Kerry Ramsbotham

Biography

Kerry joined Keele University in 2020 and completed an LLM in Law and Society before embarking on her PhD where her work is at the intersection of law, social work and digital technologies.

Previously Kerry achieved a distinction for completing her MA in Social Work completing a dissertation exploring how resilience can be promoted through pathway planning for care leavers.  After completing her training, Kerry worked as a social worker in child protection working alongside vulnerable families typically facing crisis and upheaval. Before working as a social worker, Kerry achieved a LLB Hons and went on to represent both claimants and defendants in civil matters for more than ten years whilst working as a citizen advocate supporting older people, and people with learning disabilities and mental health issues facing social and legal matters. Kerry also volunteered for Choices Advocacy and HomeStart UK for several years.

Kerry recently completed the ITAD training course and now supports the delivery of modules in the Law School as a sessional teacher including Legal Essentials and European Law.

Beyond her PhD research, Kerry has assisted with several research projects exploring various aspects of social exclusion including arts-based interventions for offenders in secure criminal justice settings to improve rehabilitation outcomes: An evidence and gap map. (Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, current), UK Social Work Academic Research Excellence Framework Survey (2022), The State of Social Work Education Report Survey: Views of Social Work Academics (2021), Singing for people with Parkinson’s disease (Cochrane, 2019), Supporting parents with learning difficulties (Cochrane 2018), Neonatal knowledge exchange between the UK and Vietnam (2018), The impact of music on a range of conditions from neonatal to old age (2017), Views about service provision from the perspective of parents with disabled children (2016), Mental health across South East Kent (2015), Enablement for People with Dementia (2015), Cognitive assessments used to inform safe driving (2015), and Engagement related process factors in services for street connected children and young people in low and middle income countries: A thematic analysis. (The Campbell Collaboration 2014).

Research and scholarship

Currently, Kerry is a PhD candidate at the School of Law, Keele University, where her work is at the intersection of law, social work and digital technologies. Her PhD is supported by the ESRC NWSSDTP and explores how digital technology impacts contact arrangements for families with children and young people with experience of public and private law interventions. This research follows on from her LLM dissertation which explored digital contact from a child’s rights perspective.

Kerry is supervised by Dr Laura Higson-Bliss (lead) and Professor Alison Brammer.

Further information

Academic Membership: Socio-Legal Studies Association (SLSA)