Richard Joiner
Professor of Educational Psychology
Richard’s application was led by his success in teaching quality and teaching innovation, overlapping with his published research on innovation in teaching. Richard’s profile is distinctive in its synergy between his passion for teaching, concern for students, and his research on the integration of technological advances in teaching environments. His present ambition to break new ground in developing students’ critical thinking by using digital technology is noteworthy.
Greg Maio, Head of Department for Psychology said:
Staff in the Department of Psychology were delighted by the news of Richard’s promotion to Professor of Educational Psychology. I greatly appreciate his dedication to the department and the university, which is inspirational to our team.
Emma Rich
Professor in Physical Activity and Health Pedagogy
Emma joined the university in 2010 as a Senior Lecturer, and was promoted to Professor in 2018 for both her research and teaching excellence. One of Emma’s key contributions to learning and teaching has been in the development of the use of technology in teaching through the Litebox project, and promotion and dissemination of this across the university. Examples of her research include partnership work with charities and schools aimed at reducing the development of eating disorders and poor mental health in children, and research exploring the impact of digital technologies on young people’s health and wellbeing.
Dr Fiona Gillison, Head of Department for Health said:
Emma’s work provides a great example of the beneficial the overlap between teaching and research, in Emma’s case focusing on both the advantages and drawbacks of using technology in what we do, and innovating in relation to how to use technology better.
Her work has great relevance given the rapid growth in digital technologies, and her promotion reflects how well Emma’s academic and public engagement activities have drawn attention to important issues and challenged people to think about these issues differently.
James Betts
Professor in Metabolic Physiology
James started as a Teaching Fellow at the University of Bath in 2005, following a PhD at Loughborough. James experienced his first large grant success in 2010 with a study funded from the BBSRC looking at the role of breakfast in population health; this was the first empirical study to scientifically investigate whether breakfast really is the most important meal of the day. He has also experienced success with his teaching, receiving the University's Mary Tasker Award for excellence in teaching in 2018, and was a long-serving admissions tutor for the BSc Sport & Exercise Science over 10 years.
Dr Fiona Gillison, Head of Department for Health said:
It has been encouraging for all the department to see James’ progression through the university, from his start as a teaching fellow shortly before completing his PhD, right through to promotion to professor in 2018.
Throughout this time he has brought a fantastic level of energy to his work, enthusing both undergraduate and postgraduate students with a spirit of enquiry and learning through his ongoing research activities, despite the many dawn starts this has involved. We look forward to his further leadership of the department’s growing research activities in nutrition and metabolism.
Jody Mason
Professor of Biochemistry
Jody’s interests are in proteins and how they interact with each other. He is particularly interested in very small proteins known as peptides, and his group focus on their ability to block protein-protein interactions implicated in disease, with both high affinity and selectivity. They do this by screening vast numbers of peptides within living cells to identify those capable of achieving these aims.
Through the course of his career Jody has received significant project grant funding from the Wellcome Trust, the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), Cancer Research UK, and Alzheimer’s Research UK.
More recently he has secured additional significant funding via industrial collaboration that seeks to utilise Jody’s existing and proprietary technologies to develop peptide-based therapeutics to previously ‘undruggable’ targets in high mortality cancers.
Jody is a core member of the BBSRC Research Committee D (Molecules, cells and industrial biotechnology) as well as a core member of the Grant Review Board for Alzheimer’s Research UK.
Professor David Tosh, Head of Department of Biology and Biochemistry, said:
Jody’s promotion from senior lecturer to Professor is richly deserved. He is a superb scientist and his research has significant potential to treat both cancer and neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson’s disease. Jody is a highly valued colleague and I very much look forward to seeing him develop his research in the future.