By Beds SU
Monday, 9 November 2026
At Beds SU, we're here to represent students and make sure the University delivers on the support it promises. One of the ways we do that is by helping students understand their rights, including what they should expect from their Personal Academic Tutor (PAT). Knowing what support you're entitled to makes it easier to ask for it when you need it.
Over the course of 4 weeks (teaching weeks 3-6), Beds SU representatives spoke to 377 students about their awareness and understanding of the PAT system: thank you to every student who spoke to us during this time. Keep reading to find out what support you are entitled to, how many students knew their rights, and what we’re doing with the information you gave us.
A Personal Academic Tutor (PAT) is a member of academic staff whose job is to support you throughout your time at university. Most undergraduate and postgraduate students will be allocated a PAT within their first two weeks of starting their course. Apprentices do not have a named PAT, as they receive support through their apprenticeship coordinator instead. Nearly 30% of the students we spoke to from teaching week 3 onwards didn’t know or weren’t sure what a PAT was.
62% of students we spoke to said they understood the role of a PAT. If you need support, advice or simply don't know where to go with a problem, your PAT is a good place to start. They can help you understand university processes, discuss study-related concerns, support your wellbeing, talk through options such as mitigation, changing course or taking a break from study, and signpost you to specialist services when needed. You can hear more about this in our video interview below, with Kara Burgoyne from the University's Academy for Learning and Teaching Excellence.
It's also important to know what a PAT doesn't do. They are not counsellors, and they're not usually the right person for detailed questions about a particular unit, assessment or assignment. For those issues, you should normally contact your Unit Coordinator or Course Leader.
You should be told who your PAT is during induction, and you can also find their details in eVision (under ”My Studies”) and your course handbook. The University should remind students about PAT support at the start of each new semester or block. We suspect that this isn’t happening across the whole University as one third of students didn’t know they had a PAT or weren't sure when we spoke to them. Your elected representatives will be raising this area of concern with UoB.
If you don’t see a name in the Personal Academic Tutor section on eVision, please let us know using our online form BedsSU.co.uk/feedback and Beds SU will help you to get connected with a PAT.
New students should normally be invited to their first PAT meeting within the first two weeks of starting university. Returning students should have their first meeting within four weeks of returning to study, while students repeating a year or returning after a break should normally have a meeting within three weeks. We started surveying students in teaching week 3 so expected most students to have either met with PAT already or have received communication about an upcoming meeting; only 53% of students said they had received communication from their PAT when we spoke to them, another concern we'll be raising with UoB.
You should be offered at least three PAT meetings during each academic year. These may be online or in person, and some meetings may take place in groups rather than one-to-one.
Two in five of the students we spoke to (40%) said they didn’t know or weren't sure how to contact their PAT if they needed support. You can contact your PAT using the details available in eVision: searching their name in Outlook should provide you with their University email address. If they are away, their out-of-office message should tell you where to get alternative support.
You do not have to navigate University alone. Your PAT is there to help you succeed, and students have historically told us that they value the support of their PAT.
If you haven't been offered the support described above, or you're struggling to access your PAT, please let us know using our online form BedsSU.co.uk/feedback and Beds SU will help you to get connected with a PAT.
If you have met with your PAT, we’d love to hear your experiences too – what sort of things did you discuss or what did you find most useful? We share all feedback (anonymously) with the University to help inform developments in the student experience so it’s really useful to have examples of what went well to work with. Use our online feedback form, available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week: BedsSU.co.uk/feedback.
If you need independent advice about your rights as a student at anytime throughout your student journey, Beds SU is here to help: you can contact us at help@BedsSU.co.uk where a team member will get back to you in two working days.