PASS: Making the most of peer support in the Department of Chemistry
Student experience 1 June 2020
Today we hear from three of our current second year PASS Leaders; Dukula, Jacob and Shauna. Together the three students, who are all studying on different programmes, have been leading sessions for thirteen first year students over the last academic year.
The chemistry PASS scheme is a scheme that, we feel, has been extremely beneficial. In the first year, when we were attending PASS, it gave us a sense of belonging within the department. It was a great tool to facilitate lectures with other students who had done the same content as us in previous years. The three of us decided to become PASS leaders and offer this same support to the first years. PASS has been a pleasure to teach, and we believe it is one of the most beneficial schemes at the University.
What is PASS?
PASS stands for Peer Assisted Study Support. It is led by students for students and aims to facilitate learning for first and second year pupils. PASS is a great opportunity to seek support by asking questions, listening to advice and learning from students in higher years who have very recently completed the same work as you. It is also a great for making friends in higher years, who you can come to if you ever need any support outside of PASS sessions.
How does PASS work?
PASS sessions are run for an hour every week and they are led by 2-3 PASS leaders. Each session is based around an activity or discussion. This is different from a lecture-based environment – and there are no right or wrong answers!
For our PASS group, we did entirely what our attendees wanted each week. They would inform us of what they would like to engage with in future sessions either through our Messenger chat or in person. We developed activities such as quizzes, practice questions and discussions around this. All our attendees also had access to an online platform, where they had around the clock access to practice questions, quizzes, course notes, interactive group discussions and more.
This was the first time an online platform was used in a PASS scheme at the university, and the engagement within it was excellent. We also offered support such as laboratory report writing help, CV/career guidance and much more.

What made you want to be a PASS Leader?
The three of us wanted to offer first year’s support, just as we received. The prospect of starting University can feel daunting, but PASS is an opportunity to meet with friendly faces and chat about University life, course content and any problems you might be facing. We also found that people who attended PASS felt more confident about course material, which is important. We three really believe that the PASS scheme does improve grades but also makes the transition to University that bit easier.
What do you enjoy most about being a PASS leader?
The most rewarding thing about PASS is seeing the difference that you are making to the first years that you lead. We all have a group chat and support each other through exam periods and university life. This helped us make good friends with our attendees and will continue to offer them advice and support if they should need it in their second year.
We three have been lucky enough to receive a nomination for the Most Outstanding Pass Leader Award across the University. We are very happy about this and feel blessed that our passees have nominated us for this! Our passees are thankful for PASS sessions and we are thankful for the opportunity to lead them.
What’s changing in PASS for 2020/21 onwards?
In the new academic year, the online platform we trialled, will be rolled out across the whole PASS scheme. This gives every student access to it. Our PASS group gave us fantastic feedback regarding this platform so we want other students to benefit too.
The PASS Scheme has developed a new website that can be accessed at https://chemistrypass.weebly.com/. This website has up to date information regarding any activities being held during the academic year. All PASS groups will also be able to use Blackboard’s virtual learning environment to run sessions online. Given the current challenges with COVID-19, this means PASS sessions can run even if we cannot meet in person.

What advice would you give to new students, to help them make the most out of PASS Sessions?
We think the comments from surveys we carried out in our PASS group are the best way to answer this:
“PASS was very helpful, going through how to do different questions we may not have thought about ourselves”
“PASS helped massively; I suspect it gained me roughly 15% more in the exam too!”
“PASS helped improve my results massively through the feedback given on attempted questions, discussions during PASS sessions and the encouragement our PASS Leaders give us each week. Thank you so much Dukula, Jacob and Shauna :)”
“Just wanted to say thank you for all your help, I got my exam results back today and I won’t lie, if I wasn’t in your PASS group, I probably wouldn’t have done so good. I know I thank you practically every day, but I really appreciate all your help”
“Thank you so much for all the help this semester, I don’t think I’d have done half as well without it”
As seen above, PASS sessions were helpful to the attendees academically. Aside from supporting their academic studies, through regular communication and information about different wellbeing activities, we supported our attendees to stay motivated and encouraged too!
We would say to make sure you use the help on offer. Please don’t be scared to ask any questions or go over certain topics. We want to make PASS sessions as beneficial as possible so if you are struggling with anything, let your PASS leaders know and they will support you as best they can.
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