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1. Upcoming Deadlines and Key Dates
1st March – Invoices issued to all TEIs (payment terms: 30 days)
7th March: Deadline: TEIs to submit APL Credits and supporting documentation for late entrants
7th March: Deadline: TEIs to submit Module Registration Data for quality assurance checks for late entrants
10th March: Deadline: TEIs to submit photographs and data for campus card production (late entrants
14th March: Deadline: CAMB Student Representative Election closes
14th March: Deadline for nominations for TEI Forum Chair
21st March: Deadline: TEIs to submit Common Awards Management Board (CAMB) Student Representative Election Results to Common Awards Team
21st March: Deadline: 2025 Seedcorn Grant applications
25th March: Common Awards announce results of CAMB Student Representative Elections
31st March: Deadline for TEIs to submit student email addresses for the Common Awards Student Survey)
7th April: TEIs to ask Common Awards students to send any feedback for the Management Board to the CAMB student representatives
2. Common Awards Webinars
Disability and Theology
Monday, April 28th at 2pm
Please use this link to join the webinar, which will be held on Microsoft Teams
The Common Awards team is delighted to host Dr Naomi Jacobs and Rev Dr Hannah Lewis for a webinar discussing Disability Justice and Theological Education.
Naomi Lawson Jacobs (they/them), who is disabled and neurodivergent, is the co-author of At the Gates: Disability, Justice and the Churches (Darton, Longman and Todd, 2022). Based on participatory research with disabled Christians, the book grew out of a PhD thesis in religious studies. Naomi is a research associate at Manchester Metropolitan University. They are currently editing a volume of disability theology written by disabled people, as well as co-editing a special issue of a disability studies journal on social-scientific research on religion and disability. Naomi is a trustee for Disability Rights UK and sits on the Church of England’s Neurodiversity Working Group.
Revd Dr Hannah Lewis is a Deaf priest, bilingual in BSL and English, currently working in Oxford diocese. She is also a freelance researcher, writer and presenter. Her PhD thesis was published as Deaf Liberation Theology (Ashgate, 2007) and she has published a number of journal articles and book chapters since then, most recently in Challenging Contextuality: Bibles and Biblical Scholarship in Context ed. Louise J. Lawrence, Peter-Ben Smit, Hannah M. Strommen, Charlene van der Walt (OUP, 2023).
The webinar will take place online on MSTeams on April 28th 2025 from 2 pm to 4 pm. This webinar will include breakout groups and group discussion. BSL interpretation will be available.
The webinar leaders would appreciate knowing any key questions or discussion points you would like to raise beforehand. Please feel free to email Anupama (anupama.m.ranawana@durham.ac.uk) with any questions you might like to raise.
If you would like to be placed in a BSL only breakout group, or have any accessibility needs, please email Anupama at the email address above.
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Making ‘Reasonable Adjustments’ for Disabled Students
A webinar with Dr Stephen Campbell, Leeds Trinity University
Wednesday 4th June, 2.00pm – 3.30pm
This webinar will provide a chance for TEI staff to learn more about ‘reasonable adjustments’, exploring how our teaching, assessment, and student support can be adapted to provide a better experience for disabled students.
Dr Campbell is the author of Supporting Disabled Students in Higher Education: The Reasonable Adjustments Handbook (Routledge, 2023), an excellent guide to creative and practical responses to the needs of students with a wide range of disabilities. The webinar will provide an opportunity to hear about his work, and then to discuss with him how it might apply in the TEI context.
The webinar is open to teaching and administrative staff at any TEI offering Common Awards programmes. It will be recorded, and the recording made available to TEI staff after the event.
3. Student Events
Building on and learning from the student conferences of 2024, the Durham University Common Awards team plans to host two identical Saturday/24-hour student conferences in 2025 on the topic of ‘How to use Artificial Intelligence well’
We will be holding one in the north and one in the south:
Sarum College, Salisbury: 14th/15th March 2025 *
Wilson Carlisle Centre (Church Army), Sheffield: 5th/6th September 2025
Canon Dr Gary Wilton has written to TEIs with further details of how to nominate students for these events.
Each TEI is invited to nominate two of their students to attend the most convenient venue/date. If you do not expect to take up one or both or your places, please would you let us know asap so that we can offer the unused places to other TEIs. Should we be oversubscribed we will accept the nominations on a first come first served basis.
*bookings have closed for the Sarum event but there are a very small number of places left - if you have not already sent a nomination and have someone interested in this event please contact the team ASAP
The purpose of the conference is to enable students to benefit from an inter-TEI learning experience on a contemporary and fast-developing topic. TEIs may nominate candidates studying for any Common Awards programme, and we hope that you will nominate the students who you believe will benefit most from the opportunity
Common Awards will meet all conference costs including accommodation and meals. Funding will also be available to help with travel costs where needed. Where a nominee needs help with travel costs please would you consult us about the reimbursement process in advance.
4. Annual Conference for Theological Educators 2025
The 2025 Annual Conference for Theological Educators will be taking place on 16-18 July, at College Court, Leicester. The theme of the conference will be: ‘Theological education and ministry among children / young people’
We will be in touch with further information and how to book your place in due course.
5. Student Representation: Elections
Candidates have come forward for student elections and each TEI individually should be holding an election process for students to vote on their chosen candidate. Following their election process, each TEI then provides the Common Awards Team with a list of all candidates who received votes in ranked order by 21st March 2025. Once ranked preferences have been received from each TEI, the Common Awards Team uses a Single Transferable Vote system to identify the candidates with the highest number of votes across all TEIs. Results will be announced on 25th March 2025.
6. Common Awards Student Survey 2025
The 2024/25 Common Awards Student Survey will run from Friday 11th April – Friday 30th May 2025. The survey will be entirely managed and analysed by Durham, with TEI-specific results shared with each TEI over the summer. The survey will be available to all students registered on Common Awards programmes in 2024/25.
Further information on providing the data required for the Survey will follow shortly.
7. TEI Invoices
All TEIs will receive invoices at the beginning of March. The invoices are based on a snapshot of student records data from 1st December; all changes communicated to us before 1st December will have been reflected in the invoices. Please note that payments are expected within 30 days.
If there are any questions or queries regarding invoices, please contact the team as soon as possible.
8. Boards of Examiners
The Overarching Board of Examiners have been provisionally set as September 2nd (Summer) and December 2nd (Winter), 2025.
We therefore ask that TEIs hold their own Board of Examiners no later than 6th August 2025 (Summer) and 3rd November 2025 (Winter). This allows the Common Awards Team enough time to process the data received from TEIs, and resolve any queries, before the Overarching Board of Examiners. Please note that the date for the Winter Board is one week earlier than usual, as per agreement at the January meeting of the Common Awards Management Board. Please do let us know if these dates present any problems for your TEI.
TEIs are reminded that they are very welcome to send a representative from their TEI Board of Examiners (normally the Chair) to the meetings of the overarching Board. Up to three TEI BoE representatives may attend each board. This can be a good way for TEIs to discover more about how the overarching Board works, and to see how we handle decisions about their students. The next meeting of the Board is due to be held online, on 2nd September 2025. Please contact the team if a representative from your TEI Board of Examiners wishes to attend this meeting.
9. TEI Forum and Election of Chair
TEI Forum members are reminded to please contact Lucy Dallas (Chair) directly with any agenda items for the next meeting, due to take place in early April 2025 (date TBC).
Election of Chairperson
The next meeting of the TEI Forum will be the last meeting that Revd Lucy Dallas will act as TEI Forum Chairperson. The Common Awards team would like to extend a huge thank you to Lucy for her role in re-shaping the forum, and for creating a collaborative space for members to share good practice, discuss important matters and enhance the Common Awards Scheme.
The Common Awards team will be facilitating a formal election to appoint a new Chair ahead of the next TEI Forum meeting. We would therefore like to invite TEI staff members who are interested in becoming Chair to complete a nomination form by 12pm (noon) Friday 14th March. The Chairperson may, but is not required to be, one of the two TEI Forum representatives to the Management Board.
More information and nomination forms have been sent to TEIs via Key Contacts, but you can also request one directly from the Common Awards team. Please also return completed forms to the Common Awards team (common.awards@durham.ac.uk).
10. Replacement Transcripts and Parchments
The cost for replacement transcripts and parchments in 2024/25 will remain at:
Transcripts - £12
Parchments - £35
If there are errors in documents, these changes will need to be made via Common Awards and the charge will be added to the next TEI invoice. If a student has lost their documents; they can order direct from the Online Document Store.
If you have students who have returned to top-up their award, please remind them to return parchments and transcripts as soon as possible to avoid delays in issuing new documents.
11. Further Information
The full 2024/2025 academic calendar is available here.
With thanks,
The Common Awards Team
