Staff Profile

Role and Responsibilities

As an Executive Support Administrator (Executive Support Team) in the School of Natural and Environmental Sciences I provide PA and administrative support to the Director of Research and Innovation, Director of Business, Innovation and Skills, Associate Director of Research (Research Culture), and Co-Director of Postgraduate Research.

I also provide administrative support for the School Research and Innovation Committee (SRC), School RA Committee and RA Network, and the External Advisory Board (EAB). Additionally, I assist the School Research Manager with Research Excellence Framework (REF) preparation, External Quality Assurance (EQA), Internal Quality Assurance (IQA), and other relevant tasks. I support the School’s Business, Innovation, and Skills, and Research Culture portfolios. Additionally, I am part of the planning committee for organising the School research symposiums, including the flagship SNESFest conference and SNESFestive Winter Symposium.

Education, Qualifications, Publications, Awards, and Achievements

I have a BA Honours degree in English Literature (First Class) and an MA in English Literature 1500-1900 (Distinction) from Newcastle University, for which I won the School Excellence Scholarship and the School Bursary Award. 

I am also a widely published and award-winning writer. My debut poetry collection is forthcoming with Broken Sleep Books in March 2025. My poetry has also been published or is forthcoming in various magazines, newspapers, and anthologies, including: The London Magazine, The New European, Wild Court, Poetry Salzburg Review, Stand, Southword, Shearsman, Prairie Fire, The Best New British and Irish Poets 2019-2021, Poetry Birmingham Literary Journal, Blackbox Manifold, The Honest Ulsterman, Iamb, Fly on the Wall Press Magazine, The Morning Star, Finished Creatures, Crannóg, Rewilding: An Ecopoetic Anthology, Newcastle University’s One Planet Anthology, Oxford University’s A Personal History of Home and A Tapestry of Homes anthologies, Amethyst Review, Ink Sweat & Tears, Streetcake Magazine, Riggwelter, Orbis, The Seventh Quarry, New Contrast, The Mechanics’ Institute Review, York Literary Review, Carousel, Bind, Abridged, Poetry Bus Magazine, Fenland Poetry Journal, Skylight 47, StepAway Magazine, The Lake, Visual Verse, Poetry Scotland, Poetry and Covid, The Wilfred Owen Association Journal, Selcouth Station, The Lickety-Split, Fragmented Voices, Confluence, Ropes Literary Journal, Spellbinder, Nightingale & Sparrow, Porridge, Osmosis Press, Full Mood Mag, Cardigan Press’s Byline Legacies anthology, Acid Bath Publishing’s The Worst Best Years: A Student Life Anthology, Travels & Tribulations: An Anthology, and A Pocket Anthology of Addiction and Recovery, Milk and Cake Press’s Dead of Winter II and Dead of Winter III anthologies, Creative Ireland’s 2022 Poetry Anthology Chasing Shadows, Black Bough Poetry, Fevers of the Mind, Bent Key Publishing's Ey Up Again anthology, The Wee Sparrow Poetry Press's Ourselves in Rivers and Oceans anthology, BFS Horizons, The Storms, and the Eat the Storms poetry podcast. I have also had an essay published in Pre-Raphaelite Society Review.

I won the Poetry Society’s Timothy Corsellis Young Critics Prize 2018, and my prose poem book review of Jay Bernard’s Surge was one of the winners of the Shortlist Book Review Competition 2020, held in celebration of the Dylan Thomas Prize by Swansea University. My prose poem book reviews were commended in the National Centre for Writing’s UEA New Forms Award 2021, and my poetry was recognised in Ellen Datlow’s The Best Horror of the Year, Volume 13. I was one of the winners of The Broken Spine’s Flash Fiction Competition. I was shortlisted for the Cinnamon Press Poetry Pamphlet Award 2022, Streetcake Experimental Writing Prize 2019, and the Terry Kelly Poetry Prize 2018, and longlisted for the Cinnamon Press Poetry Pamphlet Prize 2021. Two of my poems were also highly commended in the Newcastle Centre for the Literary Arts Water Poetry Competition. These poems were displayed at Northern Stage and projected onto Newcastle University’s Percy Building. I also contributed to New Writing North’s Dawn Chorus collective sound poem, which premiered at the Durham Book Festival. I am an Ilkley Literature Festival New Northern Poet 2023. Additionally, I was commissioned by the Ilkley Literature Festival, as one of their New Northern Poets 2022, to write and record a poem that premiered at the festival for National Poetry Day.

I am also a BBC New Creative; I was commissioned by New Creatives North, a talent development scheme supported by Arts Council England and BBC Arts and delivered by Tyneside Cinema, to produce an audio piece based on my poetic sequence The Stone Men of Newcastle, about the city’s statues. The audio piece has been broadcast on BBC platforms, including BBC Sounds and BBC Introducing Arts with Huw Stephens on BBC Radio 6 Music, and a poem from the sequence is to be featured as Poem of the Day by the National Poetry Library. The Stone of Newcastle was recognised at the Vice-Chancellor of Newcastle University’s Celebrating Success event in October 2022. My stage adaptation of The Stone Men of Newcastle was a Runner-Up for the Pomegranate Poetry Theatre Prize, and was performed by Théâtre Volière as part of the Poetry Plays Festival at the Cockpit Theatre.

I was awarded an Open Research Prize in 2023 for helping to improve SNES's Open Access practices and outcomes. I received a Spotlight Award for assisting a student in 2020, and received another in 2023 for my contribution to the Executive Support Team, support to the Director of Research and Associate Directors of Research, and organisation of the SNESFest 22 Symposium. I was shortlisted for a National Postdoc Conference 2023 Impact for Postdoc Careers Award for my work supporting RAs in SNES.

Conferences

SNESFest 24 Symposium, School of Natural and Environmental Sciences, Frederick Douglass Centre, 14/5/24 (planning committee member)

SNESFestive 23 Symposium, School of Natural and Environmental Sciences, Frederick Douglass Centre, 7/12/23 (organiser)

Fera Science Conference 2023, Fera Science/School of Natural and Environmental Sciences, York Biotech Campus, 8/11/23-9/11/23 (Newcastle University delegation organiser)

'An Administrative Perspective on Supporting Research', Researchers Empowering Newcastle University (RENU), The Researcher Network, Herschel Building, 21/8/23-22/8/23 (speaker)

SNESFest 23 Symposium, School of Natural and Environmental Sciences, Frederick Douglass Centre, 8/6/23 (organiser)

'Internationalisation, Industry, and Innovation - the How, Why, Who, and What of Collaborations', SNES Spring Research Symposium 2023, School of Natural and Environmental Sciences, Frederick Douglass Centre, 31/3/23 (organiser)

'International Symposium - Network Science: Applications for Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security', School of Natural and Environmental Sciences/The Royal Society, Old Library Building, 26/1/23-27/1/23 (co-organiser)

SNES Winter Symposium 2022, School of Natural and Environmental Sciences, Herschel Building,16/12/22 (organiser)

'Creating a Better Future: Forward Thinking for the Whole Food System', Fera Science Symposium 2022/SNES Autumn Symposium 2022, Fera Science/School of Natural and Environmental Sciences, York Biotech Campus, 8/11/22-9/11/22 (Newcastle University delegation organiser)

SNESFest 22 Symposium, School of Natural and Environmental Sciences, Frederick Douglass Centre, 30/6/22 (organiser)

SNES Spring Research Symposium 2022, School of Natural and Environmental Sciences, online, 7/4/22 (organiser)

Taskforces and Community Groups/Networks

SNES Postgraduates Who Teach Taskforce, August 2023-January 2024 (taskforce secretary)

SNES SharePoint/Intranet Taskforce, October 2022-January 2023 (Research and Business Innovation lead, Finance and Research Finance lead, Executive Support co-lead)

Research Culture Community Action Group (member)

The Researcher Network (member)

Previous Employment and Voluntary Work 

Before joining SNES, I worked as a Clerical Assistant and Receptionist for the School of History, Classics and Archaeology for over three years; during this time I assisted with a range of Learning and Teaching, Finance, and Operations related tasks.

Prior to working at Newcastle University, I worked at Fenwick on the Inventory Management Support team, first as a Data Migration administrator, then as a Data Support administrator.

I volunteered with the Wordsworth Trust to organise a Dorothy Wordsworth Exhibition hosted at Newcastle City Library.

I also worked for the university as a judge for the Newcastle Centre for the Literary Arts Belonging Poetry Competition.