A look back at the day’s success
The 4th Annual Postgraduate Research Festival was held in Woolf College on Monday 23rd June 2014 and attended by postgraduate students from a variety of disciplines across all three Faculties.
The day began with an interesting talk from Prof. Alex Stevens on how Twitter can be used to raise the profile of ones research. This was followed by Dr. Jim Groombridge providing practical insight into how to win research funding; both talks provided valuable information for postgraduates that is bound to reap long-term benefit in their current and future academic careers.
Those in attendance were then able to network and chat whilst enjoying drinks and a buffet lunch, followed by a number of poster presentations.
Following on from lunch, attendees enjoyed a panel presentation led Prof. Bob Newport , Dr. Rebekah Higgitt, Nancy Gaffield and Sian Stevenson, on interdisciplinary approaches to public engagement, including the opportunity for a brief Q&A session at the end. This was followed by a series of eleven postgraduate Pecha Kuchas where students presented across a range of topics including the evolution of stars, equine influenza, assemblage in in artists cinema, and of course the winning presentation titled “We Fought Cancer…But Cancer’s Fighting Back” presented by Stephanie Ashenden (Photo: Bottom right). The Pecha Kucha styled presentations meant students had only 3min 20sec to present their topic. All presentations were innovative and an exciting opportunity to engage with research areas across a wide spectrum of academic subjects.
Following the Pecha Kuchaas, the rest of the poster viewings took place in three presenting rooms, one for each Faculty. The posters were of a very high-standard and they were all presented with enthusiasm and passion. The posters were assessed by Dr. Iain Mackenzie (Social Sciences), Dr Colin Johnson (Sciences) and Dr. Michael Hughes (Humanities), all of whom commented on the excellent quality of the posters, making it difficult to choose just one winner from each faculty. After much deliberation the poster awards were given to: Gail Austen-Price from SAC for her poster “Seeing is bee-lieving” (Photo: Top left), Rosemary Walters from School of English, for her poster “On the boarder: locating Charles Causley in 20th Century poetics” (Photo: Bottom left) and Natoya Jourdain from SMSAS for her poster “New Analytical Methods for Camera Trap Data”(Photo: Top right).
The Festival concluded with an Awards Ceremony presented by Dr. Colin Johnson (Sciences Faculty Director of Graduate Studies) where the poster and the Pecha Kucha winners each received a £100 gift voucher for Blackwells. The evening closed with a drinks reception and the chance to reflect upon the quality of talks, presentations and interactions of the day, and enjoy the company of fellow students and academics.