Doreen du Boulay taught undergraduate and postgraduate subject courses

in Education and Applied Linguistics, study skills and skills for speci c sub-

jects at the universities of Aberdeen, Warwick and Sussex for longer than she

cares to remember – over twenty years. She taught students from a range of

backgrounds and with many different needs, and wrote the Sussex University

study skills web pages.

She was an assessor of pre-university courses for overseas students in

British universities for BALEAP (British Association of Lecturers in English

for Academic Purposes) for ten years, a consultant with the British Council

for training courses in Algeria, Poland and Zambia and for Banque Indo-

Suez training courses in English for employees. She was seconded by the

University of Aberdeen to work in local oil and gas companies with their

overseas employees.

Having begun her career as an organisation and methods analyst, she

turned to secondary school teaching, rst in Zambia, then in Shropshire and

Scotland, before becoming a university teacher. She has always bene ted

from having several feet, centipede-like, in several camps – as a subject tutor,

skills tutor and course assessor, and working in industry – and has always

tried to pass on insights from this mixture of experience. She took early

retirement due to vision problems and now works freelance.