education or university setting?

8700:10:13,560 --> 00:10:24,490Or was that just like you say, you were kind of just following following a role that looked interesting and an opportunity that looked interesting.

8800:10:24,490 --> 00:10:32,530I think always in the back of my mind have been at my viva for my Ph.D., my external examiner,

8900:10:32,530 --> 00:10:37,840who's asking me about my future ambition and whether or not I intended to be an academic.

9000:10:37,840 --> 00:10:43,410And I was very clear then that that, no, that wasn't my intention at all.

9100:10:43,410 --> 00:10:49,890And he suggested to me that I should look at going into university administration.

9200:10:49,890 --> 00:10:54,810And he was saying at that point that it's often very,

9300:10:54,810 --> 00:11:00,780very valuable to have somebody who has got a little bit more experience of being on the academic

9400:11:00,780 --> 00:11:10,200side than working on the administrative side because there is a different sort of understanding.

9500:11:10,200 --> 00:11:16,290I think up to a point, he's right. I would also say that within quality and standards,

9600:11:16,290 --> 00:11:24,450possibly the best person I've ever had working is somebody who had no higher education experience, so she hadn't done a degree.

9700:11:24,450 --> 00:11:33,470So I don't think it is necessary, but it has certainly really helped me, I think, to sometimes give me a credibility.

9800:11:33,470 --> 00:11:42,150I. But it is certainly altered how people have perceived me, and that has helped.

9900:11:42,150 --> 00:11:49,260I think that's really important. And like you say, the, you know, the value of actually having that experience and that contextual knowledge,

10000:11:49,260 --> 00:11:54,210whether or not whether or not that actually is always a necessity in practise,

10100:11:54,210 --> 00:12:01,500but certainly in applying for jobs, you know that being able to confer that kind of experience is really useful.

10200:12:01,500 --> 00:12:07,470And I wondered if you could tell us a bit more about the role that you're in now, please.

10300:12:07,470 --> 00:12:18,340You know what it is that you're doing. Yes, certainly, as as I say, I suppose my background has become academic quality and standards.

10400:12:18,340 --> 00:12:26,530So all of the policies and procedures and regulations that help a higher education provider demonstrate to a third

10500:12:26,530 --> 00:12:34,600party in the external world that the degrees and the education they're offering are at the level they should be.

10600:12:34,600 --> 00:12:40,810And then governance, which is very much around and how you're managing that internally.

10700:12:40,810 --> 00:12:47,030So I worked my way through a few different universities.

10800:12:47,030 --> 00:12:54,860And I was involved a little bit with the QAA, which is the quality assurance agency for higher education.

10900:12:54,860 --> 00:13:05,120And this is the body that sits between the regulatory and funding bodies for each of the four UK jurisdictions.

11000:13:05,120 --> 00:13:13,050And then the sector itself and the role that the QAA has taken over the years has varied a little.

11100:13:13,050 --> 00:13:20,520Say at the moment, if you look across the four UK nations, there's the Office for Students in England.

11200:13:20,520 --> 00:13:26,350There's the Scottish Funding Council in Scotland, the Higher Education Funding Council for Wales in Wales.

11300:13:26,350 --> 00:13:29,520There, there's legislation going through to change that at the moment.

11400:13:29,520 --> 00:13:37,560And then there's the I think it's the Department for Education, perhaps for Environment in Northern Ireland.

11500:13:37,560 --> 00:13:42,630And so each of those bodies has a relationship with the QAA

11600:13:42,630 --> 00:13:50,400and the QAA then manages the oversight of higher education for people who aren't familiar with it.

11700:13:50,400 --> 00:13:55,950I suppose the best way to describe it is think a little bit about Ofsted in schools,

11800:13:55,950 --> 00:14:04,650but actually the oversight of quality and standards in higher education works on a slightly different footing to schools.

11900:14:04,650 --> 00:14:10,440I think we would describe it as a bit more mature and it's here with you instead.

12000:14:10,440 --> 00:14:21,030So many years ago, just sort of towards the end of my time at Falmouth, I applied to be one of the reviewers.

12100:14:21,030 --> 00:14:28,320So one of the people drawn from higher education providers around the country who would go into a team to visit another higher

12200:14:28,320 --> 00:14:38,640education provider and look at how they were managing their academic quality and standards and write a report and make a judgement.

12300:14:38,640 --> 00:14:46,140So I did that for them for a few years as I sort of moved between between different universities myself,

12400:14:46,140 --> 00:14:53,880and then I thought that I would sort of take maybe a year or two where I step back and

12500:14:53,880 --> 00:14:57,570think about what I wanted to do because the sector was changing quite a lot as well.

12600:14:57,570 --> 00:15:10,960At that point, say, I got a part time job working in university research administration, which was a little bit of a gap that I had in my portfolio.

12700:15:10,960 --> 00:15:17,250Maybe I'd always worked much more with with the taught provision and less with I with research students as well,

12800:15:17,250 --> 00:15:23,010how we manage research, but less with the sort of the pure research itself.

12900:15:23,010 --> 00:15:29,850And if I did want to step back into a career and the sort of academic registrar or even registrar and

13000:15:29,850 --> 00:15:37,310secretary then getting some experience more experience around research was going to be valuable to.

13100:15:37,310 --> 00:15:45,020And again, I was simply taking the approach of. And even if it wasn't, I'd enjoy myself in the meantime.

13200:15:45,020 --> 00:15:47,600So I picked up a part time job doing that.

13300:15:47,600 --> 00:15:56,720And then I suppose about four months later that QAA was advertising for something called flexible part timers.

13400:15:56,720 --> 00:16:00,320And I went for that job and I got that as well.

13500:16:00,320 --> 00:16:10,190So I've then been managing a substantive role as a research administrator alongside a flexible role with the QAA,

13600:16:10,190 --> 00:16:18,590and the flexible role is technically zero hours. In reality, there is enough work that I could be full time.

13700:16:18,590 --> 00:16:25,220But I'm a sort of a bit like being a minister without portfolio.

13800:16:25,220 --> 00:16:30,270I can lead all sorts of different projects. It just depends where the gap is.

13900:16:30,270 --> 00:16:41,030So I've been designing and leading professional development courses for people in the sector, for the area I've been.

14000:16:41,030 --> 00:16:48,030I'm currently leading the work around microcredentials and writing the microcredentials characteristic statement.

14100:16:48,030 --> 00:16:51,630And I've done quite a bit of international work as well, which I've really enjoyed.

14200:16:51,630 --> 00:16:59,820The only thing I cannot do is anything to do with quality assessment England and the designated quality body responsibilities.

14300:16:59,820 --> 00:17:02,760And that's because the Office for Students would see it as a conflict with my

14400:17:02,760 --> 00:17:07,350broader role and also the fact that I got a substantive role within a provider.

14500:17:07,350 --> 00:17:15,450In fact, that substantive role is coming to an end in the next week, and I'm going to be concentrating all my time within the QAA

14600:17:15,450 --> 00:17:24,180But again, I'm going to be balancing a flexible part time on FBT role with a point five role,

14700:17:24,180 --> 00:17:28,830which is in the Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland Europe division.

14800:17:28,830 --> 00:17:40,320So again, doing sort of institutional liaison and looking to develop that the new review method methods the Scottish higher education providers.

14900:17:40,320 --> 00:17:50,140Wow, thanks. That sounds absolutely, absolutely fascinating, and I'm yeah, I'm just continually, really, really.

15000:17:50,140 --> 00:17:57,070Really struck by the kind of the mantra you have about following your following your interest and doing

15100:17:57,070 --> 00:18:03,230doing the thing that feels right and looks interesting and kind of seeing where that goes because.

15200:18:03,230 --> 00:18:06,440I think we always feel like we need to right, we need to have the answer.

15300:18:06,440 --> 00:18:11,420Like even off even the first job after the PhD needs to be the answer that needs to be my career,

15400:18:11,420 --> 00:18:15,170my job, you know, as if it's a kind of final or an end point.

15500:18:15,170 --> 00:18:20,250And actually, you know, these things are constantly evolving.

15600:18:20,250 --> 00:18:26,870I wondered if you could say something for anybody that we've got listening, who is interested in?

15700:18:26,870 --> 00:18:36,530A role in kind of the QAA or quality and standards and and any in or, you know, in or outside a university.

15800:18:36,530 --> 00:18:42,710What advice would you give them about the kind of key skills that they need to develop the key experiences

15900:18:42,710 --> 00:18:50,660or just how having a Ph.D. or any other form of research might be useful for them in that context?

16000:18:50,660 --> 00:18:56,720If you've done the Ph.D., one of the things that you've had to learn is you've got to be flexible.

16100:18:56,720 --> 00:19:02,570You might have an idea on how you're going to get from A to B, but actually something could could change that.

16200:19:02,570 --> 00:19:03,750And I mean, in doing a PhD

16300:19:03,750 --> 00:19:11,090we do that all the time don't we it's just your research takes you down a different route or something you thought would work doesn't work,

16400:19:11,090 --> 00:19:12,740so you try something else.

16500:19:12,740 --> 00:19:22,880And I think one of the things that a Ph.D. really does is enables a level of reflection that you don't normally get sort of some of the lower levels.

16600:19:22,880 --> 00:19:28,910And I think being a reflective practitioner is really, really important.

16700:19:28,910 --> 00:19:33,620I remember one of the things I said to members of my staff is if something has gone wrong,

16800:19:33,620 --> 00:19:40,430we need to know why it's gone wrong, but not in a way that then sort of paralyses us so that we can't move forward.

16900:19:40,430 --> 00:19:45,260It's just it should be much more a question of right. That didn't happen, as I expected.

17000:19:45,260 --> 00:19:56,610Why is that actually was it better? Did we learn something that we can actually use for something else or should we do it that way in the future?

17100:19:56,610 --> 00:20:01,050So I guess that's one thing always being open to different ideas and being prepared to change

17200:20:01,050 --> 00:20:08,130direction and to listen to other people and that way of like sparking ideas of different people.

17300:20:08,130 --> 00:20:10,900And I guess the other thing is that.

17400:20:10,900 --> 00:20:19,740Doing a Ph.D. you've got you've got to be somebody who can stick at something even through the boring bits and get to the end.

17500:20:19,740 --> 00:20:23,290So I mean, certainly in arts and humanities, I know it's a little bit different in the sciences,

17600:20:23,290 --> 00:20:27,520but often you are you're applying for a project that somebody else has designed.

17700:20:27,520 --> 00:20:32,020But in arts and humanities, we're actually you're designing your own project as well.

17800:20:32,020 --> 00:20:38,710You're seeing something through from that sort of real conception right through to the final completion.

17900:20:38,710 --> 00:20:46,360So it gives you that real sort of stick ability, which I think is quite important to.

18000:20:46,360 --> 00:20:52,330Thank you so much to Demelza for sharing her knowledge and experience with us.

18100:20:52,330 --> 00:21:02,440And I think has made some really excellent, excellent points about the path and the journey of a career and the, you know,

18200:21:02,440 --> 00:21:16,340the first job you have outside of your research degree, whether it's an admin job or a postdoc or a teaching job or working on a cider farm and.

18300:21:16,340 --> 00:21:28,340That's not your career forever. These things shift and change and evolve, and it's been really interesting to hear how that's worked for Demelza.

18400:21:28,340 --> 00:21:44,189And that's it for this episode. Join us next time when we'll be talking to another researcher about their career beyond their research degree.