Personal statement

Dr Gavin Rhoades is a Senior Lecturer and Partnership Leader within Bath Business School. Together with a team of link tutors and teaching fellows, he works closely with some of the university's biggest educational partners, offering training and support to ensure a high quality of provision.

Gavin has worked in education for twenty-six years. He started his career as a Secondary ICT teacher, becoming a Head of Department and Assistant Headteacher in schools in Staffordshire and Cumbria. In 2006 he moved into higher education teaching as Senior Lecturer and Pathway Leader for Secondary ICT teacher education at the University of Wolverhampton, including PGCE, Flexible PGCE, GTP and Teach First routes. In 2013 he consulted with the Department for Education about the development of teacher education for the new National Curriculum in Computing.

In 2014 he moved into Education Studies as Course Leader before becoming a cross faculty Principal Lecturer in 2019, leading university wide projects around the assessment of teaching, rubrics and online learning during the pandemic. Gavin was appointed Associate Dean for Foundation Year within one of the university's educational partners in 2021, and in 2024 he joined Bath Spa University as a Link Tutor, before becoming Partnership Leader in 2025.

Gavin completed his EdD in February 2025 where his thesis explored undergraduate students' conceptions of satisfaction. He has been published on an eclectic range of subjects including IT and Computing teacher training, online dialogic learning, Q-methodology, the history in loco parentis in higher education, Secondary students' aspirations to higher education, and mental health in digital lives.

Academic qualifications

  • BA (Hons) Information Systems and Law 2:1, Staffordshire University, 1995
  • Postgraduate Certificate Education [Secondary ICT & English] with QTS, Keele University, 1999
  • Postgraduate Certificate Education Management, Keele University, 2001
  • MA Education (Learning and Teaching) – Distinction, University of Wolverhampton, 2016
  • Professional Doctorate in Education (EdD), "Undergraduate students’ conceptions of satisfaction in higher education: a Q-methodology study", University of Wolverhampton, 2025.

Professional qualifications

  • Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, 2017
  • Qualified Teacher Status (Secondary), 1999.

Other external roles

  • External Examiner for Foundation Degree in Teaching and Learning, Northampton University, 2017 - 2020.

Teaching Specialism

  • Pedagogy & practice
  • Curriculum development
  • Assessment
  • Information technology.

Areas of expertise

  • Partnerships
  • Foundation year
  • Student satisfaction
  • Online dialogic learning
  • IT and data analysis
  • HE frameworks
  • Q-methodology.