Dr Ruth Richards

Role

Dr Ruth Richards is a Senior Lecturer in the Nottingham Institute of Education (NIoE) where she is the Course Leader for the Professional Doctorate in Education (EdD). She provides workshops to aid the skills of candidates to enable them to meet milestones and produce good quality thesis, alongside managing supervisory teams. Having had numerous successful completions, Ruth currently supports four doctoral candidates, two on the Prof Doc and two PhD routes. Ruth has recently been awarded the prestigious UKCGE Research Supervision Recognition (Full Award), formally acknowledging practice as a Recognised Doctoral Supervisor.

Ruth trains specialist Science teachers, lecturing on a variety of subjects and leading Biology Methodology and Core Science for her trainees on the Post Graduate Certificate of Education (PGCE) route into teaching, assessing and supporting trainees in Partnership School settings.

Ruth is passionate about supporting and enabling the progression of unqualified teachers who need recognition within their schools. She was the previous Course Leader for the Assessment Only QTS Route (AO) for both Primary and Secondary level teachers, assessing in a range of different subjects, supporting our local Partnership Schools.

A lot of Ruth’s work takes place in Partnership Schools where assessment of both PGCE and AO candidates takes place.

Ruth also has had extensive experience with public examinations and has worked for OCR examination board in a variety of roles since the late 1990s. These roles include: writing examination papers for Advanced level Geology; organisation of marking teams and QA of markers; coordinating the content and structure of both A level and AS papers. She has been involved in constructing the specifications and had input into discussions regarding the core content documents for the DfE and Ofqual. Continued engagement with such activities ensures that she remains ‘current’ with public examinations and more able to support her PGCE students.

Ruth has experience of school governance, volunteering as a governor a local primary school and a secondary special school in Loughborough, catering for pupils with ASD and Moderate Learning Difficulties.

Ruth has also worked as an external examiner for other PGCE and Courses.

Career overview

Ruth gained a BSc in Geology at the University of Hull, an MSc in Industrial Mineralogy and a PhD in Palaeontology at the University of Leicester. Following this, she trained as a secondary Science teacher, completing a PGCE at the University of Leicester and began teaching in schools in the Leicester area including Beauchamp College in Oadby, eventually becoming the Director of Science at John Cleveland College in Hinckley, with responsibility for the Specialist College Status.

Ruth joined Nottingham Trent University in 2009 as a Senior Lecturer where she has continued to develop her skills, firstly supporting new teachers on the PGCE course, able to advise on practice in English schools. She also began to supervise doctoral candidates, and this aspect has become more prevalent since taking on the role of Course Leader for the Prof Doc (EdD).

Continual engagement with working with external bodies, such as exam boards, has also formed an important part of her career. She is expert at exam paper writing at Advanced level, and is fully trained in all aspects of this work with OCR exam board. The Geology for A level and AS text book supports teaching across two examination boards (OCR and WJEC) and is used as an introductory text for undergraduate courses.

She holds a PGCHE (Distinction) and is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (FHEA).