Roberta Wooldridge Smith has been appointed as Warwick’s first Director of Student Opportunity, with effect from 1 March 2019.

About the role

Roberta will work across the whole University community and beyond, with an initial focus on developing our employability offer and embedding internationalisation and inclusion across the student lifecycle.

She will lead the new Division of Student Opportunity within the Education Group, which brings together Student Careers and Skills, and the International Students’ Office, to enable the alignment of our co-curricular opportunities.

Roberta says:

Having worked for a good number of years to support and develop students' academic experience at Warwick I am delighted to be moving into a role in which I shall lead our institutional strategy for enhancing students' co-curricular experience. I very much look forward to working with colleagues who feel as passionately as I do about ensuring that Warwick delivers the best possible opportunities to all of its students."

About Roberta

Roberta is currently Deputy Academic Registrar, leading the Teaching Quality team in the Education Group, a role focussing on matters relating to teaching, learning and the student experience. She has also acted as Assistant Secretary to the Senate and led on academic governance.

Previously she led the Academic Office, with responsibility for Examinations & Assessment, Teaching Quality, Student Funding & Finance, Student Records and acted as Secretary to the Graduate School.

In 2016 Roberta was involved in establishing the Warwick International Higher Education Academy (WIHEA), and in 2017 undertook a secondment as Acting Academic Registrar. Since joining Warwick in 1996 Roberta has also worked in a number of other departments including the Learning and Development Centre, HR, Deputy Registrar’s Office and Careers.

After Roberta moves to her new role, Katharine Gray will take up interim leadership of the Teaching Quality team as Acting Director of Education Policy & Quality.