Name : Symon Quy

Age : Firmly in the mid-life crisis zone.

Job : Senior lecturer in education at Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London. Small institutions require staff to wear many hats.

Mine are : teacher-training manager, BA lecturer and course leader of the Postgraduate Certificate in Teaching and Learning in Higher Education.

Salary : Not nearly enough to cover the vices, but we don't really do it for the money, do we?

Training : Moved to higher education after ten years as a secondary school teacher. Happily, my subject has allowed me to grow with it.

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Working hours : Surreal at times. My workload is outcome driven, so I get to organise my own schedule.

Number of students you teach/ staff you manage : I'm responsible for the learning of about 120 students a year. I also manage five colleagues, which is plenty.

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Biggest challenge this year : Freeing myself from teaching, managerial and administrative duties to complete the research project attached to my award in 2005 of a National Teaching Fellowship.

How you solved it : I'll tell you when I have.

Worst moment in university life : Dealing with a postgraduate who had plagiarised. The evidence was unequivocal and the outcome of the process was depressingly predictable.

What is your office like? My office is a portable cabin, but at least it's mine. Many colleagues have to share. At least I don't have to negotiate where the Barry Manilow poster goes.

What university facilities do you use? Being the English equivalent of what Americans would call a "sidewalk" university, we have fewer "facilities".

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Do you socialise with people at the university? Yes, although work does get in the way.

Who are the most difficult people you deal with professionally? Ofsted inspectors. I try to play their deliveries with a straight bat, but usually end up being clean bowled.

Best excuses for bad behaviour you have heard : From a teacher being chased up on an appalling record of punctuality and attendance: "It's all I can do to get myself in to work - I have a school phobia, you know!"

Do you interact much with other parts of the university? Yes - a pleasant feature of smaller institutions is that most staff know each other well.

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