Dr Samantha Birch
Programme Lead & Senior Lecturer in Health and Social Care
Biography
Dr Samantha Birch is Programme Lead and Senior Lecturer in Health and Social Care at Birmingham Newman University, where she oversees the development, validation and quality assurance of the undergraduate Health and Social Care BSc and the Top‑up degree.
Since joining Newman in 2019, she has played a central role in curriculum design, student recruitment, academic leadership and the enhancement of teaching and learning across the programme.
With over two decades of university teaching experience, Dr Birch leads modules across health promotion, health interventions and research methods, bringing extensive expertise in applied health research, physical activity and child health. Prior to her appointment at Newman, she spent 14 years as Lecturer and Senior Lecturer in Sport and Exercise Science at Coventry University and held earlier research and teaching roles at the University of Essex.
Dr Birch’s research focuses on health across the lifespan, with particular emphasis on children’s physical activity, fundamental movement skills, weight status and cardiac autonomic function. She has collaborated widely with schools, local authorities and commercial partners, including leading multiple research projects funded by Coventry City Council and acting as lead researcher for Coerver Coaching. Her work has been published in respected international journals such as the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, European Journal of Sport Science, Annals of Human Biology, Sports (Basel), Autonomic Neuroscience, and Preventive Medicine.
Publications
Her publications include studies examining:
- the relationship between physical fitness measures in young athletes;
- the impact of school‑based and movement‑skill interventions;
- influences of weight status and age on cardiac autonomic control in children;
- physical activity patterns among ethnically diverse and low‑income groups; and cross‑national comparisons of children’s ambulatory activity.
Dr Birch holds a PhD from the University of Essex, a BA (Joint Honours) from Newman University and a PGCertHE from Coventry University. She is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (SFHEA) and an active member of the Sport, Physical Activity and Health Research Centre and the School of Allied Health and Nursing Research Group at Birmingham Newman University. She is also a member of the British Association of Sport and Exercise Sciences (BASES) and has recently completed the AdvanceHE External Examiner training programme.
Her commitment to research‑informed teaching, inclusive practice and the development of high‑quality health education makes her an integral part of the academic community at Birmingham Newman.