Your KPA
The Keele Postgraduate Association is an independent body established by the Charter of the University in 1962; we are a postgraduate union and independent from the Students’ Union.
The Keele Research Association (as it was then known) started off its life in 1963 as a social bar mainly for lecturers in the basement of Keele Hall. Over the years the association identified the changing needs of its postgraduate members, and has attempted ever since to satisfy them. From what was originally focused on the social side of research at Keele, grew a committee composed of postgraduate students committed to representing graduate affairs within the University.
In 1994, the clubhouse moved location, from Keele Hall to its present site in Horwood Hall today and provides facilities for all postgraduates and research staff, with members of the Association being invited to sit on the relevant University committees.
You can find further information under the corresponding tabs about:
- news and updates (home)
- useful information (links)
- officers (committee)
- structures, governance and documents
Postgraduate student provision survey February 2013: report on the results
Key Findings at a glance
- 81.9% of respondents believed that the KPA should remain an independent body.
- We had 193 respondents to the survey, roughly 12% of the postgraduate community, and a greater number than those completing the ‘Your Keele’ survey in November 2012.
- 96.4% if respondents were aware that Keele has its own postgraduate students’ union.
- 7.4% of respondents believed that the KPA does not represent students well in its current form.
- 87% of respondents believed that KPA is important in promoting the sense of a postgraduate community at Keele.
- 89.6% believed that it is important to have a distinct space for postgraduate students at Keele to interact throughout the year.
- 90.4% of respondents feel comfortable approaching their supervisors/tutors with any aspect of their postgraduate student experience.
- There was a 2.1 ratio of PGR to PGT respondents.
- There was a 9.1 ratio of home/EU to overseas respondents
Introduction
This short report outlines the basic outcomes of the KPA student provision survey which was circulated in response to Keele University Council’s request that the KeeleSU and the KPA consider a merger of the two organizations, both registered charities in their own right. The survey was circulated via the postgraduate mailing list, and we have had 192 respondents to the survey, which is the highest proportion of postgraduate respondents to any survey in recent memory, and higher than the number responding to the ‘Your Keele’ survey in October/November 2012. This equates roughly to 12% of all postgraduate student community at Keele.
The survey quite openly intended to canvass postgraduate student opinion on the potential merger in the context of the role of the KPA, and its provision of service as a specialized union of students for postgraduates at Keele. The raw data is also posted on the KPA website, along with this report.
