Ms Judith Francois

Contact

Email: judith.francois@sgul.kingston.ac.uk
Location: Kingston Hill
Faculty: Faculty of Health, Science, Social Care and Education
School: School of Nursing, Allied and Public Health

About

I am a Senior Lecturer with a particular focus on Leadership and Management. Current roles including teaching across a range of pre and post registration modules, including Foundation, Pre-registration and MSc programmes. I am Associate Dean for Access and Participation for the Joint Faculty of St Georges and Kingston Universities and also the lead for the Admissions for the Nursing Associate Foundation Degree.

I am an experienced clinician and have worked in a range of capacities with families and individuals within the community setting on improving health, including vulnerable and less engaged communities.

My academic focus is on leadership and I have a particular interest in creating a more diverse and inclusive curriculum, and have introduced some innovative teaching approaches including story telling and bespoke tools for developing personal resilience.

I have developed a number of bespoke Leadership courses for a number of organisations. Current work in this area includes an award winning successful partnership with a Mental Health Trust to improve the leadership profile of BAME staff in the organisation, which is currently generating interest from other providers.

I am proud to have received the Most Innovative Teacher of the Year award 2020 as well as awarded a National Teaching Fellow 2020

Academic responsibilities

Associate Dean for Access and Participation. Admissions Tutor Nursing Associate Foundation Degree.

Qualifications

National Teaching Fellow The Higher Education Academy
MSc Clincial Leadership and Management
PG Cert Learning and Teaching in Higher Education
Fellow The Higher Education Academy
PG Cert Public Health
BSc
Registered Nurse Teacher, Nursing and Midwifery Council

Teaching and learning

I have worked at Kingston University as a Senior Lecturer in the School of Nursing since 2010 and focus on the training of pre and post registration nurses, especially in relation to Leadership and Management. I have held a number of roles including Academic Zone Lead from 2012-2015 where my responsibilities included overseeing the quality of workplace placements accessed by students, to ensure learning opportunities offered met with the University and Nursing standards. This provided opportunities to build and sustain important external partnerships between those services and the university.

I held the role of Faculty Personal Tutor Lead from 2016 to 2018, focussing on maximising individual support for students and enhancing processes to support this. Since 2017 I have been Admissions Lead for the newly established Nursing Associate programme for apprentice nurses and UCAS applicants. The apprentice provision is one of the early adopters of course provision and in line with Kingston Teaching and Learning Strategy 2022/2023

I am especially interested in developing strategies that enable nurses to both express their individual learning needs, and to contextualise this into practice. This has involved in developing approaches that improve students and staff understanding of self in action, and the influence on reflection in enabling resilience. Enabling nurses and nursing students to gain skills in managing and understanding their own resilience, whilst also contending with the inevitable workplace, academic and life stresses, is a personal driver. Within the university setting I have employed a number of initiatives that have built on this theme, including the development of tools for students and personal tutors, that enable a focus on the coping mechanisms of students and the identification of managing self.

I have created more inclusive teaching through the provision of extracurricular interventions. Working collaboratively with a community storyteller to devise aa award winning programme for students from a BAME background, in order to bridge some of the cultural barriers in academia. Good practice acknowledged as a winner of the Kingston University Inclusive Curriculum Bursary 2017.

Undergraduate courses taught

Adult Nursing BSc (Hons)

Postgraduate courses taught

Research

I have a number of current collaborations

Examining the experiences of nurses out in practice during COVID. A first stage analysis of information has been completed and further in-depth research in this area is underway.

Review of the use of the ROOT tool as a means of enhancing resilience in nurses from a Black and Minority background has been completed and awaiting publications. Further work to develop this into an app in collaboration with kingston students is underway.

A recent paper examining the role of the researcher, managing discriminatory remarks, has received wide readership with some 600 views in the first four months of publication. Further work will be completed in providing training sessions in this area.

Publications

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Number of items: 17.

Article

Kulnik, S.T., Egbunike, J. and Francois, J. (2020) When values get in the way of conversations : reflections on dealing with discriminatory remarks and behaviours in qualitative interviewing. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 19, ISSN (online) 1609-4069

Francois, Judith (2020) Storytelling : tales to unlock attainment. Nursing Standard, 35(2), pp. 23-24. ISSN (print) 0029-6570

Francois, Judith (2004) Pictures of health. Community Practitioner, 77(7), pp. 249-250. ISSN (print) 1462-2815

Book

Gault, Iris, Shapcott, Jean, Luthi, Armin, Reid, Graeme and Francois, Judith [Contributor] (2017) Communication in nursing and healthcare : a guide for compassionate practice. London, U.K. : Sage. 177p. ISBN 9781412962315

Conference or Workshop Item

Ooms, Ann, Howard, Louise, Crighton, Elizabeth, Ryan, Nicola, Price, Jayne, Francois, Judith, Gale, Julia and Chandler, Karen (2022) Nursing students' experiences of their clinical placement during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United Kingdom. In: NETNEP 2022 : 8th International Nurse Education Conference : From Education to Impact : Transforming Nursing and Midwifery Education; 19-22 Oct 2022, Sitges, Spain. (Unpublished)

Ooms, Ann, Chandler, Karen, Chavrimootoo, Danielle, Crighton, Elizabeth, Francois, Judith, Gale, Julia, Howard, Louise, Inch, Jessica, Nash, Theresa, Price, Jayne and Ryan, Nicola (2020) Clinical placement experiences of nursing students during COVID-19. In: Kingston University Festival of Research; 29 Jun - 10 Jul 2020, Kingston, U.K. [Held online]. (Unpublished)

Francois, Judith (2018) Changing places : Personal Tutor experience of using a structured framework to enable student led dialogue. In: NACADA International Conference : Academic Success: Enhance, Encourage, and Empower!; 16-19 Jul 2018, Dublin, Ireland. (Unpublished)

Dundas, J., Francois, J. and Ooms, A. (2018) A pilot study to evaluate role play as a teaching method to update nursing mentors in practice. In: INTED2018 : 12th International Technology, Education and Development Conference; 05-07 Mar 2018, Valencia, Spain.

Francois, Judith and Brady, Dermot (2017) Feel the pain and do it anyway! : An experiential workshop teaching emotional management in crisis situations. In: Kingston University's Annual Festival of Learning 2017 : What Does Excellence Look Like?; 19 Jun 2017, Kingston, U.K.. (Unpublished)

Francois, Judith (2017) Armour for practice : increasing first placement resilience in student nurses. In: Nursing Education and Professional Development : The Global Perspective; 21-22 March 2017, Cardiff, U.K.. (Unpublished)

Francois, Judith, Collins, Mary and Callender, Daphne (2016) Bridging the gap from academia to first placement : What’s Bloom got to do with it? In: Education Day 2016 : Excellence in Higher Education; 09 Nov 2016, London, U.K.. (Unpublished)

Francois, Judith, Dundas, Jane and Ramkissoon, Sharma (2016) A partnership enterprise : scenario based learning for diverse nursing students working in a diverse community. In: HERAG Think Tank 3 : Creating Inclusive Learning and Teaching Communities : Reflection and Practice.; 20 Jun 2016, London, U.K.. (Unpublished)

Francois, Judith (2016) The implementation and evaluation of action learning sets for lecturers. In: NAEP2016 : Identity and Practice : Responses to Future Needs; 15 Apr 2016, Coventry, U.K.. (Unpublished)

Dundas, Jane, Francois, Judith [Collaborator] and Ooms, Ann [Collaborator] (2015) Evaluation of teaching and learning Leadership, Management and Teamwork skills through use of class debate. In: RCN Education Forum National Conference and Exhibition: Partners in Practice; 10-11 Mar 2015, Nottingham, U.K.. (Unpublished)

Francois, Judith, Dundas, Jane and Ooms, Ann (2014) The implementation and evaluation of personal statement and interview practice workshop for pre-registration nurses: a pilot study. In: 10th Faculty Conference 2014: Empowering Partnerships; 17 Jul 2014, Kingston, U.K.. (Unpublished)

Monograph

Yaakov, Atik, Benson, Anne, Conyngham, Gerald, Cox, Mandy, Francois, Judith, Hayes, Alison, Lees, Dave, Nash, Joy, Nash, Sue, Pearson, Jennifer, Rice, Matthew, Richardson, Maria, Vaughan, Paul, Whitby, Susan, Wilkinson, Ewan, Woolford, Phyllis, Benson, Anne [Editor] and Rice, Matthew [Editor] (2007) Developing and sustaining effective teams: getting started: an introduction and overview. (Project Report) London, U.K. : Royal College of Nursing. 90 p. ISBN 9781904114482

Scott, Catherine [Contributor], Vallely, Andrew [Contributor], Francois, Judith [Contributor], Hallums, Jamie [Contributor], Ajayi'Obe, Olayinka [Contributor] and Ibekwe, Priscilla [Contributor] (1999) Refugee health in Croydon. (Project Report) Croydon, U.K. : Directorate of Public Health Croydon Health Authority. 34 p.

This list was generated on Wed Sep 13 06:53:46 2023 BST.

Professional practice, knowledge exchange and impact

I have developed a number of Bespoke programmes for NHS Trusts. Specialising in improving the quality of services by advising on leadership strategies that can be employed. I have worked collaboratively with a Mental Health Trust to pioneer a BAME leadership programme for nursing staff working in a Mental Health Trust, aimed at addressing NHS priorities to increase the numbers of BAME staff in leadership positions. I have developed a teaching strategy by cross fertilising learning and recommended improvement measures to address the inequalities of BAME staff identified in the NHS with the recommendations of developing an inclusive curriculum of Higher Education. These teaching materials and curricula allows nurses to explore their own stories, how these stories are received by others and how to influence future stories. I use this as a platform to design bespoke activities to understand leadership presence and incorporated leadership embodiment through movement, the human voice, and art within the teaching programme. The programme has successfully increased the numbers of nurses achieving leadership positions, and introducing improvement programmes that have positively impacted on the quality of care.

The work has been recognised nationally and awarded runner up at Royal College of Nursing Innovation Awards July 2019. I co-presented the initiative at the NHS England and Improvement Recruitment and Retention awards 2019, further enhancing the audience reach and knowledge exchanged. It also has resulted in further commissions of the work, resulting in a South London and Maudsley Mental Health Trust also incorporating the programme.