Why choose a Personal Academic Consultant?

Most academic support focuses on grades or diagnoses. Catherine takes a whole-learner approach, looking at every factor that shapes learning. With expertise in teaching, Special Educational Needs, and educational research, Catherine creates personalised strategies that build confidence, independence, and lifelong learning skills, not just short-term exam success.

Who does Catherine work with?

• Secondary School Pupils: Every child deserves personalised strategies to help them become independent learners in school and beyond. Catherine works with 11-18 year oles across state, private, and international schools with or without a SEND diagnosis.

• College or University Students: Having embarked on post 16 or 18 courses, the academic demand and level of responsibility for learning can often be more challenging than anticipated. They can feel unprepared for this step up and their confidence and performance can begin to flounder and they lack the support they may have received in school. Sometimes a change of context can reveal obstacles which weren’t apparent in school. Catherine can help students understand their challenges with more clarity and work towards a more independent approach to learning which they can carry with them into their future careers.

• Adults:

  • Mature students or adults who have professions which require continued learning can benefit from an exploration of academic challenges and the most efficient, effective methods to overcome them to restore independence in their learning.

  • Adults receiving a diagnosis, such as Autism, ADHD or Dyslexia often lack the support to help them understand how this impacts their daily lives at home or in the workplace. Catherine is able to help adults understand their diagnosis clearly and consider how it impacts their lives and explore strategies to help ease some of the associated difficulties.

What happens in the first appointments?

• Free Initial Consultation to understand needs and goals, building a picture of their learning journey, concerns, strengths, motivations, and potential.

• Sessions: Catherine will begin by building as complete picture of learning before suggesting research-led strategies to explore. Subsequent sessions are designed to help learners understand how they learn and why they encounter specific obstacles. Together, you’ll explore habits which may help or hinder progress, fine-tune strategies for increasingly impactful outcomes, building independence, confidence, ownership and long-term progress.

How many sessions will learners need?

Support is designed to be short to mid-term, often across an academic term, though this varies by need. The number of sessions can be estimated after the first few sessions have taken place.

When & where are appointments available?

• Weekdays

• approx. 45 minutes per session

• Locations: home, school/college, work or online where appropriate

• In-person appointments: Available in the approximate locations of Weybridge, Woking, Cobham, Epsom, Walton-on-Thames, Dorking, Kingston, Surbiton and Wimbledon.

• Other locations will be considered individually if the learner lives or works outside these areas.

• Online appointments can also be arranged for the right learner contexts.

How is confidentiality & safeguarding managed?

Catherine holds a current enhanced DBS, registered on the UK Government update service (schools can check this directly).

Strict GDPR guidelines are followed. With consent & where it may be helpful, Catherine may liaise with other professionals (e.g., teachers, educational psychologists). Catherine is fully registered under the Data Protection Act.

In very rare cases, as with all professionals working with children, Catherine may need to break confidentiality if she believes a child is at risk of harm.