The Buddy Scheme is back for year 2025-26! By signing up to the scheme, you are paired with another practitioner in student engagement across institutions and students’ associations in Scotland, to give you the opportunity to discuss and have a sounding board external to your own institution.
Last year we had 5 pairs signed up, some of them returning from the previous year. Participants worked in 8 different institutions, split between 3 colleges, 3 universities and 2 tertiary institutions.
Buddies are asked to provide some feedback on the scheme at the end of the academic year and we are currently evaluating the 2024-25 intakes. In previous evaluations, participants reported they were able to meet at least three times in the academic year, both in person and online, with some suggesting it would be interesting to visit each other’s institutions to see how things run in a different organisation.
Topics discussed are not always pre-arranged and have spanned things such as recurring themes that they were dealing with, student engagement, course rep systems, elections and governance.
All buddies so far have found it was a positive experience that they would like to carry on going forward. For one participant, it was very valuable to have someone to talk to who is in a similar work position, as sometimes the role could feel a bit isolating.
The Buddy Scheme fits within sparqs resources for professional development for students’ associations academic co-ordinators. See our Induction guide for Academic Representation Co-ordinators, which is updated annually.
Sign up for 2025-26...
If you are interested in signing up this year, you can do so by completing this online registration form by Tuesday 30th September 2025.
For further details, or if you have any queries, please contact Amy Monks, Development Consultant - amy.monks@sparqs.ac.uk.
